mixed

The idea of a tourist flying in and jumping on a big bike riding around Bkk is pretty scary.

Well, I'm very sceptical and want some bikers to report owning such an enduro for say 2-3 years and putting 20,000 km on it.

Yes, it will be interesting to see how things pan out. The bike is cheap, hopefully it will prove reliable and in a few years they'll be making a nice 250 that is a bit lighter also.

Something simple and reliable like the XR250 would sell very well if priced at 70 -80k

Thanks for the maps, they are very helpful.

What about small photshops? Any close by?

I've had a bit of a search, but could only find the address to the new imm at Cheang Wattana. Was wondering if anyone knows of a map to the office? I'll be heading from Mochit BTS, I'm familiar with Cheang Wattana, but it's a long road and I don't fancy searching for the place in a taxi.

Also, are there photo shops close by?

Thanks in advance.

It's about value rather than what can be afforded. Similar to other companies, I doubt Kawa would make a sports 250 if it wasn't for restrictions in Europe and other countries.

Europe's got nothing to do with it. The Kawasaki Ninja 250 has dominated the entry-level sportbike market for decades. The little Ninja 250, in fact, has long-been Kawasaki's best-selling sportbike. Ever since its 1983 debut, the Ninja 250 has been a favorite for beginners and many experienced riders have fond memories of the little Ninja upon which they learned to ride. It's also perfect for women and people who are too short for larger bikes.

You are correct, I was surprised. It appears the price and\or it being a beginners bike are it's selling points, two points that may not be applicable in LOS. The closest competitor would be CBR150, which is half the price.

Whether or not it's worth spending the extra 100k for a 650 is debateable. Accelaration at 100kmh+ is important on the hwys here and I've found 400's to be lacking.

Sorry to sound negative, but all bike reviews on the net are just disguised ads. Twenty years ago Kawa was producing much faster 250cc sports bikes.

On the positive side being a new bike with a gaurantee is very important, especially compared to 2nd hand big bikes in LOS. Last night I saw a nice CBR900, a few mins later it had broken down at the lights. There was a mechanic nearby, but the owner was hesistant to let them anywhere near it.

Does anyone know how too watch Thai TV over the internet? Thanks

Does anyone know how too watch Ch 7 over the internet?

For 2010 Honda will move all 250cc class motorcycle production from Japan to Thailand, so it is likely that the 200cc Honda Phantom is being replaced by a bigger model... (Honda see's all 223cc to 249.9cc in the 250cc classification)

Does this include dirt bikes? Is there a chance the CFR250 would be available here for a reasonable price?

many riders are self taught and not particularly expert (myself included) so it often is an unknown.

I'd only ridden dirt bikes and small road bikes, then I got a VFR750 and someone mentioned it to me in passing a few days later. Nice simple technique, but I was never game to 'push' it too far.

The 2t would be faster, the quote below is from another forum:

"on may 2009 at the One Make Race kawasaki 150-250cc class series 2 (FFA), the KRR ZX150 rules the race with podium 1, 2 & 3 leaving the Ninja 250R (4 strokes) 19.317 seconds behind. you can find the article here:

Kejurnas Motosportz kelas FFA 250,… 2 Strokerz ngamuuuk… !!! Rudi Triatmono Personal Blogs

yes the power of KRR ZX150 is better than Ninja 250R, on that race all team are only allowed to change the exhaust, cdi, and some racing part. "

You can get excellent condition KRR's for around 20k. Engine wise these bikes are very similar to ZX150.

Can't read that and dam_n proxy blocker on company internet prevents a translation. It would be interesting to see those 2T on the open road in real traffic though....as mentioned by Señor Powerband it's too easy to tune them for a specific powerband with the mods you had listed. On the other hand, the mods on the Ninja opened it up for sure, but they come nowhere close to the tuning that was allowed on the 2T. Isn't that a carb'd version of the bike ran there also?

Those with the food carts generally aren't in the best shape.

Finding both brand new parts and good mechanics would be easier and cheaper with the KR. So there should be no need to worry about breaking down.

The guy I used to go to had a heap of trophies and the Thai 125cc racing champion working for him. He built quite a name for himself and could charge more for it, but was still much cheaper than Red Baron and the likes.

The point is performance wise the bikes are similar, but price wise there is a huge difference. I'm not meaning to be negative, just trying to put things in perspective.

You mean top performance can be similar. Of course if you can live with a 10(ish) year old bike that has no warranty, been beat on by gawd knows whom, will probably never live with ethanol blended gas, are content with the dated styling, and can't afford the new toy, than yes there is perspective.

It's about value rather than what can be afforded. Similar to other companies, I doubt Kawa would make a sports 250 if it wasn't for restrictions in Europe and other countries.

Thailand doesn't have such restrictions, so for decent power needed on hwys, the 650's are much better value. For heavy Bkk traffic a CBR150 is arguably as good (or better) and half the price.

The Bangkok Post's motoring section runs tests on these trucks and misses all the above faults and refuses to print my findings. Could we have our own motoring section where we can at least be prepared for what we buy ?

The Bkk post runs ads masquerading as articles. To be honest it's not that much better with OS publications, who are inclined to say nice things due to the advertising revenue the need.

There was a very good article in 2006 comparing all the pickups, it came from a Swedish (?) magazine and the models had quite a few differences to those sold here.

Whenever these pick up threads come along, most sayshow happy they are with their choice, but as the cars are new, you can't expect too many complaints. Thais, even those who seem knowledgeable, often have many misconceptions and rarely look past Isuzu or Toyota.

You can get excellent condition KRR's for around 20k.

Please define "excellent condition". The KRR's I see in Thailand are generally in terrible shape and usually have a food cart bolted onto one side...

Those with the food carts generally aren't in the best shape.

Finding both brand new parts and good mechanics would be easier and cheaper with the KR. So there should be no need to worry about breaking down.

The guy I used to go to had a heap of trophies and the Thai 125cc racing champion working for him. He built quite a name for himself and could charge more for it, but was still much cheaper than Red Baron and the likes.

The point is performance wise the bikes are similar, but price wise there is a huge difference. I'm not meaning to be negative, just trying to put things in perspective.

I would look at getting another bike if it's extra speed you're after. The Wave is a practical 'ladies' bike, very reliable, cheap to run and buy, but it's no 'boy's racer'. It seems you got a decent buy for 10k, but the extra 20k you've spent will add very little to the value.

If you want a more powerful bike, then I would consider a Raider 150 or Sonic 125, both these are step thrus and around 20k second hand. You could also get a CBR 150. Sorry to sound negative, but to continue spending money on the Wave will increase little in terms of power or resale value.

I'm more after acceleration than top end speed.

Yes i'm aware that i won't get my money back but i'm not too worried about that.

Spending about AU$1,000 on a bike i can have fun with is what matters more to me.

I will change the sprockets and will probably stop spending there.

Your correct, it's not big money and you seem happy with the bike. I don't know what the price of a rebore should be, but spending to little will probably result in a poor job.

I would recommend trying to find some Thais who are good at modifications and see what they suggest.

Is this the fastest the Ninja 250 can go? That's kinda disappointing with the 144k baht price tag.

A 20k baht two stroke can keep up with that.

The 2t would be faster, the quote below is from another forum:

"on may 2009 at the One Make Race kawasaki 150-250cc class series 2 (FFA), the KRR ZX150 rules the race with podium 1, 2 & 3 leaving the Ninja 250R (4 strokes) 19.317 seconds behind. you can find the article here:

Kejurnas Motosportz kelas FFA 250,… 2 Strokerz ngamuuuk… !!! Rudi Triatmono Personal Blogs

yes the power of KRR ZX150 is better than Ninja 250R, on that race all team are only allowed to change the exhaust, cdi, and some racing part. "

You can get excellent condition KRR's for around 20k. Engine wise these bikes are very similar to ZX150.

I would look at getting another bike if it's extra speed you're after. The Wave is a practical 'ladies' bike, very reliable, cheap to run and buy, but it's no 'boy's racer'. It seems you got a decent buy for 10k, but the extra 20k you've spent will add very little to the value.

If you want a more powerful bike, then I would consider a Raider 150 or Sonic 125, both these are step thrus and around 20k second hand. You could also get a CBR 150. Sorry to sound negative, but to continue spending money on the Wave will increase little in terms of power or resale value.

Just bumping this up. Please post or PM if you can help, the thickness would need to be about 5mm.

^ I understand that there are farang ex-husbands who have forced land sales thru the courts as part of the divorce settlement. There was a guy with land on auction in Phuket, he was encouraging ppl to attend the auction and advising them to never give up as they had rights for anything purchased while married.

I'm wanting to have a rubber seal custom made, it needs fit around 100mm(4") PVC at one end and then taper out to around 200mm (8"). The length would need to be about 400mm.

It needs to be made from rubber that is somewhat flexible, yet able to withstand pressures of up 2 Bar (30PSI), without giving away or ballooning too much.

Any help is much appreciated, pls post here on PM me.

This site has certainly earned it's reputation for being negative and unhelpful. The part of the forks that was corroded is not the part that's collapsing in the irrelevant pic.

I'll Join a Kawa site and see what they have to say, the same corrosion problem I've seen on many KDX forks, so hopefully ppl there will know something, rather than googling for irrelevant pics and info on 'phase-contrast neutron tomography experiments'

Chemical fatigue can lead to hairline cracks that maybe difficult to see before a collision....but they will be more noticeable after the collision!

Ps: I hope your sand paper guy follows the correct testing procedure as found in the following.

I think we're getting a bit carried away here, it's not rocket science after all.

The forks have been cleaned and polished, they came up very nice.

They look like chrome, but left untreated will eventually corrode again.

Any suggestions?

The 2 strokes are comingback into fashion, because anyone with half a brain knows they eat 4Ts for breakfast. If you look around Bkk you'll notice there's more nice looking Kr's Dash/Beats, NSR etc.

A CBR150 has less than 20hp, an old 2T 150 has around 30hp.

Got a link for that claim? Because the dyno that Tyga has posted suggests that the NSR puts out less than 25 hp...regardless of what Honda would like to publish for their marketing.

There are links around the give the HP at about 38 for the NSR and also 24 for the LS 125 (same engine as the Dash).

Sure the companies specs are always optimistic, so are the figures for 'dry weight', the HP figure I got from the CBR are also from Honda. Mind you Tyga isn't exactly unbiased, trying claim a heap of extra HP and top speed to sell pipes.

It's a no brainer, compared to four strokes, two strokes have more power, more smoke are less reliable but easier to repair and lighter.

The main reason they're not made anymore is concern about emissions.

The old two strokes may be run down, but getting them back to top condition is easy and inexpensive, there are still plenty of cheap new parts around. The exception would be the top model NSR, as I understand some parts were made in Japan.

How many pairs of upside down forks do you think your 'Local mechanic'? has even seen let alone had real experience with ? . Corrosion eats into material , that is what makes it flake away , are you sure there is still oil in those forks or are you just presuming ?

Sure he's no expert on upside down forks, but he has seen a few and rebuilt bikes from absolute rubbish to looking brand new.

There is another guy who is an expert, I'll see what he has to say. The only way to be sure there's oil is to open them up, which I'll let some else do. The seals look fine, there's no sign that anybody has opened them.

I'll have it checked out properly before using them, but looking at them today, I think they'll be OK, but probably look a bit rough.

I had an inspection done and the only thing they tested was the noise and emission levels, didn't even touch the lights.

The noise level can't exceed 100 db's, my NSR 150 hit around 86 db's idling.

Don't know what the specs were for emissions, but this 1996 2 stroke was able to pass.

It will be interesting to see what happens in a few years with the 2ts, because apparently for imported bikes only fuel injected bikes can pass.

However the type of mods I'm talking about are completely unaccaptable.

I was told by someone that modifications could be registered, to make bike 100% legal. This would mean dual purpose tires, quiet pipe and lights and mirrors.

I would be terribly concerned with the state of the internal working components , should there be parts inside whos integrity have been compromised , you could be attaching a dangerous component to the front of your machine . You will need some special tools to complete this operation , proceed with caution , parts can be expensive , what you may have gained on the swings , you could very well end up losing on the roundabouts , good luck in your endeavours .

My main concern is that the corrosion would have weakened the forks from the outside, as the inside has oil. The shocks seem fine, like new. I will have someone check it out when I finally get to use them.

From what I've read, the corrosion probably looks a lot worse than it is, because it is lifting away rather than eating in.

I took them to a local mechanic, who didn't think it was a problem, of course he may not be an expert, however what he suggested was exactly what I'd read on the net. He's sanding them down gradually working to the finest paper.

^ This pretty much sums up my thoughts. I'll keep it registered as long as possible.

It's common for Thai riding Enduro not to have registration, sometimes they are riding bikes worth over 100k. Even though there out in the bush, there still on public roads but don't seem to be worried about the possibility of losing their bike.