The Husaberg stands above...
The Husaberg stands above the 450 off road population
This bike is out to get you-to get you to buy it. So, don't ride one unless you have about $9500 in your pocket and a desire to throw your preconceived notions about dirt bikes out the window. It is Husaberg tradition to not follow the norm and that's continued with this KTM-built bike.
Exactly where the design came from is a bit of a touchy subject, but from what we can tell, the concept was started with Husaberg engineers and refined by KTM ones. Then, KTM took and built the bike to the standards that have been so successful for them.
Well whoever and whatever departments put this thing together, they nailed it. Where other bike manufacturers have tripped over being different and made machines that suffered from being too unique, this Husaberg makes all its stuff work.
What stuff, you ask? Well, the radical 70-degreee inclined cylinder angle with the crank center raised high up in the frame comes to mind. Closed loop fuel injection with a sensor in the exhaust that keeps the fuel mixture adjusted to perfection rings a bell. Available tuning maps adjustable simply by clicking an optional switch on the handlebar (up to 10 with four pre-programmed in stock.) is there somewhere. And the best feeling chassis action we have felt on a PDS linkageless equipped bike pretty much sums it up.
But everything does not start out rosy. In fact most people who push the Husaberg around (without the motor running) or try and put the bike on a stand will swear that the Berg is a heavy pig. Its weight being a little higher in the chassis makes it feel strange when moving the bike by human power. Some people could not actually get over this until they saw what the scale said: one-pound more then the feathery feeling KTM. Then, they were confused! And while we're bitching we'll get on the only other gripe we have with this bike, the seat breaks down too quick and you will be feeling the plastic frame rails. Oh yea, the Husaberg has a plastic sub-frame-innovative.
The Husaberg FE450's home...
The Husaberg FE450's home turf is the tight stuff
Right away on this bike you get to love the EFI. Cold starts are painless, the bike idles and purrs, ready to rip. Throttle response is as good as it gets no matter what. And I swear the FI brain combined with the ignition mapping knows what I'm thinking when I ride this bike. It seemed that the Berg knew exactly what I was thinking and the motor responded with the exact pull I was looking for. Aggressive as hell when it needed to be and a big pussy cat at other times grabbing traction and making the bike go exactly as fast or as slow as I needed it to go. And it could change just by how I twisted the throttle. This in any ignition map position, though I preferred the standard one most of the time. The softer the ground and the more traction that was available, the more useful the aggressive map became. And the more I rode this bike the more I found myself riding a gear or two high and letting the marvelous chug tractor the bike along till I was ready to pull the trigger with a boost of throttle that starts out where other bikes would bog.
The Berg can light up and spin or lug away peacefully. Then every other non FI bike I get on I feel the millisecond of carb delay every time I twist the throttle and there is that imperfection in every twist that produces a little bit of hit. That feeling makes a bike feel strong but it really is a slight lag, then a punch that the Husaberg does not do. It just responds instantly.
Power wise it feels a little less powerful than the KTM all the way through, for sure a little off in peak power feel as well. It may actually rev farther, it is running clean high up in the revs. But it is not slow and feels as if the Husaberg is moving itself along faster when it is all said and done.
Yes the motor is good. Running it through a six-speed transmission makes it even better. Having a magical hydraulic clutch furthers the point with great feel and control, a light pull too. Our bike resisted boiling over better than the KTM even though they use the same radiators and, really, the same top end.
Then you get on with the handling and any bike with a motor that good is starting with a clear advantage since great controllable power has a way of making it a lot easier on a chassis. But the new design of the Berg delivers in a very strange way.
I would not call it two-stroke-like handling because the FE carries along with it a planted four-stroke feel. That feel of weight that is connecting the bike to the ground, if not downright planting it on the ground. But then the bike has a very light nature to everything about its handling character.
It is light in the steering through the handlebar. It has precision steering, like a KTM, better for any rider that fits on the bike. It is very flickable side-to-side and this combination makes it agile like a much lighter MX bike. But where the new engine configuration makes its points is any time the bike is heavily on one wheel, like in aggressive turning, hard on the brakes or in a pivot turn in a switchback. When you have to flick the bike or pivot it, it just responds like no other four-stroke. The more technical the riding the better the bike responds to it, as long as you are moving a little bit. It loves to wheelie and pop the front tire in the air and it is very easy to hop the bike on and over obstacles. Plush when you do hit stuff, the suspension is really active and it absorbs just enough to take any spine out of the hit, an area where the KTM has had a lot of issues in the past.