nklr gps mystery

[LKWitgo650@aol.com]

Hello listers My wife and I are considereing a trip to Alaska in 2002. What I'm wondering is how much time should a person allow to do this trip justice? If we pull it off it will probably be a once in a lifetime thing for us,so we would like to do it right. I know that the only logical motorcycle to do this on is a KLR.After all they are the most dependable,durable,all around ultimate adventure motorcycle. However, we are presently riding an XRL,which works for what we are doing now,but we would probably spring for an R1150GS,since we ride two-up. I'm reasonably sure that would be the most comfortable for us. Also, a friend with an A11 would go with us,so we would have one dependable bike to get us out of trouble should the GS break down. One more question. The months of July and August are the best months to do this,aren't they? Thank you Larry

[rockiedog2]

Dear fellow KLR nutjobs, Thought I would pass along what I learned on my trip to Alaska. Lots I am sure will be old news/repition but maybe some will be useful. I went from Ms to Calgary, Hyder, Teslin, Whitehorse, Dawson City, Inuvik, Dawson City, Chicken, Fairbanks, Wiseman, Deadhorse, Wiseman, Fairbanks, Whitehorse, Fort Nelson, Grand Prairie, Fort McCloud, Coeur D Alene, Idaho Falls, Laramie and back home. 12000 GPS miles, 13000 ODO miles. 34 days. Did lots of tourist stuff enroute but also did a lot of 600 mile days. It was a great trip. Things I learned/would do different: Do not get hurt. Well yeh everybody knows that even me but I did it anyway. Pulled the end near off one of my fingers in Stewart BC in one of the more stupid moves in my life. Just happened to be a small hospital 4 blocks down the street. An hour and a half of putting it back together and 700 bucks lighter I walk out. Thay won't take insurance in CA(even tho my BCBS policy is international coverage) and the emergency room was a flat 700 charge. Take your checkbook. Get Medjet. I didn't have it and wished I did. Most places up there the nearest medical care is hundreds of miles away. Do not get hurt. Do not go down. Be conservative. Think. Even minor injuries are major when you are trying to keep a KLR running and make 500 or 600 miles/day in all kinds of weather. I would equip for a long term rain event/terrible weather of all sorts with the best possible gear...like maybe the Aerostich Darien stuff. We ran in rain for 5 solid days from Grand Island to Calgary. Lashing rain. Near zero visibility in fog/heavy rain. 30 gusting 50. Just nasty as hell. For days and days. Went thru the Black Hills and never saw anything but fog. 28 degrees and freezing rain/snow in Montana. Got snowed on 4 different days. 8 inches on the ground in Haines Junction. Went to Wal Mart several times scrounging up all kinds of rain gear, rubber dairy farmer looking knee boots, all kinds of getby stuff. The Frog Tog bottoms lasted about 3 days. The top lasted the whole trip. Everything I had got wet. The aluminum sideboxes and top box sweated inside. Like has been said here before buy the best gear you possibly can. I didn't have electric gear and got by ok but dealing with all those layers for a month gets wearing. I am completely rerigging, including electric jacket. KLR issues: Jackass did have some problems. In all the rain he started having water problems. Started missing and running ragged. Steaming out the tailpipe. Would finally quit. Drain the carb bowl and go a while longer. Do it all again. And again. Checked the tee mod first. Wish my plumbing was in as gooda shape. Pulled the airfilter box and it was wet inside. Pulled the airfilter and it was wet inside. I was running w/o the sidepanels and believe water was entering the intake on the left side and finally getting into the carb and gradually filling the bowl. Could have been some carb ice too, don't really know but the KLR will run on a lowoctane water/gas mix for a long time. Like days. I made a shield over the intake with ductape but was plagued with this every time it rained. Leave the sidepanels on. My fuel mileage was bad...mostly because of relentless headwinds. Amazing. Almost everyday. Up and back. Headwinds, headwinds, headwinds. On the tailwind days I got 50+mpg, on the tailwind days 34-38 mpg. Overall for the trip was 40.05 GPS mpg. The big sideboxes just killed the mileage cause of drag. Contributing was the 16 tooth front sprocket, I think. With that gearing and a heavy load, high drag panniers, mountains and headwinds Jackass was overgeared and struggled badly til I shipped the sideboxes and a bunch on no longer needed crap home from Coeur d Alene. Keep the luggage as streamlines as possible and maybe this won't be as big an issue for you. I am going back to the 15 tooth front sprocket. Out of time will send more. Have a great day all Joe and Jackass

[Jeff Saline]

On Sun, 22 Jun 2008 15:42:09 -0000 "rockiedog2" writes:

> Dear fellow KLR nutjobs, > Thought I would pass along what I learned on my trip to Alaska.

SNIP

> Joe and Jackass

<><><><><><><><><><><> <><><><><><><><><><><> Joe, Thanks for the nice trip reports and comments. I appreciate you taking the time to share your experience with the list. Glad you had a rewarding trip. Best, Jeff Saline ABC # 4412 South Dakota Airmarshal Airheads Beemer Club www.airheads.org The Beautiful Black Hills of South Dakota 75 R90/6, 03 KLR650, 79 R100RT ____________________________________________________________ Make your vacation more memorable with a luxurious vacation rental. Click now! http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL2141/fc/Ioyw6i3nLySyRRzRHhhSPZ8pFF3aI2CwYIf6ZzRQoIDBsjcY79ffAw/

[nakedwaterskier]

Why would you take off your side panels and go on a long wet trip without them? I never heard of anyone doing that mod. before. Jeffrey

[Tengai Mark Van Horn]

At 4:20 AM +0000 6/23/08, nakedwaterskier wrote:

>Why would you take off your side panels and go on a long wet trip >without them? I never heard of anyone doing that mod. before.

I don't think the side panels do much other than act as decoration and make more work for seat/tank removal. I ran my old KLR woods beater (R.I.P.) constantly without them and that bike got submerged deep in streams frequently. Mark

[E.L. Green]

--- In DSN_KLR650@yahoogroups.com, Tengai Mark Van Horn wrote:

> At 4:20 AM +0000 6/23/08, nakedwaterskier wrote: > >Why would you take off your side panels and go on a long wet trip > >without them? I never heard of anyone doing that mod. before. > > I don't think the side panels do much other than act as decoration > and make more work for seat/tank removal.

Not true. The left side panel serves to prevent rain and road mist from being sucked into the air inlet, the right side panel serves to protect the seat (and the rider!) from heat rising off of the pipe, feel your seat just above the pipe, it will be very hot if you're not running the side panel and only barely warm if you are. On the other hand, in clear weather I usually run without my side panels because I'm always under my seat doing stuff to my bike and, well... (shrug). I usually just run the left side panel, and only when the weather shows any sign of wet. But that's more because I don't carry a passenger and thus don't care that I'd be baking my passenger's buns by having no right side panel! -E

[rockiedog2]

Thanks Don. Joe - In DSN_KLR650@yahoogroups.com, "Don Montgomery" wrote:

> > > From the Zumo forum - > > "Polar circle bug. > Present in old firmware. You need to do an upgrade of your firmware > > Among others I found this thread > http://www.zumoforums.com/index.php?topic=5813.0 after

searching "polar

> circle"" > > > Give the upgrade a whirl. > > Hope this helps, > Don M >