Crf 300 Rally - The Adventure Begins

[garyboy]

It'll be interesting to see what you choose next ..
from what I've read, you'll soon tire of the extremely heavy weight, low power, low tech, poor off road performance, drudgy on road 'performance ', poor wind protection, and, I fear, poor reliability??

I hear the new crf 300LS (US model tho) will be lower, following kawasaki's lead. Perhaps you could try that next ?? ( or another Honda model lol)

Yours ..

Jealous bitchy gary lol

[adventure steele]

Himalayan refunded

[garyboy]

Best Wishes to you AS .. hope things work out well for you and Dad.

Must admit, I quite fancied a himalayan at one point but the lure of the crf 300 rally was too great, even though I settled for the 250 for cost reasons.

Always go for what you want, and measure that with your experience of whatever,.. bikes being a difficult thing as these days test runs are very rare, and reality may vary lol.

Good luck, and .. enjoy

[adventure steele]

Himalayan refunded

[onslowe]

Adventure steele, I noticed that earlier in this thread you had a few bikes on your wish list one of which was an XT500. A good few years go I had a really good one that had a minor restoration, was easy to start (if you had the knack) and looked great but was ultimately a disappointment. They have plenty of grunt (compared to a RE) but don't handle great, terrible brakes and plenty of vibes and for over £5000 for a decent one they are overpriced so unless you are desperate to own one I would steer clear as they are best admired from a distance and I only paid £1100 Ref your current RE it sounds like it fits the bill for you which is great but looking a the photos the exhaust appears to be discolouring in an unusual way, is that normal for a RE ? I realise it wont be rust but it seems to give an impression that the finish might not last relative to a Japanese bike for example, maybe the photos are highlighting the colour change. Also I have never been but have heard that the winds in Iceland are brutal, will the RE offer enough power and protection to see you through and is it worth shipping your own bike rather than just hiring ( in case of potential reliability issues) when you get there so that the responsibility is out of your hands ? Really enjoying your ride reports by the way and the vids, all very detailed and professional so please keep up the good work, all the best. Onslowe

[Richard Simpson Mark II]

the bit that's gone that ash-white colour is the cat...which gets really hot in use. I suspect that much of the muck on the roads in the Peak District at this time of year is limestone mud...and the cat is the colour of burned lime!

Most of the miles I did on my Suzuki DR350 back in the day were in Cambridgeshire...and the soil substrate was Lower Oxford Clay...which is the stuff they made bricks from at the local Fletton Brick Works. It has a high carbonaceous content, hence fires into brick material at relatively low temperatures.

The headerpipe was yellowy-pink as a result ...it wasn't rust, in fact if you gently removed the coating the pipe was pristine underneath!

[adventure steele]

Himalayan refunded

[Richard Simpson Mark II]

I had one of the first DR350s in the country. I had had my shoulder repaired after a wait of almost a decade (plenty of slots suddenly appeared at the local hospital when the Gulf War turned out not to be a bloodbath), which meant I could do off-road/trail riding again.
A happy co-incidence...one of the American magazines published a really detailed test of the DR350, explaining how Al Baker (who ran the tuning/accessory company XRs Only) had been hired by Suzuki as a consultant to help produce an XR-beater.
The test concluded..."hands-down, this is the best four-stroke trail bike to ever come out of Japan"
And I wasn't disappointed...fantastic bike. On one occasion, I rode it into what looked like just another puddle on a Cambridgeshire by-way...but a tractor had got stuck there, and the reality was the water came up to the seat. It kept going...didn't even miss a beat, even though both the airbox and the exhaust were under water at one point. When I got home there was water in the bottom of the airbox.
Stupidly sold it many years later to finance its replacement: a Husky TE610E, which was better than it in every respect on paper, and worse than it in almost every respect in reality. In contrast to the Suzuki, the Husky would just stop if the water came as high as the footpeg...the air intake was at the bottom of the airbox. The rest of the bike had been assembled with similar thought and attention to detail.
The guy I sold the Suzuki to had just left school and joined the Met police...he came along with his former teacher to look it over...the guy was one of the original Mondeo Enduro lads. Inevitably the DR went the way of all DRs in London: stolen and never seen again.
I'd seriously consider getting another if I could find one in good order and could be confident that Suzuki would offer spares support for it. The more recent ones have electric start.
There was one running well in the Exeter Trial the other week. That gearbox has six perfectly-chosen ratios to take you from 0 to about 90 mph, and each gearchange drops you right back into the fat part of the torque. Lovely action too...it seemed a shame to ride it in MX boots. Super quiet exhaust...just right for a trail bike.
Fuel economy could vary widely...70 mpg pottering about...35 mpg going into a rainy gale heading down to Plymouth on the first leg of a trip to Morocco with a bit of luggage on the back.

[adventure steele]

Himalayan refunded

[adventure steele]

Himalayan refunded