Catch-A-Ride

What exactly is going on? Those of you who know all or some of us have a pretty good idea. For the rest out there, this blog will be covering the preparations and trip of three gentlemen (Alex, Kyle and Trevor) planning to ride down to South America (Estimating 25-30,000 km ridden) starting in the middle of October 2013 on a trio of Suzuki DR650s.

To start off the introductions, I'm Alex, I work for a company in Nisku (Just south of Edmonton) doing Systems and Operations work. What does that mean? I ensure that things go smoothly. As you can see below, that is me and the bike I recently purchased. I still have not ridden it, but it does appear that the previous owner cleaned it with a toothbrush. Regularly.

The Steed and prospective rider

She is a 2008 Suzuki DR650 with 1862 km, and will have many parts replaced in the coming weeks (new shocks, case guard, hand guards, luggage racks, many small pieces, 18" rear rim, the list goes on for awhile).

Why replace parts that are essentially brand new? The DR650 is not a new design, it is largely unchanged since the last major rework in 1996, and their weaknesses and foibles are well documented (For example, 3rd gear in the 99-05 model years tends to be weak). The terrain we expect to see (and seek) is not all nicely paved highway. There will be gravel, trails and other conditions we do did not expect or forsee. Since we want to spend as little time on the side of a road as possible, we Kyle (Let's be honest, he did most of the research on this) did a huge amount of reading and figured what pieces were most likely to cause issues and found suitable replacements.

This resulted in a huge order of parts, tires and gear that we shipped to a location in the States and then imported ourselves. Even with Duty and GST, it was still substantially cheaper than purchasing up here. Sorry Canadian motorcycle retailers, but for example, when I can get the new model of my jacket for $50 less than the last version, I'm not going to buy locally.

We will keep you updated sporadically on the upgrades to the bikes and shakedown trips as we prepare ourselves and the bikes. We welcome and encourage your comments and thoughts.