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Lake Geneva, WI
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ATKpilot99
11/2/2022 10:51am
11/2/2022 10:51am
Edited Date/Time
11/12/2022 4:34pm
Sorry for the negative topic but thought it'd be interesting to hear some stories .
Mine was a 2003 KTM 250 SX . I bought it new thinking I'd race it . Took it out for some practice days and racing never happened. Sketchy handling , harsh suspension, and a violent powerband . It also had hand numbing vibration .
An overall crude feel . The only positive was it was very light . Maybe some people learned how to set it up but I wasn't one of them .
Mine was a 2003 KTM 250 SX . I bought it new thinking I'd race it . Took it out for some practice days and racing never happened. Sketchy handling , harsh suspension, and a violent powerband . It also had hand numbing vibration .
An overall crude feel . The only positive was it was very light . Maybe some people learned how to set it up but I wasn't one of them .
The Shop
Moisture-wicking fabric provides a soft, lightweight fit
The 1983 was a great bike and I ran the 83 cylinder on my 84 which helped a lot.
I knew they were bad but had no real clue until my 85 blew up for like the third time and a buddy let me borrow his 85 KX125. HOLY SHIT!!! Night and day difference. Felt like it had 10 more hp!
I love it now though...
By comparison, the 2018 CRF450 I had was by all measures a good bike, but I just couldn't get along with it.
People get so hurt over this brand like their mothers helped pick the colors of them or something
After 40 hours with nothing but problems and a shitty customer service from KTM we sold it and bought a Honda.
E start only, but if you didn't fire it in the first 2 or 3 attempts it was a bump start situation.
4 speed/right side shifter/brakes sucked/everything leaked/ above 60 mph the parts would fly off, mirrors would start spinning, it was like riding an accident, but it looked cool, and sounded cool.
I had a naked woman painted on the tank with custom pin stripes on the sides and then the fuel tank seam let go on the bottom left side and ruined the paint,
I've never had a bad dirt bike - all of them were fun as hell.
My 2000 yz426 was a bitch to start if I stalled it but that was usually my fault, otherwise it was a ripper.
Pit Row
1998 KTM125 EXC
The engine paired to that wide ratio transmission was MAGIC. The bike was pretty easy to work on and really reliable too. BUT I couldn't stand the chassis. The bike felt like pure hot garbage. the seat was slippery. The chassis and forks flexed a lot and the PDS rear suspension was hit and miss, you could make it supple in the rough chop but it would blow through the stroke in big hits, or vice-versa. The bike felt like an accordion just coiling up and springing back to kick you over the bars all the time.
2006 Suzuki RM250
Just magical chassis. First 250 2 stroke chassis that made me feel "at home". I'm a small guy at 5'5" so most bikes feel huge, the RM, felt almost small. And it TURNED and still soaked up everything I could point it at. Only problem was it rarely ran right. I got it used, and completely rebuilt it top to bottom inside and out. crank, piston, full clutch, fresh, proper suspension with all the cool bits (I worked at suspension and engine shop at the time) Every chassis bearing replaced... just.... brand new bike damn near. Some days it didn't want to start first thing in the morning, those were the days it would run perfectly. The days it fired right up, I knew it was going to be a long day as it would randomly stall and be hard to start all day long. We went over it with a fine tooth comb multiple times and never could find a root cause. I eventually tossed a Lectron carb on it thinking maybe the carb body was just worn out. Made the bike smoother and even easier to ride, but didn't cure the problem. At that point I was nearly convinced that the cases had a warp that was causing erratic sealing in crank case and I was OVER IT. I stripped a couple cool parts off of it and sold the heap for 1/3 of what I had into it to a local RM fanboi and went and got myself a Yamaha YZ250FX so I could enjoy life again.
Honorable Mention - 2013 KTM200 EXC.
I really just didn't like anything about this bike other than how it felt sitting on it. The open chamber forks deflected off everything or felt like the front wheel would just be pointed in the wrong direction at random. The throttle seemed like it was only suggesting what the engine might do at any given time. I was still working in the suspension and engine shop at that time with lots of industry connections, so we consulted with the KTM offroad guys and Pro Circuit. We went over the bike, jetted, set powervalve did some little tricky things etc. I sold it with 7.4 hours on the clock without ever even opening the suspension. I couldn't stand how the engine felt.
This entire comment is because you think its so absurd I was focused primarily on the forks for a fork-related issue. Which, was primarily fixed by re-valving the forks... not the shock.
Best bike? 2019 KX450
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