I highly recommend the XT350 for crossing Africa. It's an extremely durable and reliable bike, and very easy to handle in difficult (dirt road) conditions. My wife has ridden more than 85,000 kms on her 1985 model on several trips across Africa (she bought it second hand with 5K kms on the clock), and it never let her down once!

Her second XT350 is a 1994 model which she has ridden across the Australian outback, also without any hiccups. She is so fond of her XT's that she'll probably never sell them, as they are perfect for long-distance travelling in remote areas. The XT350's are very economical with fuel, usually 320 - 340 kms before hitting reserve. With an auxiliary tank or small jerry can of 5 or 10 liters you can cover more than 500 kms between fill-ups.

In terms of reliability, my (Dakar)rallye-prepped R80G/S was a POS compared to the XT350's. After riding across Africa for a few years, my dad wondered if my wife actually rode her bike, 'cause he couldn't understand why I only asked him to send parts for my R80G/S, and never for the XT.

With hindsight, I should have bought an XT350 as well for our African journeys, but I was lured into buying a G/S by the BMW marketing machine at the time. It's way too heavy for many parts of Africa. And I'm talking about the first generation R80G/S (!) which are light-weights compared to the stupidly heavy juggernauts that followed in the GS lineage.

My wife and I crossed the rain forest in Congo (then still named Zaire) on several occasions and I can assure you it was quite a struggle for me (and I was a young, fit 85kg/190cm athlete at the time with lots of on & off-road riding experience!). The BMW's cylinders would scrape over the earthen 'banks' when riding in the muddy ruts, to the point that the bike would start pivoting on the cylinders with only one of the wheels touching the ground. Which meant my wife had to turn back and help me lift the heavily laden Beemer out of the muddy ruts. Then I would try to ride the top of the 'middle bank' until I slid back into a rut, and the whole ordeal would start all over again. I was exhausted most nights after struggling with the beast all day, while my wife (58kg/174cm) would dismount her XT 'fresh as a spring flower'.

We also own a KLR650 (1995, bought 2nd hand in 1998), which I rode across the Australian outback, and while it is a much better bike for riding dirt roads than any Beemer (except for the new GX650Challenge), it's still a lot heavier, more complex, less reliable and less fuel-efficient than a XT350. The fact that it has water-cooling is a disadvantage in terms of reliability.

Based on my experience (5 years & over 150,000 kms in Africa), my advice is to keep it as simple as possible. On a trip across Congo (Zaire) I once came across a German KLR650 rider who was stuck for 6 weeks in a remote village waiting for a new radiator and water pump to be shipped to him. Even today, I would not hesitate taking one of our old XT350's for a trip across Africa.

Don't worry about finding small metal flakes in the oil filter. My wife's two XT350's always showed small metal particles in the nylon oil filter at oil changes. I used to do the maintenance for four colleagues and friends that rode XT350's, and all four of them showed small metal particles in the oil filter/screen at oil changes, and they all did over 50,000 kms without any problems at all.

The thing to check on XT350's is the double rubberized intake that connects the two carburettors to the cylinder head. When they get old, the rubber cracks and the engine will draw air through the cracks, which of course leads to a very lean mixture.

Just check your XT thoroughly, check steering and swing arm bearings (good thing on the XT is that it has grease nipples on the swing arm bearings) for wear. Valve clearance adjustments last a long time before having to do it again. In my experience you can easily do 20K kms between valve adjustments.

Don't put too much weight on the luggage rack as it will cause the rear part of the subframe to break. Better is to reinforce it before the trip. Or put all the weight on the saddle (side panniers and roll-bag on saddle).

Just go! You'll never regret it. You will if you don't go. Africa is the ultimate 'last frontier' for those seeking true adventures. My wife and I still reminisce about our years riding across Africa.
cheers!

One more thing, Tripper. You can put your concerns about air cooling and highway speeds to rest. As she had to keep up with my R80G/S, my wife would ride her XT350 at full throttle for days on end when we crossed the Southern part of Africa where there's long stretches of sealed roads (Sth Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana, etc.). She really flogged her XT350 and I was actually waiting for the engine to blow up, as it had 85,000 kms by the time we reached Cape Town. All I had to do was top up the oil on a regular basis, but nothing dramatic. Upon returning to Europe I took off the cylinder to measure the wear , and it was not out of spec yet (after 85K kms ridden hard in Africa!), but getting close, so I decided to have it re-bored and put in a new piston and valves, as I had it open anyway. And today the bike is still going strong!

Just wanted to say thanks for those interesting and informative posts Gypsyrider; great experience there that should expel any doubts about the durability of XT350s!

yeah awsome comments. Its funny you mentioned the rubber, as that was something that was going when I last used the bike. it was cracked. All comments were good, martynbiker, gypsyrider....and all others for sure.

quick repair.
 

to repair the rubber if its cracked use windscreen fitting adhesive, the black stuff, or even just silicone if you cant get that, smear it into the cracks then wrap them with the Black self amalgamating rubber tape that Satellite dish installers use. this stuff bonds to itself. its so good actually you could even forget the sealer! ( OK you have to take the carbs and the rubbers off to do this)
not a permanent repair but one i know has lasted over 11,000 miles!


Martyn

re: quick repair
 

Martyn, thanks for the tip about the self-amalgamating rubber tape and windscreen fitting adhesive. Great idea! I have done temporary repairs with silicone in the past, but I'll definitely apply your idea next time, as the OEM XT intake manifold is quite expensive. A roll of self-amalgamating rubber tape is going to be part of my on-the-road repair kit on my next ride. I can see it coming in handy in quite a few applications, especially since it doesn't bond to the substrate, so it can be cut away and peeled off without leaving a sticky mess behind on the substrate (i.e. if one needs access to wires, tubes, etc.)