Blake and Matt's KLR Adventure

Matt's Priorities

Looking at Blake's list of mods I see that he is taking the belt and suspenders approach to crash protection. (Witness his installation of both an improved brake caliper mount, and a brake caliper guard.) I expect to meet him in Nevada looking for a KLR, and instead a Bradley tank will show up. I have my own list of mods, and while some of them address some of the KLR's inherent weak points, most are for comfort or to protect my camera gear.

Since my KLR is currently down due to front brakes that locked, my first priority is to flush them and put in new brake juice. While I'm doing that I figured it would be a good time to put on stainless steel brake lines and install speed bleeders.

Phase two will involve both sides of the handlebars. One flaw I did find with my first KLR (fortunately before I left for Alaska) was how easily a fall can break the left mirror mount. Since the mount is part of the signal switch the replacement gets a bit expensive. Fortunately the aftermarket provides a nifty solution in the form of an improved switch and mirror mount. In addition to providing better crash protection, the switch also allows you to turn off the headlight while putting around in the dirt, and a feature I'm really looking forward to, push to cancel turn signals. Other items for the handlebars will be heated grips, Pro-Grip Gel Grips, and a Vista Cruise. Finally to keep track of where we're going, I'll be using a Moose Roll Chart Holder. The last three items are coming from Arrowhead Motorsports and I would have provided direct links but they used a frame based site that makes linking impossible. (Sorry Fred)

Phase three will be performed when Blake comes up for Memorial Day. First off, we'll do the ever popular Doohickey upgrade. When I had my first KLR, the Internet hadn't been invented yet so I never knew about this failure prone device. Now I gather it's a test of whether you're a real KLR aficionado or not. A skid plate and a low profile drain plug also seem to be well advised so they're going on. Another area I was never concerned about before reading about the KLR on the Internet, is that apparently you can be going down the road and all of the sudden the rear end of your bike will decide to part ways with the front end. So I will be installing a subframe bolt upgrade kit. Then I plan to hang a pair of aluminum panniers on the bike. On my Alaska trip I got by with soft saddlebags, but my camera equipment has gotten a lot more expensive since then so I wanted hard, lockable storage.

While Blake is here I plan to check out his bike for two additional items, a Corbin seat and an LED taillight. Although I've done 400+ mile days on the stock seat, it's generally pretty miserable after 100. I had a Corbin on my 1983 Vision and really liked it so I'm pretty much leaning toward that option. I'm still not sure if I want to spend $65 to save a few watts.

Blake's Initial Equipment

One of the other things we discussed during our planning session on Saturday was that it'd be good to do a dry run of camping by motorcycle. We need to sort out who's going to bring what to make sure we don't miss anything or double-pack. Memorial Day weekend provides an ideal time to do this, and it is far enough away that we should be able to get our luggage ordered and installed by then without a problem. We'll also use the weekend to upgrade the doohickey on Matt's bike, as he's stuck his fingers in his ears and shouted "nya nya nya" up to this point.

Matt has already ordered most of the equipment and enhancements he expects to use, so I'll let him post about them. Here's what I've ordered in preparation for the Memorial Day weekend dry run:

Happy Trails Northwest Side Rack

A simple but durable rack for the rear of the bike that will provide a solid mounting point for saddlebags, plus a little crash protection as well. The biggest benefit is that it'll keep my saddlebags far away from the muffler so that they won't melt! Chosen to work with the saddlebags below.

Ortlieb QRL Dry Bag Saddlebags

These soft panniers are made from dry bag material. Properly rolled closed they'll float and they're very abrasion resistant. They're also lighter than aluminum or plastic panniers, and some folks maintain that they won't catch a rider's leg during a fall like hard panniers can. I used to have a pair on my first motorcycle and was quite satisfied with them. They're a little more tedious to open and close than hard panniers, though. The "QRL" version has quick release latches on the backs to attach them to the Northwest rack, making them easy to take on and off the bike.

F1 Engineering Rear Master Cylinder/Brake Mount

The OEM mount is a cheap, forged piece that breaks easily if you fall on the right side. Once it breaks you have no rear brake—a real bad thing when you're in the dirt. F1 Engineering has made a CNC machined aluminum piece to replace it.

Kawasaki Rear Master Cylinder Guard

This is a simple little shield that attaches to the rear master cylinder and keeps the rear brake hoses from getting snagged on any vegetation.

Mapping the Route

Saturday the 18th Matt was in town, so after a great Moroccan dinner we retreated to my bachelor pad to review the maps Matt received from Sam, the "discoverer" of the Trans-American Trail (TAT). Since we can only afford to escape from real life for about two weeks we decided to focus on the Colorado and Utah portions of the TAT. Both of those states are fairly close to California, and they offer some tremendous riding and scenery, so they seemed like a good choice. Also, riding across them should take about a week, which leaves us a week to get there and back, plus a little extra in case we decide to take some time off along the way. Matt ordered the maps for both states and brought them with him when he visited.

We examined the route to get a feel for how far from civilization we'd be and kept an eye towards camping opportunities. Sam's maps are pretty focused on the route itself, and only show about 40 miles per map, but we were able to follow its general path on a couple of road maps I have to get an idea of what parts of the states the route flows through. We'd like to camp out during our trip, both to save money and because we simply enjoy camping. However, I'm not sure how enthusiastic I'll be to pitch a tent and cook a meal after 10-12 hours of wrestling my KLR over a couple hundred miles of dirt.

It looks like we won't be straying too far from civilization—or at least a hotel and a diner at the end of each day. Similarly, we're rarely very far away from potential camping spots, either. So, we decided to play it by ear.

We also decided to ride our bikes from California to Colorado instead of trailering them to Utah. We'd initially thought about trailering the bikes part way, but somehow it just didn't seem right. I mean, these are dual sport motorcycles, supposedly as adept at pavement as they are on dirt. The idea is that you can ride your bike on pavement to the fun off-road areas, ride the off-road areas, and then ride back home again. So, why haul out the trailer and miss the fun pavement on the way? (Yes, we know that there's no fun pavement in Nevada.)

So, the initial plan is to head out from our respective homes and meet up in Sparks, Nevada on day one, then travel to Delta, Utah on day two. Day three would see us heading towards Grand Junction, Colorado, but with Moab so close we might have to stop by and see Fred at Arrowhead Motorsports. It would be an ideal time to ditch our street-oriented tires in favor of some Dunlop D606's, which are better suited to our upcoming off-road adventures. Lastly, day four would end around Trinidad, Colorado and the start of our Colorado leg of the TAT.

Colorado should take about four days to complete and Utah should take about three days if we stick to Sam's schedule. That leaves about five days (maximum) to get back home at the conclusion of the TAT ride.

And the Adventure Begins

I've known Matt for about six years now. We "met" as members of the Triumph Sprint ST email list. When I moved to California he was one of the first local motorcyclists to show me his favorite roads, and even though he moved from San Jose soon after I arrived, we've stayed in touch and done several long distance trips as well as weekend rides together.

During one of our weekend rides he decided to ride his Kawasaki KLR650, a dual-sport motorcycle, instead of his Sprint ST. "What's that ugly thing?" I asked when he first wheeled it out of his garage. He told me a little about dual sport motorcycling (motorcycles that are equally adept on pavement and dirt) and the trip he took to Alaska on one, but I was pretty much a street snob at the time and wasn't too interested in the idea. Later that day we traded bikes for a while, and I found the riding experience, well… interesting. The bike had very little power, which was a good thing because it had very limited brakes and a suspension that seemed to sag if you just looked at it hard. When we traded back Matt asked what I thought of it. I said I thought I could see how it might be fun to ride on some of the rougher rural roads, but little did I know that a seed had been planted.

Fast forward to November of 2004. Riding with a couple of friends in the boonies south of San Jose I managed to low-side my Sprint ST. Dang, my first motorcycle accident on the street! I was fine and the bike was still rideable, so it wasn't until I got the bike home and started to replace the damaged frame slider that I discovered that one of the engine mounting tabs had sheared off the cylinder head. Uh oh, one totaled motorcycle. "Hello? Insurance company?"

A couple months later I had a check in hand for the (meager) value of my Sprint ST. I thought about getting another Sprint ST because they really are tremendous motorcycles, but then a funny thing happened. Remember that little seed that had been planted during my ride of Matt's KLR? A few emails later I discover that Matt's brother just happens to be thinking about selling his KLR. Bingo--Blake's got a new bike!

Sometime in early August of last year I sent my buddy Matt a link to a cool video of someone's dual-sport motorcycle trip along a portion of the Trans-American Trail. "Let's go!" I said in the email, fondly recalling our last ride together. You know, one of those throw-away invites folks don't really mean.

What? You don't know what I mean? Hmmm. Neither did Matt!

So here we are, in the early part of March, 2006, and the idea of riding at least part of the Trans-American Trail is still gnawing at Matt's mind. It turns out that neither of us took a significant vacation last year because of work demands, but this year the stars are aligning and it looks like we're both going to be able to get away for a while. What better way to spend our vacation time than to abuse our bikes and our bodies by traveling the Trans-Am?