Yamaha OEM Heated Grips vs Oxford Heaterz Premium

[myKidsPwnedU]

I thought I would post my experience, having just removed the Yamaha OEM Heated Grips from my FZ-07 and replaced them with Oxford Heaterz Premium (Touring model, which are the same size, 120mm). 

 

Why? I had thought the Yamaha grips were good, riding around Los Angeles in the winter. Kept my hands comfortable on cold days.

 

Then, this week, I went to the mountains (around Bishop, CA). Riding with my brother in temperatures as low as 21F with Dainese winter gloves, the Yamaha grips were pretty useless. My hands and especially fingertips were freezing no matter what I did. He said his hands were also cold, but when I switched to his BMW R1200RT there was no comparison - there was about twice as much heat coming off his grips as mine sitting at a stop. I actually had to turn the heat on his down after a short time riding his bike, and he swapped back with me pretty quick after experiencing my pathetic grips!

 

Of course I could install hand guards too, but the point is the grips themselves didn't generate nearly as much heat as the BMW grips, and I was pretty sad about it. So, I read the glowing reviews of the Oxford grips on Revzilla and decided to swap them. It was painful having to pull out all the wiring and redo it, but now they are installed, the Oxford ones seem much hotter on full - can't keep hands on them with bare skin at 100%, but could do so with Yamaha grips. I am pretty optimistic that the Oxford ones will be comparable to the BMW ones.

 

BTW, I know the Yamaha grips have three power settings for different size bikes which you configure with a long press - I had it on big bike/max - that wasn't the problem. 

 

Once I was back where the weather was 45F and higher, I thought the Yamaha grips were quite good again.

 

So, if you ride with weather in the 40s and especially if you have hand guards, you may be very happy with the Yamaha grips. However, if your riding includes below freezing temperatures and you want warm hands, I would go for Oxford.

 

This is just my experience, but I wish I had read a review like this before I bought the Yamaha grips, especially since they were $120 compared to $89 for Oxford.

[mjh937]

My experience with the Yamaha grips is they are almost too hot on the high setting.  I usually use the medium setting and that seems to work well for me.  I have not ridden in below freezing temperatures but it I have ridden in the low 30's with no problems.