True, but I found it shockingly hard to find a mechanic that would check my valves for me - most outright refused saying that if the bike started then everything is fine. This was both in my home country (UK) and all the way across Asia. I finally found someone who both had feeler gauges and was willing to check in Kathmandu, but then they didn't have shims for a Suzuki (I had a DRZ, which has shims instead of screws like the DR), so I ended up having to ride with valves out of spec all the way from Nepal back home to the UK. I haven't had a chance to crack open the bike because it's hard to find a workshop in London, but I suspect I've sustained some damage.

I mean, it is impressive that the bike managed to keep going despite this, but it kind of goes to show how problems can start to compound themselves when you can't do stuff yourself. I'm considering buying a DR in the States for my next trip, but ONLY after I've taken apart my DRZ and rebuilt it and feel confident. I'd honestly never reccomend someone do what I did (that is to say, taking a used DR/DRZ, no preventative maintenance done (cause I couldn't find someone in the UK to do it for me), and then take it on a big trip. Too many mechanics either didn't have the tools, wouldn't work on my bike, couldn't communicate with me, or weren't very good, and I spent SO MUCH time chasing problems wondering whether the last mechanic put the carb back together properly or knew what he was talking about when he said something was fine. If I hadn't been an idiot mechanically I would have fixed it quickly, moved on, and not even given it a second thought and probably be posting here about how reliable the bikes are

Note: a lot of these problems seem greatly lessened in the Americas.

Realistically I don't think it's very hard for ANYONE to get to the point where they can do this stuff on a DR/DRZ (We'll certainly see when I finally get a workspace) but not everyone has the opportunity to do so.