Hope this question wasnt asked before. But my criteria is a little different. I want to buy a 2-stroke bike that is good with trails and also as a SuperMoto. I am thinking something between 250-500CC stroker. Some background on me: I have owned a lot of small 2 strokes in my life and the biggest I had was an RD350 LT. I have close to 70,000 kilometers of commuting and light trail experience on strokers. The things I am looking for in the bike - Should be good for an easy swap of tires between SuperMoto and Dirt setups. - Mono-shock. I am sick of riding vintage dual spring shocks - Automatic 2T oil mix. I dont wanna bother with mixing oil myself everytime. - Should be decent for commuting and occasional dirt rides. (A good compromise between these two is fine too) - Taggable in AT LEAST ONE of the CONUS states. I can find a friend thats willing to get it tagged for me in their state. - Decent fuel mileage would be great, but doesnt really matter. (one of those added advantages things) - Maintenance, I can do myself mostly but something with solid engine and low maintenance cycles would be better.
What year I know KTM makes the best ones today, and some states you can plate them BRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Year, doesnt matter. Anything from 70s to present models should be fine as long as most of the above criteria is matched. If its a really old model model, I can always find a project and rebuild myself. . After all, I have folks here that I can bug with my silly questions right?..
KDX200SR this is the Japanese model with a steel tank and oil injection i dont know how you would go with rego over there but here its fine OR the TSR200(known to break cranks) and the DT200/230's
i don't think there's a auto mix oil 2t available in the us.. hasn't been one available for a long time... the only one i can even think of in the last 20 years is the tdr - and i don't think those came to the us... monoshock + automix is gonna be tough..
Thanks for the replies. My question was primarily, which bike would be a good all rounder for trails and supermoto. The above constraints are my expectations rather than strict requirements. Okay, if I have to choose between the two, I would deal with dual shocks than dealing with mixing oil. Is there an after market 2T oil injection kit available for any of the smokers? Wait there was a KDX200SR in the US?
The last 50 state legal 2-smoke with all that you are looking for was the 77' & 78' DT400E. 1978 was the last year for 50-state emissions exempt street legal open class 2-strokes. It's fairly old technology, drum brakes and 7 to 9 inches of wheel travel, and an early design monoshock and about 30hp stock with oil injection and ample parts sources. They will go 70 mph all day with the right gearing and weigh about 25 pounds less than a modern DRZ (with half the suspension travel). In the mid-80's there were a number of open class 2T bikes with near modern suspension but none came with oil injection (WR500, KX500, CR500, etc). There are a few of these bikes around that have been dual sported but they were all designed for premix'd fuel & oil.
no idea But we did get lots of US model KDX's imported to here so you might have got the models we got also. i notice that some Mono shock ,oil injection bikes made it there(special imports?) DT200/230,TDR's etc so you might get lucky Baring finding one of those get the old rattler DT400 and put it in a better frame
As stated above, I think you're going to have trouble with the oil injection thing. Pretty much only road legal bikes got oil injection and I think that the poster above is correct and the U.S. hasn't allowed road legal 2-strokes since the '70s. If you can plate a bike that has been imported from Canada then you have some options. We got the DT200R here from '89 to '96 (I have an '89) and they would seem to pretty much meet all your criteria. Also, as mentioned above, we also got the TSR200, and the TDR250 (more road than off-road), for a few years in the '90s. We never got the street legal KDX as far as I know.
My 74 dt100 had oil injection, and so does my Hodaka Road Toad. Sure, but they're from the '70s. What I said was that the U.S. hasn't had road legal 2-strokes since the '70s.
When the US imposed the 125cc limit (and later 50cc limit) on emissions legal 2-strokes the manufacturers dropped oil injection on larger engines (except for the bikes mentioned, the KDX200 and the DT200, for non-US sales & distribution). There is not enough sales volume to modify the larger competition engines with oil injection for a market that is Administrated out of existence by the EPA. I have not seen an aftermarket gear driven oil injection pump system for sale in over two decades. The snowmobile and watercraft outboard engine industries moved to crankcase pressure driven oil injection pumps with reliable success after a few initial problems (before the EPA further regulated 2-stroke watercraft outboards based on oil spillage concerns). Metering the oil feed rate based on engine rpm and engine load (crankcase pressure) proved to be very reliable to the point that with synthetic oil 50+:1 fuel/oil ratios became commonplace on outboard engines. This method of oil metering also addressed much of the WOT throttle chop problems typical of 70's and 80's pre-mix 2-strokes because the metering was not based on throttle position and fuel delivery (and also less throttle position sensitive than mechanical lube pumps). Crankcase pressure during engine braking builds and these pumps by system design meter oil similar to WOT pressures to resolve this problem. This was a big design concern in watercraft engines because a prop in water is always loading the engine at peak torque for the throttle position until the throttle is chopped (load conditions similar to sustained WOT desert conditions until you hit the fishing area), None of the manufacturers applied these pumps to a production motorcycle engine (no profitable volume market due to regulations). You might do a web search as there are people who have successfully applied a marine outboard 2-stroke oil pump to their motorcycle. IIRC porting and packaging the pump were the major problems, along with oil tank position & priming concerns. If you don't want to go to that effort, the legal 70's era bikes or a 200cc import from Canada are the oil injection options.
I am still a fan of the KTM brand 2 smokers , they do not have the oil injectors, but you can get a big tank and boy they handle so much better than any old 2 smoker, I wish I would have gotten a 2 stroke instead of my 4 stroke DS . I mean really a 240+ pound 2 smoker with a electric start and motocross suspension Brembo brakes what more tells you BUY ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
KTM 380, one of the best all round bikes every made IMO. Great trails bike with loads of bottom end grunt, and they are a awesome supermoto bike as well. Glyn
well KTM did do an oil injected EXC200........BUT we didnt even get it here in Aus i dont think they even sold out side of Europe but they did do one
99.9% of home built Super Moto bikes handle like sh*t. You would be better of with 2 sets of stock wheels, one with dirt tyres, and one with road tyres. Next best thing would be to run a 50/50 tyre. If you are happy to build your own, you can build a potent bike, out of dt, it, and yz 400 parts.
