2005 Honda CRF450X Dirt Bike - Long Haul

Painful. Especially the radiator! And the shock body! Eek, the muffler, too! All totaled (literally), the Glen Helen 24-Hour cost about $1025 in parts. But considering the punishment the bike went through, it was in good shape, especially when I rode it. The bar might not be exactly straight, but there isn't any new vibration, shakes or irritations to speak of. I've been off the bike for about 40 hours and I'd have noticed it.

So the DR staff spent a couple of days trail riding in Baja on it. The CRF survived Mexico with only a few new scratches, which were hard to notice since all they did was cover up old scratches. And to get the bike ready for its next big adventure, prerunning the Baja 1000, we simply swapped to a 15-tooth countershaft sprocket and changed the oil. In Mexico, on the fast and beat rough roads that made up this year's course, the CRF showed great stability and durability but fell a little short in the gearbox. It could have pulled a 16-tooth countershaft, but first would have been too tall. It really needed a six-speed, like a KTM EXC. But even through all the high-rpm rides the bike never whimpered. We were going to check the valves but skipped it since the bike was running so well and starting right up. What Baja did do was eat up the Sidewinder Ti-series O-ring chain. It was totally our fault since we used WD-40 (which has too much kerosene in it for the Teflon O-rings per Sidewinder). This dried the chain. Then the 15-tooth countershaft ran the chain against the case guard, letting the heat get to the O-rings wherein they started to fail. And once the O-rings began melting off the chain, the rollers got loose and the chain began flopping around enough to saw the knobs off the side of the tire. We replaced it with a D.I.D 520 VT narrow T-ring chain that mimics the smaller size (width) of the stock CRF chain. The Sidewinder Tri-Metal sprockets still show zero signs of wear.

Off to trail riding duty again, the CRF still feels as tight as ever and was ridden back-to-back with the White Brothers CRF we featured in the Dream Rides section (April '06), which was a brand-new bike. The biggest hassle so far has been to Heli-Coil the brake pedal pivot bolt, which stripped out when the bolt removal was attempted with the circlip still in the back of it (you saw the picture last month). The clutch cover was cracked from said brake pedal flopping around, and a little JB Weld fixed it. We actually glued it a few times before finally breaking down for a new cover. And wouldn't you know it-on the very next ride the bike fell over on a rock and wrecked the cover again. It is amazing how well Dirt Rider fender stickers can keep oil inside the motor in a pinch! So we again used JB Weld to fix our new cover, and it's still running. Until we find something stronger, we'll stick with it!

So the next task for our CRF is the DR 24-Hour where, one year after it was introduced to us, it will get finished off. We have a team assembled to run it through one more grueling event, and then you'll see it spread out like a Playboy centerfold and view what more than 200 hours of abuse looks like.

Running Tally

Hours on Bike: 191
(46 since last update)
Modification cost total: $2840.25

IRC M5B rear tire: $77.95

---