Yamaha Xvs1300a Midnight Star Review

Used Buyer Review

The Midnight Star is Yamaha's answer to the cruiser question nobody was really asking — but damn if they didn't nail it anyway. That 1304cc V-twin pulls hard from basically nothing, with a fat midrange torque curve that makes highway overtaking genuinely satisfying rather than a white-knuckle gamble. The Star-branded bikes were built to last, and most examples you'll find have been babied by weekend warriors who bought them for the look and barely scraped past 10,000 miles. Used examples typically show up in good shape, but check the front forks for seal weeping and inspect the shaft drive output for any play — it's rare but expensive to fix. The riding position suits average-height riders perfectly, though anyone over six feet will feel cramped within an hour. Stock exhaust is aggressively quiet for a cruiser, so most used bikes have aftermarket pipes already fitted, which usually improves the soundtrack considerably without killing reliability.