The new steel horse... KTM 1.0

[sinuhexavier]

I guess I'll find out... For being my first time back on a bike in 9 years it felt great, I did get into way tighter singletrack than that and had a blast. The 950 was certainly slower but he made it through... Is it the best bike for it? probably not, but I wouldn't hesitate taking it on anything I've ridden my 400 on at this point and I can cruise at 80MPH on the highway.

[R_Lefebvre]

I'm talking about TIGHT woods and technical singletrack. Not gonna happen on a 640/950 unless you're just a total savage. I know I couldn't pilot my XR650R 1/2 the places we take our smaller woods bikes.

Yup. Nice looking trail BTW. Here's the type of place I ride a lot:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YebA6...e=channel_page

I've seen guys muscle some 500's through that stuff, but they aren't having as much fun.

[jesusgatos]

That looks amazing Rob. Gotta come get some of that. There was actually a guy on a KX500 on that ride with us, but he was pretty worked by the end of the day and that's still a MUCH lighter bike than any of the big 4-strokes. Sorry to take this thread off-topic. I don't think either of us were trying to say that you can't ride trails on that 640, there are just some places that I wouldn't want to take it (but I'd love to see you try - haha).

[R_Lefebvre]

And the Ganny is actually pretty "wide open" compared to some of the trails I've done. Usually during Hare Scrambles or Enduros there's some sections of "fresh" trails that are pretty crazy. I think most people would be faster on a 125 than a 250 or 450. Some of the guys setting them up are pretty masochistic. Trees closer than the handlebars.

[R_Lefebvre]

Jesus, I just looked at all the pictures in your post, pretty great ride you had. Reminds me of Calabogie I did last year. Peaks not as high, but lots of rock ridges and such. I noticed one of the guys in your group had what appears to be a trials tire on the back. How did that work out? It's something that enduro guys are experimenting with more, and I'm interested in trying it myself.

Did you get your bike fixed? I feel your pain. I took my front fork apart last week to address an oil seal leak, and discovered the cause of the problem. I dropped it hard on some rocks and dented the outter tube right where the fork seal sits, and scratched the steel tube. $1100 for new parts. Generally bikes are WAY cheaper than... any other form of motorsports. But sometimes replacement parts prices are way outta line. $1100 for a single fork tube, when the whole bike was only $6400.

[jesusgatos]

Oh yeah, that was a GREAT weekend. Lots of trail riders are rockin' trials tires and everybody seems to love 'em. I ended up selling that bike as a basketcase. The guy who bought it was stoked and I had already moved on. I was tired of the race-bike maintenance, but wanted a bike with a modern, motocross chassis and suspension. So I bought a late-model XR250 and a 2005 CRF450R with a blown-up engine. I'm going to stuff the XR250 engine into the CRF chassis. Should make a pretty rad trailbike. I'll have a full stable of XR's in my moto-trailer (XR50, XR100/CR80 bigwheel hybrid, XR250/CRF450 hybrid, and an XR650R).

What kind of bike are you riding? If it's a Honda, I've got a set of Showa parts-forks and could send you one outer tube.

[R_Lefebvre]

I have a 2006 WR250.

I think you had a WR as well? I'm surprised you had lots of "race bike maintenance" as mine as been reasonable. The Yamaha engine is much better than the Honda or Kawasaki in that regard. But I can see your point, I miss the days of my XT125 (Honda XL125S type bike). Drove it for 15 years without even knowing if it had an fork oil. I've had to do a bit of maintenance on the WR, chain, suspension bearings, fork seals, oil changes... but the most costly stuff is caused by the rocks.

A lot of guys miss the old XR250 and 400. And I almost bought a TT-R250 instead of this one. Would have if they'd been available new in 2006. My XT125 was a good bike, but the muffler rusted out and can't get replacement parts.

[sinuhexavier]

This week I had some downtime so I boogied out to Sedona to do some riding. I stopped in Prescott and picked up the bike. I had Scott drop it off at Star Island Motorsports the local KTM dealer. Their service department is hammered. I wanted them to fix the fork seals change out all the fluids and install a aux. fan. These guys choked, I got the bike back with an empty tank, they didn't bother telling me about a couple leaks or missing bolts on the radiator. So lame...

I spent the afternoon installing the Spoxworks 43 tooth rear sprocket, the 42's were all sold out. The KTM skid plate had also arrived so I bolted that on.

With the work done on the bike it was time to get over to Sedona. This was the farthest I'd ever ridden on pavement and was my first taste of "twisties"... The allure of a larger adventure tourer is clear...

The clouds were moving in but it seemed just a good a time as any to be among the people in one of our nations great National Monuments, Tuzigoot.

I met Steph in Sedona at the Amara Resort. We checked into our room and quickly found out Michael Jackson died... No mention of Farrah... She's getting a raw deal.

First thing in the morning I ran over to my good friend Dave Cichan's Fat Tire Bike Shop. He owns a bike shop, but secretly he is also a great moto mechanic, so he gave it a once over and made some tweaks.

Levi Leipheimer's old time trials bike, don't you love bike shop bathrooms?

[sinuhexavier]

I met Steph for lunch before she went for a hike up the West Fork of Oak Creek.

After the lemonade it was time for some throttle twisting... I am super familiar with Sedona from mountain biking, though I had never been on any of the "4WD" trails. I was riding solo, so no action shots...

My G10 was the camera that I used and it was the first time I used it on a "trip" as my only camera. It's my point and shoot and I have never really checked it out. During one of my rests I really strated to look at it and realized I had never used the video camera function, so I got all Les Stroud and started filming...

So lame you can't imbed videos here... So here's a link...

[R_Lefebvre]

Did you get the fork seals done? If not, you can do it yourself, it's not too hard really. The only thing is you need a fork seal installation tool. It's basically just a collar. You can buy them, but I just made one on the lathe with some delrin. After that, the job is pretty straight forward, but cleanliness and attention to detail is key.

That looks like a good skidplate.

Did you use a small tripod with the camera?