Maintenance & Technical > KX500 Original
Better on track?
Goat:
I loved my 98 on the track except in the air it felt like a tank and I couldn't throw my 150 pounds around enough to make a difference in landing position. The 500 takes some practice in the corners to get decent. I raced for many years on many different size bikes. Until i got my 500 I was 100% comfortable/confident in any situation. Seemed like the 500 put me back to virgin as far as learning to ride all over again. Plan of attack is way different. Now when I ride a 250 I feel out of control and it also feels like a 80cc bike lol.
motopunk:
--- Quote from: Goat on December 24, 2013, 05:10:54 PM ---I loved my 98 on the track except in the air it felt like a tank and I couldn't throw my 150 pounds around enough to make a difference in landing position. The 500 takes some practice in the corners to get decent. I raced for many years on many different size bikes. Until i got my 500 I was 100% comfortable/confident in any situation. Seemed like the 500 put me back to virgin as far as learning to ride all over again. Plan of attack is way different. Now when I ride a 250 I feel out of control and it also feels like a 80cc bike lol.
--- End quote ---
yes,thats the reason, why i prefer the 87 kx for the evo-class. the ergomatics of tank and seat are so much better. tank is smaller and it feels more like modern bike, as the88/89 kx250 and 88-2004 k5-frames...
if i take my ´83 kx250 it is like riding 125 with squeezing out all rpm´s it is able to make.. 8-) but this bike is realy fast, if i have the right track under the wheels . this bike really feels like big dinosaur if i try to whip it a little bit in the air, but i love it since my first ride/race after the restore.. 8-)
pökö:
I found an old topic, written by motorrads where he put the newer front end of his kx 500 .. he had asked, Destry Abbott triple tree offset and Destry said they had used 23mm offset triple clamps and the pro circuit dogbones ...and sorry my USA is not good i use google translater :-D
motopunk:
motorrad is using the 48mm fork which gives a little bit more stability in the front end ... but the 46mm fork is with the right setup as good as the 48mm forks...
kawasaki-fork-clamps had mostly of the years a22 mm offset ...
and you should know, that destry abbott is one of the legendary baja1000- winners on the big kx .the reason for the 23mm upset is more stability on highspeed-straights, also the longer dogbones are effecting this... , but this also takes away a little bit of the handling in small corners ...
as far as i understand you are searching for better handling .. what are you planning to ride with it? motocross? cross country? trails?
where are you located??
pökö:
woods and iceroadracing and in FINLAND http://www.iceroadracing.com/en/ pro circuit dog bones are 1.5mm(132,5mm) shorter than original(134mm) and you can check the rake and trail calculator that triple tree thing......and here is old thread for motorrad: http://www.kxriders.com/forums/index.php?action=printpage;topic=6712.0
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