The ADDC is the easiest choice Vicks. Probably the cheapest, very high level of security for the riders (medical assistance etc etc). Its in your back yard, you can train as much as you want, for most oversea's participants the soft sand is the most intimidating and yet you can practice every weekend as much as you want. ADDC and navigating, not so difficult as you have the roadbook and the GPS and tracks to help you. People rarely get lost at the ADDC. Since there is a lot of Off piste riding the GPS will give waypoints and CAP headings. Somewhere i wrote a thread about my first ADDC, back in 2006. it's doable and its a blast.
Good advise i think and i'll listen. Found a Rally prepped 530Exc and considering that option as well. Now i just have to take care of the money aspects and buy up one of the bikes. Looks like you are all heavily favoring the Desert Challenge and i'll keep that as the target for 2014 although it seems too close to me.. we'll see... next update after 2 weeks as me n the mrs are off to our maiden EU trip backpacking our way
The thing is if its far away you will never start racing. Close is good: It means getting fit and taking the plunge. Don't be nervous - you will love it! BTW I sent you a mail. Cheers Neil
Hey Vick! I'm not going to repeat what I posted yesterday in your Goodbye Orange Crush thread, so here I just will say Congrats, do it, enjoy it! Happy for you. Talking about ADDC... found this: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.604068516289665.1073741825.564439970252520&type=1 That's the most ridiculously fast conversion I have ever seen... I'm in... .
OK ppl i got the bike !!! It's an '10 KTM 530Exc. Rally prepped with a Mecasystems kit, oil cooler etc. Being a rally bke, it has its share of minor bruises and i will be taking care of them along with a full strip down and re-build. Here it is loaded on the trailer when transporting it to AbuDhabi after de-registering it. The bike still needs to be registered in AbuDhabi and for this i need to get it clear the inspection first. Of course for that i need to have working turn signals, tail lamp etc which i need to take care of. Hopefully in the next few days and then i'll take it out for a spin.. in the desert.
Great news Vick...!!! That bike should take the s***t out fo you in the desert... Well done! Ok, take care of all the street legal details and ask the authorities to speed up all the registering process... they must know you just can't stand not to ride it Keep us posted, man. .
Great bike for Rally. Congratulations. I can concur with everyone so far - the ADDC is a great event to start with. The single bivouac makes logistics so simple and the riding is great, once you get the hang of that dune riding. I loved the event my first time and learnt heaps. (Not so much the second time - don't crash on day 1, it sucks big time!!). As for it being so close, don't sweat that. The organisation is great and very helpful people will get you sorted without too much drama. Just get your entry in, your license and insurance sorted and everything else will fall into place. Best of luck.
Hey Tony, see you soon .. The bike has an RNS repeater how cool is that ? Thanks for the encouraging words.. makes a positive difference. No !! not yet... let me do a couple of rides atleast .. Thanks Jon, although i can already feel a butterfly in the stomach. Oh and, yeah, defn. sucks to crash out on Day1. I did a DNF (technical) on Day1 - stage 1 in an earlier Rally and felt miserable for quite some time after that.. Gonna ride out every weekend to get more and more practice with the bike in dunes.
Thanks for the encouragement guys. The guy who i bought the bike from is Kobus, a southafrican business person. But the bike was owned by Kaan Bilgen originally. cheers
she's home.. There is some damage to the tanks and swingarm - casualty of a fall during the last rally perhaps. Unfortunately it looks like the tanks, after being bent inwards due to the crash, were not bent back in to position, this has led to the swingarm and left tank suffering some scraping. While i'm not going to do a complete strip down and rebuild yet, i intend to take care of these kind of damages.
The bike is well set up IMO The head light protection was getting in contact with the lights and i wanted to take care of this as well. took the mask & cover off and then added a washer to the top two screws and that gave a good 2-3mm gap between the headlight and the protection. started making some notes on the stuff that needs to be taken care of on the bike i love KTM tool kits In order to verify and get used to the bike, i used the std tool kit with that was on the bike to do all the work. That way i will know if anything needs to be added to the kit. took the rear tanks off and carefully bent the mounting tabs outwards found a couple of damaged/chafed wires and took care of them. made turn signal indicator mounting brackets out of some metal strips that i had. These are temporary so that i can get the bike through inspection tomorrow and get it registered. with the indicators, flasher unit and switch mounted + wired up - it works.....
