Dennis,
See below:
Are the front shocks air adjustable?
**No. You can put air in 'em, and a lot of people do, but it's not factory recommended. I personally see it as a way to blow fork seals.
I read hear that an owner has had several (like 7) electrical issues
causing the bike not able to be started with his 2008, is this an
isolated issues or have others had the same problem?
**The '08s and '09s had wiring issues. There has been a recall that supposedly fixed the problem(s). I haven't had any problems with my '09. Make sure the recalls are performed on your new bike when they deliver it to you.
Does the KLR650 have a 600 or so mile required break-in maintenance,
and if so, is it just checking the valves an timing chain? Does
the dealer have to do it in order to not void the warranty?
**The maintenance is easy and yes, there's a 600-miler... the hardest part is checking the valves. You can perform all maintenance yourself and not void the warranty. The law says so.
What is required to maintain the drive chain, all my past bikes had the non-Oring chain, which required me to lube the chain after a few
hundred miles. Do O-Ring chains just need to be kept clean and not
lubed?
**The KLR has an o-ring chain and maintenance is easy compared to non-o-ring chains. This may start a religious war on chain lube, but keep it clean (get the grit out) with something like wd-40, and if it makes you feel better, the factory recommended chain lube is 90wt gear oil at 500-mile intervals. One guy got 30K miles out of wd-40 alone on an o-ring chain (google "the wd-40 experiment"). Once again, YMMV.
-Jeff Khoury
Astatic Solutions, LLC.
----- Original Message -----
From: "bufbooth"
To: "DSN KLR650" DSN_KLR650@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, May 5, 2009 6:00:29 PM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific
Subject: [DSN_KLR650] Looking to Buy a new KLR650
Hello All,
Just wanted to thank all for the feedback on the KLR650s over the
last few days. My local Honda dealer is also a Kawasaki dealer, so
after work today I rode over to see if they had any KLR650s in stock.
They did, three of them, one of each color (Blue, Red, and Green),
and the bonus was they had a Honda CR650 parked right next to them.
The CR650 is definitely out of the picture, this comparsion helped me
a lot, even though I knew on paper the Honda is not what I wanted, it
helped to see one next to KLR650s. Hard to give up on a brand that
has worked well for me over the years. The green color was nice, but
I think I am going to go with Red.
I think my little Honda XL185s thought she was being traded in, when I was ready to leave, the ball bearing in the kick starter struck, so I could not swing it open to kick start it. Took me a minute to get it unstuck, looks like I got a little groove in the path the ball bearing rides back and forth on.
A few more questions if I may:
Are the front shocks air adjustable?
I read hear that an owner has had several (like 7) electrical issues
causing the bike not able to be started with his 2008, is this an
isolated issues or have others had the same problem?
Does the KLR650 have a 600 or so mile required break-in maintenance,
and if so, is it just checking the valves an timing chain? Does
the dealer have to do it in order to not void the warranty?
What is required to maintain the drive chain, all my past bikes had the non-Oring chain, which required me to lube the chain after a few
hundred miles. Do O-Ring chains just need to be kept clean and not
lubed?
Thanks all,
Dennis in Indiana.
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