Motorcycle Recomendations

[Wanttohuntmore]

Anyone run a Rokon?

 

[Packin_packout]

Yeah...slow but it can crawl over anything. Choke is in the wrong place your leg hits it when transitioning from sitting to standing. Hitch mounted carrier drags worse than my mx hauler.

 

[Shraggs]

Fun thread, reminiscent of my youth crazy bike days! 125 Elsinore and my MR175.

Today, as I consider an electric bike I think the trail 70 refurb will be better.

4 dozen tickets in autos over the years, I’ll resist this thread!

 

[TheGDog]

Fun thread, reminiscent of my youth crazy bike days! 125 Elsinore and my MR175.

Today, as I consider an electric bike I think the trail 70 refurb will be better.

4 dozen tickets in autos over the years, I’ll resist this thread!

4 dozen tickets in autos?

Man... that's your tattle-tale that you ain't goin' fast enough!

Come on over to the dark side and go Moto!

Very very early one Sunday morning... I once drove from where Sepulveda Blvd crosses over the 101 Fwy in Hollywood... down the 5 Fwy... down the 55 Fwy.... exit Hamilton Ave... all the way over to where Hamilton Ave crosses Brookhurst.... and I did it in 25 minutes... reaching top speed of 170mph along the way.

 

[Shraggs]

Holy sh*t!

 

[Espo720]

I've gotta 250L myself and while it is heavy... its fuel injected and has racks. Thing starts in any weather everytime and I can pack stuff on the fender rack or they sell saddle bag racks as well. Get some better tires, I run Dunlop d606s, and you'll gain a lot more traction and control, the stock tires suck.

 

[TheGDog]

I've gotta 250L myself and while it is heavy... its fuel injected and has racks. Thing starts in any weather everytime and I can pack stuff on the fender rack or they sell saddle bag racks as well. Get some better tires, I run Dunlop d606s, and you'll gain a lot more traction and control, the stock tires suck.

What tires do the L's come with stock? Like the "Death-Wings" (Trail-Wings)?

 

[tony]

I'd love to have a Ural

 

[Espo720]

What tires do the L's come with stock? Like the "Death-Wings" (Trail-Wings)?

They come with IRC's that are more like 80% road and 20% offroad for DOT approval. They slide out in damn near everything that isn't pavement, once I put the Dunlops on that are wayy more aggressive it was a totally different bike. The weight doesn't feel so bad when your not sliding all over the place constantly.

 

[Downeaster]

If you go the TW200 route, wider pegs, a rear rack, skid plate, and a led headlight are great upgrades.
On the other hand, the front tire should go before any of those. It isnt called the "deathwing" for nothing. On anything loose in the turns, she wants to face plant you with a vengeance. Tried another upgraded tire that was highly spoken of and it was only slightly better. Changed to a Kenda 760 (Trackmaster as mentioned above), and i fell in love. Velcro in corners, rides up and out of ruts when you need it to, and is surprisingly just fine on roads (admittedly dont do too much of that anyhow).
After being constantly underwhelmed with the rear tire in anything even slightly greasy and steep, i recently switched to the Duro atv tire on the rear. Ill let the pics speak for themselves since it is untested as of yet. If the reviews and the sheer awe are right, i think im gonna love her
Stock tire in pic for reference

 

[a_noob_hunter]

I actually just sold my 2015 ktm 350 code. I was in the same boat about 4 years ago when i hunted southern Idaho. I had a Kawasaki klx250s and didnt have enough power. Ended up selling it and bought a KTM 35p XCF-W and loved it. It did everything i wanted that my KLX lacked, it was about 50 lb lighter and had twice the power. You can find them for anywhere $5k-$8k. I prefered the 2013-2015 models, before they updated and (slightly) restricted them in 2016. And it was titled as a motorcycle and so i got it plated and road it legally on backroads.

Sent from my LM-G850 using Tapatalk

 

[TheGDog]

If you go the TW200 route, wider pegs, a rear rack, skid plate, and a led headlight are great upgrades.
On the other hand, the front tire should go before any of those. It isnt called the "deathwing" for nothing. On anything loose in the turns, she wants to face plant you with a vengeance. Tried another upgraded tire that was highly spoken of and it was only slightly better. Changed to a Kenda 760 (Trackmaster as mentioned above), and i fell in love. Velcro in corners, rides up and out of ruts when you need it to, and is surprisingly just fine on roads (admittedly dont do too much of that anyhow).
After being constantly underwhelmed with the rear tire in anything even slightly greasy and steep, i recently switched to the Duro atv tire on the rear. Ill let the pics speak for themselves since it is untested as of yet. If the reviews and the sheer awe are right, i think im gonna love her
Stock tire in pic for reference

Dig it! That ATV Rear tire looks like that'll hook-up but good in the uber soft-stuff, and for straight-line traction in muddy snotty too.

My only concern would be braking within a lean on like some hardpack, with that tire. On a Quad you can get away with a more open knobby pattern like that because you've got the luxury of two tires working together and they don't really learn-over quite the same way motos do. So the shoulder lugs design requires a different approach to the tread layout, for these reasons.

But like I noted above... if it's like endless sand-washes, then sure, you'll probably love that tire for being able to hook-up in the deep sand like that. Just be kinda squirrely in hardpack or shale/rocky areas I'd think though.

If the terrain you're encountering has a lot of variance to it, such as in SoCal deserts. and if the riding location has enough more of the other less-soft types of terrains to it... you might not want such an open Mud/Sand type of tread design because it'll be more prone to chunking-off chunks of the edges of knobbies in rocky sections.

So riding Desert provides you with a unique challenge because you need a tough enough carcass and side-wall Ply-rating and close-enough spaced knobbies to resist the harsh affects of the lava/rocks/gravel sections you'll sometimes go bombin' along thru or clawing up thru on your way along the trail. Yet still have enough of an open tread pattern to them to not suck or feel dangerous when you need to ride within a sand wash for a ways. You go too geared for rocks and hardpack, your soft terrain and mud performance starts to suffer. So you have to pick a balancing act in finding that particular brand and model of tires that performs in your specific application. D606's are not bad. I think I liked the Pirelli MT21's possibly the most in dirt . Well.. the MT21 Rear I remember I liked the most, but it was a little more suspectible to pinch-flats from hammering whoops or rocks... and maybe the D606 front I'd say bit in and held a line a little more confidence inspiring in the softer stuff. The Pirelli same model for the front was maybe a little better in the softer stuff... but the D606's made you less nervous when you were traversing hard-pack sections. Neither of them do "well" on hard clay sections with some of that wet snotty surface-level mud covering them Exercise extreme caution in such sections, heck even ith offroad only tires on those sections! HA!

The one thing I never got the chance to try was mounting Trials Tires on a DualSport. Lotta guys swear buy them. But I can't imagine they'd do very well at all in a typical SoCal desert sandwash.

 

[Downeaster]

I'd tend to agree with you on the hard pack thought, but i thought the same about that 760 up front. Time will tell i guess. The sidewalls alone pretty much keep that wheel up, so I'll do a little testing on the air pressure in a day or two. Waiting on a new battery.

 

[Idaho_bow_hunter]

I ended up with a CRF250F and sold my CRF250L, So far I’m pleased. The 60lbs different is very noticeable and the F climbs better. I get some guys at work questioning why I didn’t get a bigger bike like a Husky or KTM, but so far it seems like a good choice for hunting and putting around the desert and mountains on. I put a LED headlight on it and plan to upgrade the suspension. Once the snow melts in the higher elevations I’ll start to explore and do some shed hunting. I’ll try to incorporate it into a black bear hunt this season as well. Im sure I’ll get judged by some for riding a beginner bike, but I’m a newbie and I’m fine with that.

 

[TheGDog]

Bullet proof engines they've been making since forever. Great choice for way back in there. You mentioned putting on LED on it, just make sure your stator has enough windings on it to produce enough output to run the LED as well. I imagine it should since LED hardware takes bunch less energy to run though.

Now to learn about the cheapie mods you can do to help it's performance. Hit up forums and see what's out there is terms of mods for performance improvement. Things like charcoal canister delete, possibly opening up breathing in top of airbox, things like that.

Now just make sure your toolkit has enough stuff in it to help you change a sprak plug, a chain-breaker and master link. Mini tires-spoons, and pump. And whatever allen wrenches you need to do most of the stuff on the bike.

Get familiar with how to remove the rear (or front) wheel.

And first thing you need to do right away?... is adjust the rear suspension sag for your weight! See manual.

 

[Coldtrail]

You'll be happy with your decision, buy for utility instead of status. I've been riding cycles for about 35yrs, if I'm headed into the backcountry for a park & walk mission my choice of ride is my wife's "beginner" 200 Suzuki, it's light, geared super low & loves going slow, doesn't burn much gas, easily hidden off the main trail & I can handle it about as good as a mountain bike.

Gotta remember we live in the USA and are masters at buying more than we need, people in 3rd world countries have been using "beginner" cycles for years as primary transportation & putting them through more abuse and maintenance neglect every day than 99% of American riders do in their entire lifetime and you don't see them upgrading.