How to desert-prep a scooter?
 

Dear HUBBers,

I have been accepted on the 2012 Budapest to Bamako rally on an ex pizza delivery moped:scooter:, racing alongside the usual assortment of GSAs, XTs and KTMs.

I am guessing that I will have to make up the prep as I go but on the off-chance that someone here has raced a scooter in deep sand are there any pointers?

A frontal lobotomy has already been suggested!

Henry, I offroad a Suzuki Burgman (650) and have taken it through most major Australian deserts (and a few non-Australian ones in Kazakhstan/Russia/Mongolia).

I do NO major preparations whatsoever - I don't even let air out of my tyres.

The biggest challenge is having the small front wheel dig in in deeper sand, so you will often prefer to ride slower - this where you have an advantage, however, as you can ride slowly without needing to worry about a lot of fancy clutch work,

Many of the dirt bike riders would often prefer to go slow in these conditions too, but find they can't because the engine will die at low revs (without a lot of clutching/declutching) so they have to go faster to maintain momentum.

When I rode the Sahara I found that the dunes had a hard and soft side, provide you get enough speed up on the hard side you will maintain sufficient momentum to cross the soft side of the undulation before sinking too deep (most of the time anyway :smartass:).

Great info, thanks a lot!

'Riding Slower' wont be a problem, the stock bikes we are getting wouldn't go past 30 mph/45 kph on flat tarmac anyway. we are going to derestrict, swap the barrels out and get them up to decent speed for the european stage (day one is over 1000kms) then gear them back down for the desert stages.

Hopefully I will have the bikes back on the road in time for Ripley!

I would strongly suggest new clutch plates and plenty of adjustment allowance in the mechanism. I took a 125cc on the mongol rally and damn near ate the clutch because it didn't have enough power to free itself from sand without slipping. If your scoot is an auto then check whatever mech it has.

Cheers Martin

the exact bikes haven't been sourced yet, it's kind of out of our hands. They might be CVT in which case springs, bearings and belts are going to be needed by the bucket full, or they might be semi-autos in which case plates and springs aplenty I reckon!

Did you go through the Turkmen desert on the Mongol, I love that place!

Obviously the correct tecnique for riding in deep and soft sand is to accelerate through it. Riding below 30kph is a recipe for wobbly disaster. This should pose a bit a problem for a low powered slow bike.

If you are genuinely expecting to encounter soft and deep sand you should definately fit a rimlock on your rear wheel. A front rimlock probably wouldn't serve any purpose though. You can buy them for about a fiver, and fitting requires only drilling a hole in your rim. You will then comfortably be able to ride with tyre pressures as low as 5psi without the chance of your valve stem being ripped out the tube. An added bonus is if you get a puncture somewhere a bit hairy, you can continue riding on the flat and the tyre will stay on the rim, and if you're lucky the tube could survive as well.

Are you taking something like a c90 clone with big wheels? Here in London most food delivery bikes are Honda 'Innova 125's.

What a strange thing to say.

Nath,

The honda would be my preferred choice but we'lll take whatever we can.....

I was going to do the budget rim lock option, i.e. some cheap self-tappers, they work pretty well!

From what I remember from riding on sand I reckon I want ro try and keep it above about 50 kph which might be a problem if we end up on 50s!

Actually what may be a solution is one of those pedal/engine Peugeot bikes as seen in morocco. No top speed but amazing on the sand due to lightness. Couldn't lose a beduin kid on a piste, very embarrassing!

We have now decided on the mods we are going to make to the bikes (assuming we get the Honda Innovas)....

1) Knobbly tires
2) Budget Rim locks (short self-tapping screws)

That's about it. Hopefully I will have one ready for Ripley!

Presentation in the making?
 

Hi Henry,

Does that mean you might be able to do a presentation at Ripley about your plans?

Iain.

honda cub 90 is the way to do it!
they are pretty indestructable, and will go forever if you keep the oil topped up.

Iain - I certainly could do a presentation if required/desired.....

Joe - unfortunately there aren't any ex-delivery C90s coming onto the market - hence the hunt for an Innova (essentially they are the replacement for the C90 and have the same design ethos - big spoked wheels, light but solid backbone and small but indestructible engine.

Well I guess the only way to know is to try it out, but I'm pretty skeptical of this idea. I know Chris Scott always goes on about it, but can't remember how much he reckons he's used it. What happens when you get a puncture? If you try to ride on it the tyre will obviously come off its seating on the rim and pull away from the screws, but then there is the risk the inner tube will get caught on the screws as the tube and tyre flap around, and be irrepairably ripped.

Honda innova seems like the best bet to me. C90s are way overpriced whenever I've looked. Think about cheapo chinese trials pattern tyres. Used them successfully on cg125s. CG rims are meant to take 300 on the rear but I think I used 410 on mine without trouble. Those cheap trials tyres are way narrower than you'd expect. // Tyres & Tubes - Got mine here, rear 410 cost around £15 a couple of years ago but you do need a trade account (you can buy their stuff from smaller bike shops, but obviously they mark-up the price)

Cheers Nath,

Just saw your blog (someone tweeted it) - gutted I never made it to the Pamirs - visa prob in UZ meant my TJK visa had expired....

Time will tell with the rim locks, we'll be testing them with low pressure tyres on redcar beach. We're going to have to take quite a few spare wheels anyway, I can easily imagine them collapsing from rock abuse.

TBH I think you are going up a blind alley with lowering the tyre pressures. The main effect is to lengthen the tyre foot print, this isn't going to make a huge difference on a relatively long foot print anyway. The rubber will dig in anyway. best thing is to use a trials type tyre, not a knobbly, they will just dig holes. 3.00 17 catspaw tyres work really well in just about any concieveable conditions. vee rubber make them.
The big disadvantage is that any stoney surface will immediately rip the innertube to shreds when it pinches on the rim. We race offroad with 40psi in them to prevent this.

I've tried the self tapper rimlock idea a couple of times without much success. Drilling the rim's ok and as I understand it the idea is that the screw bites into the tyre - ie the point of the screw makes a hole in the tyre and cuts its way in as you do it up on the outside.

When I did it it just pushed the tyre away from the rim. To get it to work I had to start the hole in the tyre with a smaller drill bit. No idea if it works or not as we never had to reduce the tyre pressure on the bike I did it on.

Get In!!!!
 

Dominos have come through with the bikes!!!! We have Honda Innovas. They're not running but what do I expect for free!!!

I can't fully believe this is actually happening, it may be the stupidest idea I've ever had. The last time I felt like this was when I decided to take a bike to Mongolia but hadn't actually sat on a motorbike before.... Stupid idea = time of your life!

Will see you at Ripley if you're going (mines the bike with the big blue box on the back!), please don't ask me for a double pepperoni......

What an epic day. Couldn't borrow a van so had to hire one (it'll be cheap if we can get back to Sheffield before 6pm!

Drove down to Canterbury via Domino's HQ in Milton Keynes to pick up three bikes that had been left at one of their stores for us. We got down, filled out the V5s and went to their bike store to get them.

Shock and horror awaited as the bikes available were not Innovas after all, but Honda Leads - a 100cc twist and go with TINY wheels. The CVT wouldn't have allowed any suspension mods and would have probably been shattered by a rock.

Having forked out more cash than I could afford on van hire we were understandably gutted, but did spy two Innovas at the back. A few phone calls established that they were due to be sold to a dealer, and a few more calls and we managed to 'gazzump' himp. We ended up with two bikes instead of three so the hunt for the third is still on. Backup plan is now for one of us to stand across the other two bikes circus-style!

On a side note we have started filming it all and the production company think it's going to make alright telly!

Was just thinking about your plans the other day, and how nobody's mentioned the infamous Purple Helmets yet. So in the unlikely event you haven't already seen it, definately blag a copy of their dvd 'Total shite' off somebody. Should provide both relevant entertainment, and maybe some inspiration as well (I believe many of the 'Helmets were competitive enduro riders).

You could also see about getting contact info, and asking them stuff such as what's the best suspension to swap in. They had a stupid amount of kitted out c90s, and it would seem logical that they might have tried different stuff with some of them and been able to observe what worked the best.

Nath, great minds! I got in touch with one of the Helmets a few weeks ago. He was able to confirm that the way we were thinking about the front wqs right - i.e. something like a CR80 front end, gave us some great tips on how to swap the stems over (I was thinking chop, extend and weld the CR stem - advised to have the Innova stem pressed out and then pressed into the CR bottom yoke - perfect fit guaranteed! He also advised us of a suitable replacement swingarm - of an MT5/MT50, and we have tracked a few down on flea bay. A few XT500 type rear shocks and the bouncy bits are done....

Now that we are (almost) definitely in the race category we have started to look at the power output..... 8hp is standard, but with all the extra fuel, suspension and frame bracing we will need more to move, let alone be competitive! We have tracked down a place in greece that works with Takegawa on performance parts. We can get the things up to about 13hp in theory - just need to find a sponsor for our engine spares/parts. We also have a spare engine to take as a backup so we are getting there, slowly.....

p.s. we will be in London for the Brighton Burn Up in September - some distance testing for the bikes and our backsides! We are meeting up with probably some people from London Bikers who have offered to help with fundraising, be good to see some HU'ers there too!

Spare air filters for sure ! Fine dust can clog them, especially being so low to the ground.

Indeed, we're fabbing up some old yorkshire tea tins as airboxes with larger oiled foam filters, will still need plenty of spares though!

Hi,

as for fitting knobby tires, my scooter team is a bit split.

As for our Vespa scooters:

• The knobby tires wear extremely fast, especially on harder surfaces. The fact that our wheels are only 10" doesn't exactly help. Yours will be bigger, but if you have two set of tires where one is a knobby set, you may find yourself having very little rubber left with far more punctures, which means that you may need a third set of tires. As we are riding unsupported and have to carry all our tires, this is a no go for us... but you have a support car, right? If so, this is not a major problem for you.
• Riding knobbies on har surfaces will mean that you will weaver a lot
• For 10" wheels, the only knobbies we have found are extremely hard rubber compound, which is not that good. You may be in better luck though
• The amount of km7s on sand that you will ride in one go in this rally is not that long. This means that you will need to change tires often if you don't want to ride long distances on hard surfaces with your knobbies and only use knobbies on the sand - this may however be different in the rally vs touring class. I would seriously look into how many kms of sand you will be riding on each leg vs hard surfaces

For our intents and purposes I feel that the benefits of knobbies are outweighed by their shortcomings on this particular rally. For our own purpose I think that dual sport tires is the way to go... and I think that the other guys are starting to lean my way as well. The jury is still out on this, and I may very well change my mind. But as of now - no knobbies for me.

As for other mods, I am not too concerned. I may look into a better airfilter, but i think the orignial will do just fine. If the other guys want a performance air filter, I'll get one as well - but it is not a great concern of mine. I will however bring a ladies stocking to wrap arround the fileter and filter housing on the stretches that has really fine sand.

Auxilary lighting may be a good idea, but also this is something i am undecided about. Personally I like the helmet mounted auxilary lights that is used in Enduro. As I am not too concerned about this either, I'll go with whatever the other guys are having.

My greatest concern is to keep my ride light and have a good weight distribution, using only tried and tested parts and upgrades, and keep as much of the scoot as stock as possible as there is little info on upgrades that has endured these types of races. Another concern is to keep all the scoots as identical as possible, including cylinders, pistons, electrics, wheels, etc, so that we won't need to carry as many parts and tools. Another concern is of course being able to carry plenty of fuel... You can fit a large tank, but then again, a jerry can can be sent with another rider to be filled up.

We may be beefing up the suspension if we find performance parts that are built to be durable and not just for increased performance. Many after market parts promise better performance, but lack in the durability department.

We are now making some headway. We will try out some knobblies and some catspaw but I am thinking the catspaw will be better - better on tarmac, larger footprint on sand and will last better.

We have one front end - from a KX80, plenty beefy enough but a bit heavy, and one spare engine for if (when) the first one explodes.

Our bikes produce 8hp as stock so we are now looking at getting the power up as we will be racing, so performance camshafts, bigger pistons, different exhausts and carb jets should see us good. A massive amount of work to do and the support vehicle is still in pieces!!

Yes, it would be worth checking out what sort of 'setups' the Purple helmets use, have seen them perform a number of times and it is quite amazing the amount of abuse those little Hondas can take. All the riders in their group are indeed experienced offroad riders, and really good crowd entertainers.

Yep, have spoken to one of them already! We now have a KX80 front end for one bike, and I've tracked down the swingarms we need on fleabay. Now we are trying to find a corporate sponsor who can help with the engine parts we need - pistons, camshafts, carb jets, cans etc. I reckon we can get nearly 12 hp out of those engines! (without knacking them too much...)

What started off as a very simple, "desert racing, why don't we just take some delivery bikes" idea has become a bit more complicated now the hangovers worn off......

Update
 

Due to financial constraints we have now had to revise our plans to 'try and get the bikes MoT'd and then leave.

This plan is now going fairly well, all the bikes are running. Admittedly two of them are running through a hotwire as we only have one battery between all of us (and that only works because Liam pissed in it).

We may have to do some more, but by the end of the month there should be some footage of us off-road testing as we are getting filmed by the BBC for local news, will post a link when it becomes available!