Durability/ mileage of sub-600-ish aircooled single engines
Hi everybody,
although I really like my Funduro, I feel I'd prefer a smaller/ lighter/ less complicated (whatever, can't quite put my finger on it) bike for a serious overland trip. So I was looking at the smaller singles. I came across two comments which left me wondering:
Ingo Mayerhoffer says about the DR350 engine (in German) that it were "robust and long-living, you could even get 40,000km out of it". To which I was thinking "Erm, hello? I'd rather get at least 140,000km out of it, please?" Buying a new bike/ reconditioning the engine every couple tenthousand km is out of my budget.
And Chris Scott says in his "Adventure Motorcycle Handbook" something along the lines of "take a big single, they have a larger oil reservoir and thus last longer [than enduro racers]".
On the other hand there are some people here on the HUBB who traveled with smaller singles, and then there were Mondo Enduro/ Terra Circa...
Many agree that the big aircooled singles (XT600 etc.) are very reliable engines. Now the engine concept is the same no matter the displacement, but the oil reservoir isn't. But is it really an issue (on longer trips, or at all)?
Daniel
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