04 TT600RE info wanted

[denmo]

Please tell me all about this bike if you have or had one.
Are they reliable / good for trail riding / bearable on the roads or motorways / easy to maintaine etc.
Please let me know as i am looking for a bike for mainly trail riding and town, with the occasional longer trip back to the UK from Spain.

[floyd]

Hi, i had one of these and i did't like it, i am basing these experiences against Yamaha's XTZ660 which i had before. The XTZ660 was far superior, better comfort, better handling, better wind protection, more power, better brakes and a larger fuel tank to name but a few reasons. If you could find a low miler they are a great buy. I was so disapointed with mine i sold it after a week. There again someone will say they are great but each to his own good luck
Floyd

[beat_]

there are some guy's in poland who drove all over africa and beyond on tt600r. they made a movie about it
http://lordmaciek.easyisp.pl/afryka2005/
http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=swinarski

[DougieB]

Just done a trip on my 04 TT600RE from Edinburgh to Perpignan, and around a bit then back. It's a fair bit harsher than the xt660z, which is essentially a road bike. Having said that I, personally, found myself in utter agony after doing Edinburgh to Rouen in one hit. So that's my distance limit for the bike (500/600 miles?) in one long day. 300 miles is much more do-able. Mine is standard, except I've fitted a 20 lt acerbis tank, and a sheepskin over the seat (big difference, and adds lots of miles onto your personal range). It has an 18" rear, so a better choice of off-road tyres. 70 mph is ok on the motorway, 80 mph for over taking (need planning at that speed). But unless you're a Popeye-a-like it's tiring on the motorways, though do-able to get somewhere. Only thing that's gone wrong with mine in the brief 10k or so kilometres I've used it is the starter relay sticking open. I've not used it enough to have anything go wrong really. Forget pillions, apart from the fact it's not got enough go, they hurt a lot on the wafer thin seat. If you spend most of the time on the road, or take the occasional passenger I'd think about the XT660, which'll still let you go off-road. But the TT should be cheaper.

Other than that, it's just a bike with two wheels and and engine and rider suspended between them. Try it first.

[andybee]

Howdie - I'd have to vote with Floyd on this. I bought one last year and thought it was a bit of a lemon. It's not too badly put together, but lacks the substance of the XT600 (especially the early ones) or the 660. On the motorway, I thought it was kinda poor. I'm quite heavy (95kg) and found that overtaking and the like needed a lot of planning and yoiu really had to thrash the bike to do it safely.

I kept mine a bit longer than a week (5 months) and found that it did improve on being run in - but it still wasn't great. I've since sold it and bought an 04 KTM 640 Adventure, which is what IMHO I should have got in the first place.

Cheers,
Andy

[lordmaciek2]

beat_: thx for putting links to my movies

So I have a TT600R and made 55000 km on it; It's a greate bike for me - I m looking for a new bike now but cant really find smth like the TT600R;

on-road: I'm got used to this and I enjoy long day riding on tarmac, my daily max was 1400km (600-700km is easy);

off-road: you can not compare it to the new XT660 or old Teners; it's much lighter and have greate suspensions (rear - ohlins); you can really do some offroad with gus on WR/EXC and after make 1000km onroad; simple, air cooled engine, on normal riding you can change the oil every 10 000km (when the oil cooler is installed I put 3.1L of oil); 20L tank from acerbis;

But the TT600RE is another bike; acording to the spec its 20kg heavier! the seat was lowered and the suspensions are not that good (sachs I think); electric starter added but no kick

It's still a good bike but for me I think I would be dissapointed to switch from TTR to TTRE;

The bikes I m thinking about now (I cant sleep!!!) are: rebuild my TTR, buying a TTR (2003 not E) with low km, DRZ400E, XR650R, KTM625SXC, KTM640Enduro;

maciek
http://mswin.prv.pl

[leigh]

I did various trips on my old TT600r, now halfway through trans Canada- Alaska-Argentina, all good so far (22000 kms). We are on two TT600re´s this time.