Knowing that a good many contributors here are from Devon I just signed up to post a youtube that made me laugh, and is supporting Devon Air Ambulance.
I found it on a site I use regularly - HorizonsUnlimited. The star of the youtube is riding a Honda 90 from Malaysia to the UK and is about to enter Europe from Turkey. (The youtube was posted up while he was in Istanbul).
I'm a great fan of the TTR250 and have often browsed this, and the TTR250 faq site, but I now wonder about the C90. A group recently rode a batch of them to The Gambia (an annual event) and two women are now on their way to Mongolia from Mitcham (UK) on a pair of the Chinese versions.
Anyway, on signing up to this site, I just saw, on the Overlanding forum, that I've been preceded by someone I met at the Thundersprint a few weekends ago. I had my TTR250 there that I had previously ridden to Cape Town. Yes, I think it's a brilliant overlanding bike.
So, I'm just going to dream up a few words to write over on that forum as well.
Cheers Ken
-- Edited by ken on Monday 4th of June 2012 04:48:00 PM
Thanks for talking with us, Ken. Pleased to have you aboard, having read about you in other posts on this forum and the web.
It will be interesting to read your comments on the WHY and HOW of the TTR? I know that I'm completely satisfied with mine, but I had to be since it was supplied by the TTR Guru in Devon.
Why: As well as sports bikes, I've ridden small trail bikes as well, culminating in a Serow back in the 90s. That was such a nice bike I decided to ride it up to North Cape and then around eastern Europe and home, over 3 months. And it was brilliant. Later I started looking for a bike to ride to Cape Town and was influenced by the reports of Lois Pryce. I checked out the TTR250, never having known anything about it, and it all looked good.
How: Well I bought this bike with quite a high mileage, but it had only one owner who seemed to have looked after it properly which I think is more important. Plus it already had the 22ltr tank fitted and the home-made rack. I'd read about the weak points, the starter train, so changed the starter clutch as a precaution as it seemed a straighforward job. And fitted a lowering link as it was too tall for me off road. And sawed off the exhaust restrictor which was still in place. I had the wheels respoked with heavy-duty spokes, which was a bit of a disappointment as they are tending to rust. I only did it because the Serow broke a couple of spokes during the time I had it, so it was probably unnecessary.
That was about it, apart from a plastic topbox, soft panniers and a tank bag (all second hand) and tank panniers, new. I took far too much stuff (everyone does it seems) and ditched the tank bag by Egypt as it was incredibly uncomfortable apart from anything else. Total weight of luggage, which I only came to know through the entire bike being weighed at the end of the journey for air freight home, was 90kg.
And nothing broke, so it truly is a very strong bike.