DR 650 project: It's now a Beast!

To start with i have to say that my language skills are limited when it comes to grammar and spelling, so if you hate bad grammar and poor spelling stop reading.

I have been riding an 1997 model dr650 for the past 1.5 years, as soon as i got it i started tinkering with it and i got it to a stage where i was fairly happy with it and confident that i could take it on long trips.

Unfortunatly I killed the gear box during a two day enduro/navigation ride.
The bike made it through both days and has done a further few thousand kilometers since but it is making a very nasty clunking noise in third gear.

The bike has over a one hundred thousand kilometers on the clock so instead of throwing money at the gearbox problem i decided to by another one.

With in a week i found one 30mins down the road from where i live, it is a 2002 model with 13000 on the clock and it cost me $1500(Australian) i got it cheap because it also had a few problems, the first on was that it would only run for 30 secs before spitting and coffing to a stop, second it jumped out of second gear every so often, third it had a small oil leak on the bottom of the crank case and forth it is yellow.

First problem was solved by throwing the fuel filter in the carb away after i did that it ran fine.
Second problem didn't seem to be a problem really, when riding the bike you just had to make sure you put it in second gear properly.
The oil leak is a bit more serious, there is a welded up crack on the rear of the crank case which seemed to be leaking.
I'll deal with the yellow at a later date.


here are the two bike's



here is the weld

My old bike curently has the following mods.

IMS tank
drz400 suspension front and rear
cheapo head light
HID fog lights
GPS
adjustable screen
home made top and side racks
TK silencer and mid pipe
4lt auxsilery fuel tank on the rear (dummy exhaust)
pumper carb
lowerd foot pegs
B&B bash plate
electronic stearing damper
bar raiser
protaper bars
ego barkbusters
home made counter sprocket cover
vapour speedo and dash
re shaped seat
Other litle bits and peices

Thats all i can remember for now

The new bike has no mods


but will have all of the above swapped on to it plus it will get.

bash plate water tank/tool box
rally style fairing
high copmression piston
ported and polished head
big bore header pipe.
maybe a 32lt safari tank

How much for your YELLOW head light surround? Or can I swap you for my white one?

I have stripped down the yellow bike engine and i have found the problem with second gear. the second gear dog clutch is worn out so two new gears at 80aud each from suzuki will fix that and while i'm wating for the gears i have started porting and polishing the head.

I have messed about with heads on other engines before but i still have no idea what i am doing when it comes to porting so its going to be a steep lurning curve and an expensive one if i mess up.

Basically all i'm going to do is take out all the casting marks and smooth out where the valve seat meets the alloy then give it a good shine up.
So far on the intake tracts i can see that the casting is quite good the surface is very smooth compared to other heads that i have worked on.
but there is a rather large ledge where the alloy meets the valve seat.

on the exhaust side its not so pretty the actual hardend insert is machined in such away that it tapers in by 2mm from the initial oppening. then the port trac is very chocked as it turns the corner to meet the other port.

anway the plan is to open the exhaust valve seats up a bit and to make the port tracs more even and i'll polish them as well.

This plus the high comp piston should make a ktm killer out of this dr


i will take some pics and post next time.

Sorry but I'm going to put all the yellow plastics on the old bike before i sell it

Thanks mate!

Keep us posted on the work... I love reading about others tearing bikes apart and putting them back together

Ah the very thing im going to do soon myself, well ill get my brother to do it cos he`s inherited dads old porting shop after he passed away.

Have a look here & here for porting.

This looks like its going to be a good thread.

Mezo.

You've got me. There's something about the story which makes me think the writer might actually know what he's doing..bring it on...

Sounds like an awesome idea! Great minds think alike.

What do you have in mind for the bash plate, can you weld and bend thick aluminum? What kind of rally fairing? Frame mounted? What are you going to model it off?

I'd like to see what you come up with for a rallye type fairing. I imagine one would look really slick. I think I'm going with the Baja Designs Racelight on my next DR, but a rallye fairing would be a hot contender. I'll be watching the build. Luck to ya'.

Your story inspired me to pull my finger out mate.

I'm going to make an ally frame to hold the fairing not sure what the design will be i'll just go with the flow and see what i end up with.

Here is the bash plate
Its mostly made from 3mm ally but there are also some 4mm ribs on the inside to give it some strength

here are a few bad pics of the un finished item

Like the pix I like the words but too many red x's


I might have to do the sme to my DR soon 70,000+ km

what red x's?

Hi Joe
Looks like a sweet project you got going there . Let us know when you are finished so we can organise a ride.
Cheers Chris.

pics in posts 6 12 & 13 appear as x's

I can't see any pics at all

ah crap how the hell do i fix that i can see the pics fine,
tell you what you can all come round to my house to look at the bike in person

is it working yet

Dude...


WTF happened to this engine!? :eek1

That's a serious bit of welding you've got there. DR cases a pretty strong, for that to crack there it would have had to take a pretty big hit.

IIWY, I'd be swapping the cases from your other engine, I don't reckon you'll ever fix this properly.


Keep us posted
Cheers
Paul