08 KTM 530 Dual sport questions

[Uzi]

I am thinking about getting an 08' I've read till my eyes bled at thumper talk seen a few bad stories but mostly good reviews. Anyone here have any experience with them? My daily ride would consist of about 15 miles of rather poorly maintained gravel roads followed by highway and inner city riding for about 20 or 30 miles.

I've always want a bare bones big bore dual sport and I hate to join the four stroke side of things but that bike seems to fit my needs. My only question is 1000+ miles a month am I going to spend more time on valve adjustments and such than I will riding?

I don't care much about comfort or carrying stuff and I like the idea of hitting local single track or completely unmaintained dirt roads the mood moves me. I don't want a sport bike or cruiser because of the gravel roads. Roommate has an 07' CBR1000RR and has to ride to the highway at 25mph not my idea of fun

Is there some other option that I missed I thought about an XR650R with D/S kit but I would really like to buy new this time Any other bikes that might be better for this type of thing? Main thing is I want an off-road bike that is road legal not a on road bike that does ok off-road. High speed speed riding won't happen that often but I don't want something that is screaming its valves out to get to 70-75mph

Any input appreciated.

[bigjay]

dirtbike magazine had 90% good stuff to say about it, check out februarys issue, theres an article dedicated to it, the thing they pointed out is that it is a DIRTbike made road legal, not a road legal bike made dirt.

[ISBB]

brian one of the owners at thumpertalk picked up an 08 and loves it.

[redrocket190]

http://www.husqvarnaracingclub.cz/stra ... nky/55.htm

[britincali]

^^^ That looks shit, does nothing for me whatsoever


Kinda looks like one of those chinese MX lookalike cycles......

[redrocket190]

Tell me how you really feel!

I have a 510 SM and wished I had bought the TE version. Awesome engine. Really straightforward to work on. But I do agree it needs a graphics kit...

[britincali]

Just looks tacky and plastic, I normally really dig the huskys....

[britincali]

Ahhhhh that looks better!!!!

[britincali]

And this is very bling....

[dannygraves]

ya, the huskys are cool... I especially like that FI... just think, no more jetting

[Uzi]

redrocket190 whats the valve life and adjustments like on those huskys? From what I'm reading on the pumpkins you need to adjust the intakes at every oil change and the exhaust valves every other change. So 700-1000mi between valve adjustments that doesn't sound like much fun to me. That would make it a once a month or so job with the miles I would put on.

A few people on thumpertalk posted that you should plan on a total valve job before you get to 8-10K miles. I saw an aussie guy post that he had 9000km (5600 mi) on his and hadn't really done anything other than adjust them a couple times and he had a dealer look his motor over and the ring end gap was at new spec still. Its just hard to sort through all the crap about top speed and the flat-billers that say it pops big wheelies over at thumper talk. I just want to find someone that actually rides it but takes care of it to know about the reliability.

I just hate to plunk down almost 9G's just to be doing top ends all the time.