Hi there,

I am in the market for a new bike, and have really gone for the new Tenere. Clearly I am going for one second hand and after a fair bit of searching around the £4,000 price range have stumbled on a decent looking 2009 one for £2,995.

It does, however, have 26,000 miles on it and so has clearly been on some,or one, fairly decent trip! This isn't necessarily a bad thing of course, and it has a full service history but I was wondering, would this thumper have plenty left in it? ie the life expectancy of of a Tenere in general?

I do intend to hold on to it for a very long time, and will use it purposefully for overlanding, starting with Morocco in two summers. I've emailed the seller but of course appreciate second opinion, is there anything I should look out for with this model?

Finally, for a fair bit more, say £500 I can manage one which has only 6,000 on the clock. Without seeing the bikes specifically you cannot tell, but might it be worth holding out a little longer for this one, does the mileage really affect it quite so much?

Many thanks
I will find out just how hard the miles were, but in the meantime any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

Mine has 23K on the clock and it's a 2008, doesn't use a drop of oil and goes great - mos tof them were hard miles.

Pop over to . : XT660.com The #1 xt660 resource : . | The #1 xt660X, xt660R and xt660Z Tenere resource, that's where you'll find a wholeraft of owners. One member has nearly 60K on the bike (a bike courier).

The bike doesn't really open up properly until around 10k anyway - but it's your money.

A few things to look out for;

Reg/Rec connector, some of these were shipped without being properly pushed together, and then missed at PDI. with 26K on the clock I'd wager that this one is fine.

Cush Rubbers, these are made from cheese and need replaced every two tyres, or every tyre change if you are unlucky. Worth checking the hub for movement as they retail at around £30 to replace. You can extend the life by packing out with inner tube, but it doens't last long.

Wiring loom wear, some early bikes had the ties overtightened and the loom couldn't move, as a result it wears through. A few people have seen this, but I'm the only one so far to suffer a failure from it.

Other than that the bikes are great value for money. Yes they will fur/rust in places if not properly winterised, no more or less than other bikes.

Aftermarket OE stuff, the crash bars have a habit of breaking at the front mount as do the Alloy bash plates. If the bike has them, check it - you could use it as leverage to push the price down. Other aftermarket stuff is available from Adventure-spec, Off-the-road.de and Touratech.

But the best thing is to pop over to XT660.com and aske the guys, you'll get lots of feedback.

I agree with what GasUp said, but if it was me, for another £500 I'd be more inclined to go for the lower mileage one...
Go see em both

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http://www.tenere.co.uk

Thanks very much, it really does seem 6 of one etc etc.. Modwise my only intention was for handguards and a bash plate- the adventure spec one does appear particularly good, despite the price, especially as it includes the water pump protection. Lets just hope I can resist the urge to add more and more....

Not to sure about the crash bars, have had mixed reviews. Having said all this, haven't even got the bike yet but can't blame a guy for dreaming....

Will indeed head over to the forum, also waiting to hear back from the high-mileage seller, but I am inclined currently towards the additional cost and lower mileage. Time to wait and see, hopefully I'll be a very happy man before long!

I'd get the lower mileage one. That's high mileage for a single...Geoff Shingleton had a lot of trouble with one of these recently - seemed fine when he bought it.

Don't get too hung up on this, lots of people do but the reality is no-one has destroyed a waterpump (yet?). JMo & Piglet took a standard Tenere through the US, covering something like 20K miles both off/on road. Mines had done 1/3 of it's life on trails with no issues. If you lay the bike down the water pump doesn't go near the ground, and my bikse been horizontal more time than I care to remember (I use the OTR bash plate) with no damage.

Clearly, if you want the piece of mind then go for what you want, but do it for the right reasons, rather than speculation.

Handguards - Barkbusters appear to the dogs danglers these days. Unfortunatly for me, when I got my bike the only thing available were the OE ones. They are as tough as you like but a bit pricey and lots of people complain of the lack of wind protection, I don't find it a problem at all though....

Hi,

I beleive it's all about the maintenance and how the bike was ridden i don't ride fast on motorway, oil servicing i think is very important ,and not letting the soaking in the rain, in the long run the electrics are affected. my 98 xt has 100 000 km and ride everyday. will surely goes on to 150 000km.

However if most bike sell for 4000 and one is 2995 there must be a reason. I would go for one that hasn't done big trip (motorway) , more for a city owner.

Cheers

You can do fair bit to a bike for the 1K difference in cost. If the motor seems OK I would be most worried about the rear shock as they are big bucks to replace. If all looks good and the consumables like tyres, chain and sprockets, discs are OK then I would have no problem with a higher mileage. In a lot of respects a motor that has done long trips may be no worse than one that has only been used for short 5 to 10 mile commutes as it would never get up to full working temperature.
I have an old model XTZ660 which I love and am tempted to get the XT660Z soon. They seem to be getting a lot cheaper. I have seen 2008 models with low mileage, luggage etc for 4k.

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