Trip to Mongolia ?
 

Hi,

Can anyone offer me some advice on motorbike trips in mongolia? I am thinking about taking a 3 week trip in august/september but have a few concerns. I am a new rider and there would only be 2 of us travelling. What do you think ?

thanks a mill,
lara:helpsmilie:

How are you getting there? flying the bikes in? , riding there via Russia? , taking the train from Moscow?.

The only massive issue is that mid September is the start of the russian winter but this has benefits in that the mushy bits in the north are harder and drier.

2 is a good number to travel in as if one gets in trouble the other can help out , the mongolian gravel desert is nasty though , bring LOTS of spare tubes and or repair kits and a spare set of tyres (can be bought in Ulan battaar)

Collectively me and my wingman are bringing 16 inner tubes + those on the bike half heavy duty half normal tubes and 4 repair kits each giving us 64 patches to fix tyres and a potential 72 patches before we are stuffed.

Seriously? 16 inner tubes?

What makes you think there aren't tube repair places in Mongolia or Russia?

eer!
i rented a bike out there last july, a 225 serow, which was ideal, i rode around 1500mls on pretty bald tyres and no brakes to speak of, and only got 1 puncture. the roads aren,t that bad ,if its dry, just corrugations ,you,ll need to stand on the pegs most of the time and travel as light as possible.
The north is the best area to visit,Theres an awful lot of nothing in the gobi, but the hills of the north are stunning.
have a good trip mate.

I'm bringing only 4 spares , two will go into the tyres each one inflated one deflated for express repair so its not so bad...

The thing is our original plans were solo trips and we combined them and our kit was already bought.

We have stuck to our original kit lists since there is a possibility we may split up people can and do fall out this may well happen without one being held hostage to the other for lack of spares.

Reports from motosyberia state that they got many punctures a day, we are going deep to the Chinese border (and crossing on foot for a day trip), where there is rocky stony desert , its all well and fine being able to get spares in Ulan Bataar but if that is 1000km away then you are in trouble.

Although many people say that tubed tyres can be patched up many many times I've found that the limit is about 5-6 times per tube less if it is torn and thus better to have some backup.

We had light snow at the start of September 2007. Take a decent warm layer, and more Vodka than you think you'll need. :scooter:

lol. Just bring a repair kit, one front spare, one rear tube..s (two rear if you are feeling particularly nuts). Don't go putting them in your wheels uninflated, you'll just make your tyres nice and hot and do yourself no good trying to get your tyres on and off, pinch flats and all.

This isn't a thread about tyre repairs in Mongolia. The roads are no worse than the rest of the region.

Kennichi: Tyres (and tubes) for most western/modern bikes cannot be bought in Ulaanbaatar. There are very cheap tyres and tubes for the Izh Planeta 2-stroke bikes, and sometimes for Ural sidecar rigs, but the quality is very low so even if those fit your bike you're much better off bringing your own.

The countryside tracks are not that hard on tyres unless you ride superhard and fast. In four years there I never had a serious puncture. One slow leak only, from a nail I picked up on the sealed road between UB and the Russian border. The south Gobi tracks can be rocky, but again if you have proper tyre inflation and are not hitting the rocks at 100 kmh then you should be ok.

Lara: Mongolia is doable as a new rider provided you ride within your limits, even if that means traveling slowly. There is a lot of info on various aspects of riding Mongolia in past threads in this forum, so I suggest spending some time searching and reading some of those threads. In terms of the season, KTMmartin is right, first snow often comes in the first week of September, and temperatures at night in early September are often already below freezing. Bring a very warm sleeping bag if you are camping.

Scott