doohickey wrench

[Thomas Redd]

I just replaced the K750. After loads of research the K750 really does the best job of providing support for fast on road riding and strong off-road. The trick off-road is knowing the bike's limits and keeping up with yourself - and not the guy/person in front of you. Pick the tire you want, but think 2-lane road, 70, sunny, no major traffic, and speedo at 60mph....peace in your place, the KLR... T

[revmaaatin]

--- In DSN_KLR650@yahoogroups.com, Thomas Redd wrote:

> > I just replaced the K750. After loads of research the K750 really > does the best job of providing support for fast on road riding and > strong off-road. > The trick off-road is knowing the bike's limits and keeping up with > yourself - and not the guy/person in front of you. > Pick the tire you want, but think 2-lane road, 70, sunny, no major > traffic, and speedo at 60mph....peace in your place, the KLR... > > T >

Hi Tom, Best is a superlative that is on a line-of-continuum that is relative. But you know that. I digress to disagree with your premise; I would suggest that the K750 is "best" at anything beyond passing a state vehicle inspection when new. When new, adequate for street riding with gusto, but wear out surprisingly FAST. One writer said his rear went South at 1000 miles. How do we measure 'best' should more likely be described as "this works really well for me." Nov 2003: When my new to me '01 arrived at home with 2505 miles on the tires, I followed OEM tire pressures and rode with gusto. The tires tired to kill me--twice; not that the throttle position, entry speed into the turns contributed anything to my near demise. List wisdom responded that I was riding at way to low of tire pressure, etal. During my 2004 GDR ride, our 5 KLR-riders met another group of 4 DS riders that were widely known to each other through BMW associations, etc. One of those riders was riding a box stock KLR with absolutely no mods to it. none. He just wanted to see if a semi arduous ride could be completed on a box stock bike. (Others in his party had extensively prepared machines--plus, this party had the luxury (=the big bucks) of a chase vehicle--carrying minimum equipment, etc). We had a chance/encounter/rendezvous with them a Union Pass, South of Dubious, WY, and again at Atlantic City, WY. The KLR with stock tires was still competitive--cough--though they had yet to see any really wet conditions that did not have gravel for a road. Back to the OEM tire: I would suggest that if you were to follow me West on those OEM tires, across the prairie trails of gumbo, cactus, wheat grass RR right-aways--returning to hard-packed gravel roads coated with marble to golf-ball sized stones--only returning to black macadam long enough to cross the Missouri into West River Dakota's--pointing the KLR further west along section lines with not much of a trail other than described on the GPS until we can see the Black Hills. Pause long enough to let out a little more tire pressure, or if you feel lucky--add a little more--because we are going to enter riders paradise just short of MOAB. We can carve canyons with 1/2 mile sweepers, jump the creek and climb the Piedmont trail consisting of broken shards of granite, basalt and dead fall coated ruts/trails compliments from the last 40/50 mph gust that are common--breaking the tops out of the tress and making it difficult to walk, let alone ride a KLR. Not one person that I know continues to ride in these conditions with OEM tires--if they even attempt to ride them much beyond the time it takes to switch to K270's or D606's. shrug. At best, "best" is a superlative that is relative to your riding conditions and skill level. We all applaud those that have found a tire that works really, really well for their style and conditions. Some search for months/years with out finding the 'best' for them. Personally, if you were to show up (here) at a DS ride (as described above) with those tires, I would politely suggest we change your tires--(I keep a full set on the shelf year round)--as you/your tires are an actual endangerment to the other riders for the condtions here in South Dakota. revmaaatin.

[revmaaatin]

--- In DSN_KLR650@yahoogroups.com, David Farrell wrote:

> > I just wanted to also suggest that many out there on the list have the wrench already (the better one sold by vendors such as Arrowhead Motorsports). if you post where you are located, I bet you could locate one nearby. You should only need it once as many on this site own it and would be glad to rent/loan it out. Or better yet, start a new thread stating you are wanting to borrow one. I have loaned mine out before just for the price of shipping to and from the borrowers location.

HI David, Perhaps Eagle Mike could respond to this as well: Needing the wrench once might not be exactly correct (if you keep the bike long term)and here is why; if you are using a look-alike replacement spring, it has a limited life expectancy. Watching over Jeff Saline's shoulder for the past 5 years and noting numerous do-hictomeys, it appears that you are likely to need to replace the spring after some 20K smiles as it will have reached it serviceability limits of tension, etc. shrug. YMMV. others might comment as well. If you replace the OEM spring with Eagle Mikes torsion spring, it appears that it should never need replacing again. Both of my KLR's (now) have the torsion spring; when going in the 2d time to do the torsion spring upgrade, both bikes still had tension on the EM (sic) replacement spring--neither had reached the 20K smiles that Jeff observed on his 03 KLR. (=tension, but not much remaining on the spring) As an ancillary note: I believe the failure rate for do-hickeys done under Jeff's coaching is close to 1/3. For me it has been 50%; one of two KLR's had a broken do-hickey. My 2505 mile bike had a nice doohickey. My 20K mile bike had the sage brush doohickey, but low and behold, after replacing the OEM drain plug with a magnetic one, it captured a dohickey part previously fragged but not recovered. frown. scary thoughts. etc. Thank goodness for a magnetic drain plug. You can draw your own conclusions if you should replace your doohickey. revmaaatin.