Nice bike! That's the JVO kit from Spain that quite a few forum members have. Dakaroo, JMo, Bluebull etc. Jonah Street will also be riding it in the 2011 Dakar.
Gary Benn (the builder of the bike) has worked for Yamaha for ages. He currently works for Craig Dack Racing here in Australia. The bash plate/oil cooler was custom made by B & B here in Australia. Gary talked to a lot of people in Yamaha to get the mods right. The engine mods to get the oil lines correct were the hardest part. I was on the ride with him (mentioned in the magazine article), but I didn't get any photos before I fell off and injured myself and returned home. I do know that Gary estimates the cost of the mods to the bike (tanks, new rims f/r, cush drive, rear rack, pipe, bash plate and oil mods) would cost about $6,000 to do if there were any paying customers. Gary did the entire trip (about 4800 kms) with no oil changes. Since the ride, he has pulled the top end and reported no problems with valves, piston or rings. The other two bikes did one oil change during the ride and required no adjustments when there valves were checked.
The gearing was 16 / 48. This gearing pulled about 160 KMH (GPS indicated) on the bitumen yet handled the 1000 sand dunes of the Simpson Desert (although this year has not been the driest, so sand was damp) The hubs are Talon hubs laced to Excel rims (std on back, 1.85 on front). All supplied here in Australia by John Titman Racing with heavy duty spokes.
I have just replaced the piston and timing chain on my 06 wr450. New piston is a JE forged 12.8:1 unit. engine seems quite a bit noisier at low revs - I think the noise is piston slap. Are forged pistons noisier than cast pistons? the bike seems to run as well or better than it did prior to doing the work. thanks Mark
Seat concepts will make a 07 + wr450 dual sport/comfort seat foam and cover if they get ten orders , what do you guys think? http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=621311&page=14 http://www.seatconcepts.com
I'm in -- have one on my 530 and love it. The best seat I have found for the WR is one I made and that ain't cutting it.
Great now we just need a few more. Once they make the mould it should be a standard product on their website.
The SeatConcepts foam is excellent, it even cut down some of the vibes to my ass. I'm gonna try and dualsport this TE450, with a 15/43 gear set, I cruise 70mph at about 5600 RPM. When I get to the trails, I can go to a 13 or 12 t CSS to climb any hill. 3 gal IMS + 1 gal Acerbis can gets me about 150 mile range.
OK guy's (and gals) we asked for it so let's get it on. We need at least ten (10) for a group buy for the WR450 seats from MXBundy at seat-concepts. I'm in. Spread the word!
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/2FoSN5cemvc" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe> the cush drive rear wheel the TE610E (1995 to 2006 models) will do the trick, but dont confuse it with the TE610 which doesnt have the cush drive hub. i modded one of these for my late model TE610 and have just adapted the rear wheel to the WR450F. the te610e rear wheel only has a 20mm rear axle, so you'll want axle shims as the WR450F rear axle is 22mm (the 400 and 426 should still be 20mm, so nice match there, and the 1999 wr400 had a 220mm rear disc so even better on that year model). the TE610E only has a 220mm rear disc but its easy to bolt on a 240mm husky disc from the rest of the TE range on the 2000 to 2006 model, this is close enough to the yamaha's 245mm to work fine. the 1995 to 1999 TE610E uses a different rear disc and i couldn't find a 240mm husky disc that would suit. however, its very close to the bolt hole pattern of the WR450F, so if you dont mind a dodgy brothers job, you can just buy a cheap WR rear disc, and drill out the bolt holes a few mm wider so you can bolt it on to the husky wheel. i just flipped the disc around so the bolts werent counter sunk anymore, then used wide washers so that the bolts had good purchase. will post an update after some testing.
I have a 2001 yz 426 and the rear axel is a 22 mm i think that from 01 all wr/yz from 01 onwards had 22 mm
the earlier TE610E models from 1995 to 2006 had cush drive hubs and it turns out the rear wheel is extremely easy to adapt to the WR450F. (dont confuse the TE610E with the TE610 which has a fixed rear hub). the wheel spacers actually fit perfectly in the swingarm, no need to machine any wheel spacers. the TE610E rear axle is 20mm while the WR450F is 22mm so ideally you should have axle shims machined up. i went the lazy way and got 20mm diameter alloy tubing, cut it down one side and just made it a tad bigger to act as a 22mm shim. the TE610E rear axle fits fine, and even the chain tensioner blocks fit the WR swingarm perfectly. the TE610E rear disc is only 220mm, but most of the TE450 and TE510 models have 240mm rear discs with the same bolt pattern on the 2000 to 2006 TE610E. unfortunately the bolt hole pattern changes on the 1995 to 1996 TE610E so you'll need to drill the bolt holes out a bit on a WR450F disc to make it fit. the rear sprocket doesn't quite line up, it needs to be spaced outward by around 3mm. i just used washers to do this, then longer sprocket bolts so i could use nylocs in addition to the normal nuts. i figured if the sprocket is only sitting on these washers then i'd better double up on nuts in case there was any flex that could gradually loosen the nuts off. clocked up 1000km so far, works a treat. a cheap mod for motard or extended road riding if you can get hold of a TE610E rear wheel. feels much smoother on the road, and peace of mind given there's a fair bit of comment on the web about the WR450F gearbox not really coping with road or adventure type riding. at the moment geared the bike 14 / 45 so it just burbles along nicely at highway speeds, although first gear feels way too high for the gnarly stuff. but works a treat as i like the strong mid range of the WR and dont rev it out that often... this gearing and the cush drive hub have made it much smoother and more pleasant as a pseudo-adventure bike.
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