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klr
Posted: Mon Aug 21, 2000 2:05 am
by Jeff Gronert
-----Original Message-----
From: Ken Green
To: jeff.gronert@...
Date: Sunday, August 20, 2000 22:34
Subject: KLR
>Hey Jeff,
>
>Tell me about the KLR. What makes it such a great bike? (All I ever hear
>are good things, but I've never ridden one).
>
>-- Ken Green
Well alot of my early motorcycling was dirt bikes, and I've always liked
singles, my last four singles have been 70' Kaw 350 Bighorn (20k mi),73' Yam
360 RT3 (57k mi), 85' Hon 600XL (25k mi), and the KLR (46k mi), I like the
twostroke's but their no longer practical. The Hon was light and fast (loved
the bike) but vibed too much for long road rides and was unreliable with
magneto kick start. The KLR has duel balance shafts and I've ridden from
Long Beach to San Francisco a few times to visit my brother, no problem! and
it always starts right up. But then I'm road bias and have set my KLR up for
canyon carving , sorta like a supermotard. Oh the 6 gal fuel range is nice
too, especially when your other bike's a VTR and you've done some pushing
and siphoning and packing extra gas and being the first one in a group to
need gas and calling AAA on the fwy phone to get gas. Also the KLR has
taught me to be a better rider because body position is so critical on the
bike! and that knowledge has carried over to my other bikes. [87' FZR1000
and VTR]
CaffeineRacer,
When life throws curves...lean into them!
klr
Posted: Mon Aug 21, 2000 7:56 pm
by JIM JAMES
I thought so! It's a damned virus and your bike caught it from mine, either while riding behind it or while it was parked by mine at the camp ground. We need to keep them separated when we can't keep an eye on them. I sho' don't want mine to learn any bad habits from yours, like falling over, cutting off in the fast lane of the interstate, and the like....james
----------
>My KLR started tweeting when I cranked it up last night (4040 miles).
klr
Posted: Wed Sep 20, 2000 4:57 pm
by punkynsquirt@cs.com
Steven: Glad to hear some old gal with a dog was doing her thing long
distance traveling on a bike. I will be using 2 debit cards for 2 different
accounts. Will not keep them together. Will use a dummy wallet with expired
cards and copies of documents and no more than $50 cash for the days
expenses. The rest will be hidden in different locations. I just got one of
the new Bank of America debit cards with my picture and signature on the
front. A thief could only get cash from an ATM if he has the PIN number and
supposedly couldn't make purchases if his face doesn't match the picture on
the front of the card. In practice, however, Merchants/clerks may not pay
attention to the signature or picture, but it seems to reduce the risk
somewhat. There are no guarantees. I wish I could take more time with trials
before departing. I'll undoubtedly pay a price, probably shipping things
back, falling down and so on. Thanks for your interest.
Lew Waterman
Punky & Lew's Americas Motopaseo
klr
Posted: Thu Oct 05, 2000 10:15 pm
by Dan Jenson
Any one else out there planning on riding in the Ridge Runners 500 run from Angels Camp, CA. to Carson City, NV. and back, this weekend? I live in Tuolumne, Ca. and I'll be there joining in on the fun. KLR650 (2001) Dan Jenson
klr
Posted: Fri Oct 06, 2000 11:22 am
by Weaver, Mark
hi dan. i'm doing it on my y2k klr. i'm getting up godawful early tomorrow to ride out there from santa rosa. what time do you plan on starting? anyone else? do you know anything about the course?? mw
klr
Posted: Sat Feb 16, 2002 12:36 pm
by Steven van Twuyver
To remove the carb, first unscrew the 12mm plastic nut that holds the choke
cable -- then remove the choke cable -- else it will break if you do
anything. There are two approaches: you can just loosen the clamps and
rotate the carb and remove the bowl if that is all the cleaning that is
needed.
The better approach is to completely remove the carb by unscrewing it from
the head. Best to waste the carb mounting screws and loosen them with a
pair of vice-grips. When you replace the screws, use a stainless metric hex
head with some staineless washers which can then be easily removed at any
time with a wrench. The whole carb will come off when you push it far
enough into the airbox snorkel, which will allow the manifold to drop out at
the head. I would use carb cleaner on all the metal parts and avoid it on
plastic and rubber. You will have to remove the float to prevent carb
cleaner from contacting it. At 5000 feet, I would leave jetting stock until
you determine that it is running too lean - I would expect it to be pretty
close at that altitude with stock jetting. Drill out the idle mixture EPA
plug so that you can adjust the mixture if necessary.
-svt-
klr
Posted: Tue Apr 23, 2002 10:29 pm
by btlynx
my fav is kawasaki long range
klr
Posted: Sun Jul 07, 2002 11:51 pm
by Andy Cohen
Well folks its been a real slice. When I first purchased my KLR I went
looking for people who shared my interest and in my wildest dreams I
never thought I would wind up with you folks!
I have made some great friends, Mark, Stu, Mitch, Dale, Fred, Toby, RM
and Cin, Krok and Scotto, thanks. Every time I see a KLR I think of al
the fun I had with mine and the friends I made.
I had fun reading, flaming and stirring the pot myself on this list, I
still miss Jennifer and the discussions of oil, tell me again Beardo
which is best for my blinker?
As with everything all good things must come to an end and this is true
of men and motorcycles, I sold my KLR this weekend, however I get to
keep all the memories and great times I had with the friends I made. I
will keep the KLR stuff on the website,
www.finishlinewest.com
http://www.finishlinewest.com/> unless someone wants to host it
themselves.
Take care, God Bless, and thanks.
Andy Cohen
www.finishlinewest.com http://www.finishlinewest.com/>
A visionary is one who can find his way by moonlight, and see the dawn
before the rest of the world.
--Oscar Wilde
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
klr
Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2002 1:21 am
by Steven van Twuyver
From: "Combat_Tourer"
Subject: Need help in Guate
I went for a test ride on my KLR650 today after some extensive
maintenance only to have it die, repeatedly, about 7 miles out of
Antigua.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
As much of a piece of shit the Electrex stator is, they do have the absolute best flowchart for diagnosing the stator/diode board. The diagnostic page starts at:
http://www.electrexusa.com/electrex_fault_finding.html
This will lead you to a four page graphic HTML file that may take a little while to load. I haven't looked at in a while, but I believe it may only cover the charging circuits. Professor Jim's absolutely terrific color schematics are available in the KLR files section at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DSN_klr650/files/Wiring%20and%20Instruments/Wiring%20Diagrams/
So here is what little I know about the KLR high tension circuits: The KLR stator has numerous poles that are wound with thick wire (I believe there are 9 or 11 poles on the stock unit - my Electrex unit had the same number but many of these were not wired - later model Electrex units may wind more poles akin to the stock KLR units). Two of the poles are wound with thinner wire and these are wired seperately to charge the CDI. These two "high-tension" poles allow the KLR to start even if the battery is bad. You may be able to ohm these out to ensure continuity on each pole. There is also a seperate Hall-effect sensor that triggers the CDI located in the case where the stator is. I presume you could check this by measuring it with an ohm meter and sweeping it past a magnet. I would expect a resistance change. From there you have the coil. You can do primary and secondary resistance measurements on the coil. Don't know what values are out of bounds, but typical readings should be less than 10 ohms for primary and 10K for seconday (going from memory so don't hold me to this) - no shorts or opens. Make sure the coil doesn't have any hair-line cracks and ensure that the ground wire screw attached to the frame near the coil isn't corroded or rusted.
I had a KLR coil intermittently fail on my Alaska trip because water dripped into the high-tension wire in the coil. The wire is exposed and does not have a rubber boot to protect it from the rain. So in long rainy periods it can catch some water since the wire faces the rain. Unscrew the wire from the coil, carefully dry it, make sure the wire piercing screw isn't rusted or corroded (I believe it is brass) and spray some WD40 in the high tension wire and coil wire hole to help dry it out - then dry the WD40 off.
If you are absolutely sure it is spark related, then the above are areas you should check out. It really does sound like you could be afflicted with the T-mod disease where a drop of moisture blocks the bottom carb tube from venting the inner chamber of the carb properly. Hope this help and good luck.
Previously hosed by Electrex,
-svt-
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
klr
Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2002 1:15 pm
by RM
On Thu, 7 Nov 2002, Steven van Twuyver wrote:
>As much of a piece of shit the Electrex stator is, they do have the
>absolute best flowchart for diagnosing the stator/diode board. The
>diagnostic page starts at:
[snip]
30k mi on an Electrex G45, zero problems. How did I get so lucky?