Austrian Death Machine- The $300 KTM

Give me your clothes, your boots, and your...
goddammit does anybody here ride something a little more reliable? I don't want to deal with that crap.

I've never really been interested in KTMs- I've always felt they're for the really skilled riders who will give anything for another tenth of a second, and as such don't mind maintaining them; or for the rich posers who pretend to be those guys, and can afford a new one every year or two. I just didn't fit the target demographic, and the potential maintenance costs scared me. But, when a '96 400 RXC came up for $300 on AdvRider, I felt I had to jump on it.

Why is it $300?
In short, because it's broken. It was running, but making a nasty noise, so the PO pulled the left side cover off, and in pursuit of the noise, proceeded to break the inner and outer clutch baskets. No big deal, I've done worse.

Broken outer basket:

Broken inner basket (note the missing bosses in the bottom holes):

So I ordered a complete clutch basket assembly from a '96 620 RXC on eBay- the KTM part diagrams seem to indicate it'll interchange., which is nice, because I've never seen another 400 RXC. Plenty of EXCs, but never this specific model.

Now, what was making that noise? My research lead me to believe it was probably the main shaft bearing, shown below (the one without a gear on it):

BUT there's no play at all in that bearing, so I think it's OK. On the left side of the picture, however, you can see the balancer (the one with 3 bolts in the bottom of it). That guy has a bearing which is pressed into the side cover (the part I removed for this photo). That bearing barely moves and feels like someone dumped sand in it.

So, I ordered one for $20, whipped out my trusty Dremel, and went to work:

Dremel, the official tool of "hell no I'm not buying a bearing puller!" since forever.

Then I of course had to clean all of the metal shavings out of the side cover:

Now we wait for the bearing to arrive.

What else is wrong with it?

As far as I can tell, not a whole lot- but the throttle sticks, which seems like something I should probably address. The first suspect is the sketchy heated grips it currently has, which it lacks the juice to run anyway, so off they come!
I'm not sure how you're supposed to remove heated grips, but a knife on the throttle side and a screwdriver on the clutch side made short work of them. This did not fix the sticky throttle, but it did give me an excuse to order new grips.

To look at the other end of the throttle cables, I had to pull the tank. When I did, I found this:
Why is there an American flag on my Austrian bike? Because that is an Edelbrock Qwiksilver- which my research indicated is pretty much a big old hunk of dogE36 M3.

Not pictured because I was swearing too much: taking the top off the carb, lubing everything, getting it all moving properly, then pinching the throttle cable while reinstalling. Throttle cable ordered, everything should work smoothly once that's replaced.

While I had the tank off, I noticed another potential issue:

Cracked intake boot. The right way to fix this would be to order a new one, but because $300 bike, I used "Shoe Goo". If it's tough enough to hold shoes together, it's tough enough for this:

Total spent so far: $483. For reference, the big gas tank and the nice seat add up to more than that new.

Looking good!

I'm enjoying this.

Nice work so far!

Why the hell does a dirt bike need heated grips?

Dusterbd13 wrote: Why the hell does a dirt bike need heated grips?

Winter ridding?

If I had a dirt bike with an electrical system that was up to it, I'd try it. I'm pretty sure that his one isn't up to it, unless someone added an oversized battery.

In reply to ¯_(ツ)_/¯:

I love KTMs, and I'm by no means a pro or rich poseur.

I've never owned a 4 stroke KTM, but my experience with 2 stroke KTMs is that they are overall more reliable and durable out of the box for serious trail riding. The down side is that when they do break, it costs a lot more, and/or takes more time to get the parts to put them back on the trail.

Don't buy a mid eighties to early nineties KTM, like I own. They are the hardest to get parts for. I have to go to eBay for almost everything.

HappyAndy wrote:

Dusterbd13 wrote: Why the hell does a dirt bike need heated grips?

Winter ridding? If I had a dirt bike with an electrical system that was up to it, I'd try it. I'm pretty sure that his one isn't up to it, unless someone added an oversized battery.

I actually have heated gloves+jacket, so to me no bike needs heated grips, but my DRZ has a plug for my heated gear... and with its' much better electrical system, I still needed to choose between running the high beam and running the heat, since doing both would drain the battery

In reply to HappyAndy:

I'm not saying my opinions about KTMs were well informed... just what they were. We shall see, so far parts costs have been a bit more than the Japanese stuff I've owned, but pretty much in line with what I'm used to paying for Buell parts.

:like:

I guess you could say this is a Double Brutal project to undertake.

Let me know how shoe goo works out for you on those intake boots - I've always wondered if there's some way to seal those well enough since pretty much every bike manufacturer wants a billion dollars for them (looking at you especially here, Kawasaki.)

Kinda funny. Back in your Maverick trip report I recommended ADVrider as inspiration. I had no idea that you actually were a ADVrider.
Can we expect that this KTM will be taken on the TAT (Trans American Trail)? Tenn to Oregon on all dirt roads!

In reply to JohnRW1621:

We shall see... once this is running I need to decide whether I want to keep it or not. It could potentially replace my DRZ rally bike, but honestly I've never ridden a KTM, so I have no idea what to expect. The TAT will happen some day, but I really like the idea of doing it as a fly'n ride

Could the Maverick handle the TAT? Now there's a story!

Add some major suspension travel. Winches at both ends.
Maybe a Maverick version of the Prerunner look.

Inspiration:

In reply to JohnRW1621:

Don't think it hasn't been discussed

Also, thanks for sending me off on another Mexican 1000 research binge.

In other news, the plastics on this thing have seen better days, and I have a few cans of olive drab Plasti-Dip laying around... good idea?

Well, Balls...

I bought the wrong used clutch basket. See below:

Wrong splines, wrong plates, wrong part numbers.

So, what went wrong? I don't think I had bad intel, research still indicates that SOME 620 RXCs had the parts I need, but when I look up the part numbers on these parts I ordered, they also come back as 1990s RXC parts. What?

My immediate reaction was to hop back on eBay, and find THE EXACT SAME THING. '96 620 RXC clutch basket. Except, on this one, I can see the splines and the part number of the pressure plate in the picture, and they're a match.

Conclusion? KTM is a bunch of weird midyear-changing shifty berkeleys. Be more cautious when ordering parts.

For GRM challenge budgeting this blunder wouldn't count, but... actual budget spent is about $600 now.

Ouch

berkeley You KTM

OK, got my bearing, let's install that:

Cold bearing+warm side cover=easy press fit!

Got my new eBay clutch, looks the same, let's install that:

Yay, it fits! Oh look it has one of those lock washer, bend the tabs in things. These are usually cleverly designed so that you always have at least one position where the tabs will bend in properly, but the dumbberkeleys at KTM made it have 6 identical positions.

Oh OK, maybe I'll just retorque it, make sure everything's seated, and it'll line up- no? berkeley you KTM. It has threadlocker, it'll be fine.

OK, now we put the side cover back on, reuse this old gasket, installation is reverse of... how the berkeley am I supposed to put this on? Impossible. I'll use RTV, berkeley you KTM.

OK, assembled, RTV dry, topped up with oil:

Tank on, fuel on, key on, kick it a few times, and it starts! Aaaaaaaaand... it still sounds like there are rocks in the case. I shut it down and rotated it a few times with the kickstarter, I'm thinking top end/timing chain, but then IT STOPPED TURNING. This is actually a good thing, since now when I take it apart hopefully whatever is keeping it from rotating will stay jammed so I can find it. Still though: berkeley you KTM.

I'll get back to this thing later, have to make sure the DRZ is ready for Black River Stages.

WHAT...ARE...YOU? pt. 1
In pursuit of the "clank" noise I opened up the side cover again, hoping to find something binding or rattling. Removed the balancer and clutch basket:

Turning the crank by hand still results in a bind-CLANK over about 60deg of a full revolution. Our problem is most likely in the top end somewhere.

Bummer!!

WHAT...ARE...YOU? pt. 2

After a LONG break to work on the RX7, I'm back to this beast. I took the valve cover off, which on an LC4 means I also took the rocker arms off:

Nothing too scary looking here, but I'll check all the tolerances of course.

The cam looks fine too, with no obvious play in the bearings:

BUT the autodecompression thingy (furthest from camera, next to the cam sprocket) clanks back and forth an alarming amount- I will remove it either way, autodecompression makes for annoying kickstarts and this thing has a manual compression release anyway.

Your threads are always awesome.

In reply to Tom Suddard:

Thanks! Your magazine is always awesome