New to me anyhow. I'll start with a bit of foreshadowing, quoting myself, as my words frequently come back to haunt me. This was regarding what to put in your trail pack, wibby suggested a small pack saw
"I assume the folding saw is for hacking off appendages left dangling after crashes :laugh:"
So my buddy picks me up for first ride of the season and my first in about 15 years. We were given permission to ride in an area by a land caretaker, but in our excitement didn't listen carefully to directions. Finally see the trails, unload bikes, gear up and - get chased off by a farmer. We were parked on his "propurty" and "no one ever rides there" on the trails WE CAN CLEARLY SEE. But hey what do we know, we apologized and loaded the bikes back up. Turns out the propurty wasn't very deep and we finally find a more promising entrance to the trails and venture off. Mind you, it's been raining 4 days straight here in New England. Trail starts off fine, heads straight toward a newly formed lake, branches off just in time and skirts the edge of the lake. At the end of the lakefront where the trail finally shoots into the woods, there is one part where we have to ride though about a foot of water for 5-6 feet. My buddy rolls through on his CR, no problem, I follow up, and halfway through the bike stops dead and sinks in about carb deep :ohmy: I hop off, check the front wheel - clear. Check the rear wheel - missing! Replaced by a spiral of vines. It looked like freakin Little Shop of Horrors. So as I'm wrestling vines out of my rear wheel with my bare hands the voice of wibby echoes in my head "Use the saw..." Which was strange cause I don't really know wibby, so it was more like the crazy voice of the plant in that movie... Only I don't have the saw :clue: never thought I'd need it on a test ride, especially this early in the season when nothing is even showing leaves yet. So anyway, free up the bike, it starts right up thanks to the suggestion on this board of carefully sealing the flywheel cover. Rest of the day goes off pretty much without a hitch, did another, even deeper water crossing and rode plenty of nasty, slimy trails. Gotta say the KDX is absolutely an all around awesome bike, it truly did everything well, from tight woods to fast dirt roads to a little sand pit jumping action. I'm not used to a 2 stroke with such good bottom end torque, that was a nice touch. Suspension performed well, I'm sure I will find the limits in time as others have, and then I'll start whining, LOL. The carb needs a little fine tuning for low end response, I'll take an evening soon and hopefully straighten that out. I think the only disappointment was the rear brake. It looked good when I had apart the other day - good linings, no contamination, etc. but in fast riding it and steep downhills it was not very effective overall. A rear disk may be one of my first upgrades. As we were getting ready to leave, loading up the bikes, a 12 year old hillbilly kid rolled up on his bicycle, without shoes :laugh: all excited with 20,000 questions. It got annoying after about a minute, but then I realized that the kid's on to something - dirt bikes are awesome. So we told him to go bug his Mom for an XR50, and headed out and had a cold beer. Apologies for the rambling, but had a great time today and wanted to give a thanks to all for a great recommend on a bike as well as the tips that helped keep it going smoothly :thumb:
carney out.
"I assume the folding saw is for hacking off appendages left dangling after crashes :laugh:"
So my buddy picks me up for first ride of the season and my first in about 15 years. We were given permission to ride in an area by a land caretaker, but in our excitement didn't listen carefully to directions. Finally see the trails, unload bikes, gear up and - get chased off by a farmer. We were parked on his "propurty" and "no one ever rides there" on the trails WE CAN CLEARLY SEE. But hey what do we know, we apologized and loaded the bikes back up. Turns out the propurty wasn't very deep and we finally find a more promising entrance to the trails and venture off. Mind you, it's been raining 4 days straight here in New England. Trail starts off fine, heads straight toward a newly formed lake, branches off just in time and skirts the edge of the lake. At the end of the lakefront where the trail finally shoots into the woods, there is one part where we have to ride though about a foot of water for 5-6 feet. My buddy rolls through on his CR, no problem, I follow up, and halfway through the bike stops dead and sinks in about carb deep :ohmy: I hop off, check the front wheel - clear. Check the rear wheel - missing! Replaced by a spiral of vines. It looked like freakin Little Shop of Horrors. So as I'm wrestling vines out of my rear wheel with my bare hands the voice of wibby echoes in my head "Use the saw..." Which was strange cause I don't really know wibby, so it was more like the crazy voice of the plant in that movie... Only I don't have the saw :clue: never thought I'd need it on a test ride, especially this early in the season when nothing is even showing leaves yet. So anyway, free up the bike, it starts right up thanks to the suggestion on this board of carefully sealing the flywheel cover. Rest of the day goes off pretty much without a hitch, did another, even deeper water crossing and rode plenty of nasty, slimy trails. Gotta say the KDX is absolutely an all around awesome bike, it truly did everything well, from tight woods to fast dirt roads to a little sand pit jumping action. I'm not used to a 2 stroke with such good bottom end torque, that was a nice touch. Suspension performed well, I'm sure I will find the limits in time as others have, and then I'll start whining, LOL. The carb needs a little fine tuning for low end response, I'll take an evening soon and hopefully straighten that out. I think the only disappointment was the rear brake. It looked good when I had apart the other day - good linings, no contamination, etc. but in fast riding it and steep downhills it was not very effective overall. A rear disk may be one of my first upgrades. As we were getting ready to leave, loading up the bikes, a 12 year old hillbilly kid rolled up on his bicycle, without shoes :laugh: all excited with 20,000 questions. It got annoying after about a minute, but then I realized that the kid's on to something - dirt bikes are awesome. So we told him to go bug his Mom for an XR50, and headed out and had a cold beer. Apologies for the rambling, but had a great time today and wanted to give a thanks to all for a great recommend on a bike as well as the tips that helped keep it going smoothly :thumb:
carney out.