Sibirsky Extreme 2012 - The Toughest Ride of Them All

At the end of the day its a BMW ... even their High Performance (HP2) bikes have appalling suspension. So you sure as hell cant hope for anything on their average bikes. If you buy a BMW bike, you are buying the engine ... You are somehow supposed to know you need to have a complete suspension revamp if you want to do anything off road. With the new Husky, changing from 190 to 250 - 300mm suspension travel with good quality forks and shock is the FIRST thing I would do (bet the rims are utter crap too).

Its a complete marketing philosophy - they have worked out that the average buyer will orgasm in his / her shorts over 5 more hp, or slick new tweaked plastic panels, but they dont give a flying fu@k about good suspension. And BMW is right. Thats exactly what the average buyer is like and why BMW are one of the very few motorcycle manufacturers doing OK in the crisis.

KTM is learning ... KTM adv bikes these days have much smoother more economical and more powerful engines, and the suspension on their adv bikes is getting crappier and crappier. The wheels on the late model 640 adventure, 950/990 adventure bikes are also terrible. KTM learned the hard way that if you want to sell adventure bikes, forget about the adventure components, and just focus on putting a good road engine and gearbox in the bike if you want to sell numbers. When they started making adventure bikes 15 years or so ago, they used top of the range 50mm WP Extreme forks in their 620 Adventure - with DLC coated tubes. Same forks they ran in the Dakar. Now the adventure bikes get the lowest level of forks to come out of the WP factory down the road. The cheapest, simplest forks in the range. In 15 years KTM adventure bikes have gone from having the best suspension they could possibly get, to the worst. Cause now they know ... for 98% of buyers, it just doesnt matter.

And if you are in the 2% that care, then you get your wallet out again ... whether you ride a KTM or a BMW or whatever.

while Terry and Rod in the background worked on their bikes:



Including a bit of fuel blowing":



Prutser was in decent shape:



and Beamster was ready to go:

I agree in!!!!!!!!!!

We continued for while on this road which alternated between gravel and old asphalt, until the heat killed the KTM.



We waited the usual 15 mins for it to sort itself, but the bike still wouldnt run.



Prutser got out his towing rope ...



Terry on the X Country took up the towing duties:



And would be towing the KTM for much of the rest of the day. There were patches and windows when the KTM ran under its own steam, but they were no longer predictable to us. We thought letting the fuel pump rest for 15 minutes was solving the problem, as it had for the first day and a half, but now the KTM wasnt even playing by those rules.

Walter is absolutely right. The suspension on my old 2K4 ( SORRY....'04) 625 SXC is way better than my 690E. The 690s a better road bike but out of the box, not as off-road capable as the older models. Despite me fitting a shorter but stiffer rear spring to make the front end work, it's pretty hopeless and very sticky. It's something I thought would be OK and would ease off, alas it didn't...... but before my next trip I'll have the front end rebuilt by a reputable suspension team.

Yes I should have added that in ... the 690 seems to be bunched in with the adventure bikes when it comes to suspension at the KTM design works. They have the crummiest forks WP make for KTM. There are plenty of guys with 690s who have changed their forks to proper EXC forks or the twin chamber forks or even the cone valve forks.

There's a bit of a myth out there that if you buy a KTM then the suspension is good out of the box .... well it used to be like that. Now (especially for non competition bikes) they are no different from BMW in saving every cent they can on suspension and wheels. Even if you spend GBP 30k for a brand new 450 Rally Replica, you are going to change the OEM forks to cone valve forks or extreme forks straight out of the box before you take it racing. A model or two ago, when you bought a Rally Replica, you got top of the line forks in it. Not any more. You're getting mid tier forks now as OEM equipment on your top of the line racing machine.

I was figuring out if my KTM EXC 500 would do a good adventure bike for such a trip (I do speak Russian and do want to got for it 2014).
Stock suspension fine, 20-Liter Acerbis tank, Coyote 30l U-Shaped saddlebags and minimalistic luggage should be the basis (+saddle upgrade, gear Ratio, rear hub, etc, etc).
Basically same Motor as the Husaberg FE501, and mapping can probably be set to match conditions (low consumption, various gasoline quality).
I am however a bit concerned on the water crossings, since quite difficult to make the airbox really water tight: ok for a few seconds of deep water, but about navigating for a while in a 80cm+ deep lake ???
I think the motor would hold the distance, I´ve seen some EXC with 50.000km on first engine.
Another advantage is the kick starter.

And for the bike how about the Old but reliable Africa Twin or the new Tenere 660, I will love if honda make the AT again the honda bikes have been the most reliable bike I ever have, now have 990 Adventure and l really like the suspension and the HP but is very thirsty

BTW you video is the first one i have ever see complete without get sick for moving the helmet camera too fast to the the sides, nice job waiting for another one

Fossilator got what I was talking about in his post # 977. Looks like we`re heading for a killer summer in Australia this year, so I'll be trawling the Cool Max and Helly Hansen sites to get some of their stuff.

One thing I won't be doing is wearing lighter clothing, after surviving what could have been a fatal crash a few months ago with "only' a broken fibula and shoulder damage. I was wearing a BMW Rallye2 suit and Oxtar Infinity boots; good gear.

Speaking of suspensions: What does Prutsers bike have holding each end up?

I'm please to see X could perform the heavy lifting while enduring the hot conditions.

What's your estimate for the towing average speed?

What was the impact on fuel consumption while towing?

Sweet report! Be careful out there!

Charlotte

meanwhile I limp back to the UK and listening to Rods wise words, I purchase a very low mileage R1100s and head into the Alps



Ended up visiting about 12 countries over the next couple of months while the other crew played in the mud!





Walter & Rod.....Hope this was not too much of a hijack!

Hi Walter are you planning to add this RR to your website? Where I can be lazy and just read the RR

I don't know how much more fuel Tee Bee's bike used towing the KTM.

But I know Rod came up with a name for this trip.

From London to Magadan on a Gallon !!

Excellent stuff, though not entirely what one had envisioned when Walter's RR started.

I mean, looks to be at this stage, it is Beamster the Country Lady who's got in all together, except having to wait for the boys to fix their damn bikes every turn of the way - their trousers dropped and all.

I feel for her.

I might do - but website is playing up at the moment. Google is reporting some malware on one oc the pages and I dont have a clue where to start trying to find it amd remove it.

Nevermind... I thought you were posting in real time. LOL

Hey..........some b*s*ard's been photoshopping the pics to make me look fat. I'm normally like a racing snake- I clearly hadn't had time to suck in the lame gut.

The bike behaviour was weird. It ran for hours at 70-80 mph without missing a beat but after the rest at the bus stop it ran just a few miles then faltered and died . After that it was towed more than it ran.

The country started to change and we climbed up into cooler air and pine forest. Beautiful..especially at 25mph. :0(
I'll post some pics later this evening .

ROFL :) maybe he's found a new niche market...towed bike adventures - BYOTR - the green alternative ;p

Contact Google and ask them! Same happened to Tamper Talk site couple of weeks ago! Google is wrong!