This is our "Baja Twin"...
Read about how this 1993 bike is performing in the Maintenance section, here.THIS is how the Africa Twin started out to become a "Baja Twin". The name refers to the original Honda XR 250 Baja enduro motorcycles that Honda only seems to be willing to sell in Asia. They are sturdy looking and can be ridden all day, because they 'carry' around these special Owl-like 8"-Mother Of All Head Lights.
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Original Honda Baja with owl head lights |
It used to be a Honda Africa Twin
The motorbike that some people claim to be "the father of all big bore enduro bikes", was sold to me over the internet. After a brief inspection and a ride on the monsterous looking thing, I did indeed buy it in an eye wink. These sort of machines never stop to exist, stop to run, stop for anything, so it must be good. At home I found out the chain was sloppy, some of the panels were cracked, the trip meter wasn't working for long, the fuel tank was dented as well as the radiator on the left and the luggage carrier had a crack in it (all a result of someone dropping it to the left).
Anyway, the black - metallic grey bike turned out to be a beauty. Our beauty. Our 'George' (people give their bikes names, don't they?). Ready in time to leave for a short field trip to Morocco. The country to try out a RTW trip in short, the natural habitat of the Honda XRV 750. It wasn't that we didn't reach to Northern Africa, or that we didn't like the idea of such trip, unfortunately we did not see much of Morocco's Atlas mountains, Marrakesh or any other of the King's Cities. George did not even bring us all the way to the port of Sete where our ferry was harboured (South of France).
Honda Africa Twin 2011 |
The bike was quickly fixed at Uncle Tom's scrap yard in the South of France. We bended the handle bar back into position and so did the footsteps as well. We spent an entire roll of duc tape to stabilize the cockpit (more or less). A Honda CBR 600F served it's purpose as a donor for the broken regulator. The next day Comarit brought us to Marocco (Nador) where we shortly found out that the fuel pump had stopped its operative duties too. Bummer!
Now it's a Custom Twin; Baja Twin is born
BajaTwin AKA 'George' |
Some of the (after market) gear that has been bought and installed on the Baja Twin:
- Baja Designs Rally Headlight (transformed H1 light to H4)
- Acebis mud guard (front) and alu stabilizer
- Mefo Sport Explorer tyres (front and rear) - Super Explorer's are better but not available in seize 17"
- Self made alu wind deflector / fly catcher, held with MRA brackets
- Acebis hand guards
- BMW GS hand grips
- Trailtech Vapor computer / dashboard
- Garmin eTrex Vista GPS + RAM mount system
- K&N airfilter
- Arrow Dakar exhaust
- Selfmade luggage plate ( Jeroen van de Voorn)
- Alu spacer to replace the speedometer drive thingy
- Holan alu cases from Poland (2mm and riveted, importend when going down to the ground ;-)
- Blinker lights from Louis.de
- Engine guards
- Jason's Mosfet regulator from Roadstercycle.com
- Facet 40105 Fuel pump via Ruggedroads.co.uk (ask Jonathan for Africa Twin advise, he's a guru) UPDATE april 2019: +100K km and still going strong as an ox. So buy this pump to replace the old AT crap
- 12 volt cigarette connector
- SW-Motech foot pegs (ridiculously strong)
- New guards for water coolers
- Seat / bench is newly upholstered (twice) by some dude in Ilpendam
- A lot of Hammerite
Jeroen van de Voorn of VVM Racing (Spaarndam) helped me out with rerouting the exhaust and checking the valve clearances as well.
Thomas from Bikes & Solutions (Haarlem) fixed a problem with the carburetor that was caused by some dome-ass mechanic in Morocco. This lunatic dug into my bike and defragmented most of it right on the dirty street... He found out the fuel pump had ceased to exist but that's about all he could do for ten Euro-bucks!
- And, yes, we'll be both sitting on George. One cylinder each ain't bad! LOL
Read about how this 1993 bike is performing in the Maintenance section, here.
Not bad.. I may learn to ride a bike again after 40 years Devinder G
BeantwoordenVerwijderenYou bet ya. I will teach you to refresh your skills on the throttle!
BeantwoordenVerwijderenJust found your blog, very nice (baja) twin :) and it looks familiar to me :) there is the reason why
BeantwoordenVerwijderenhttp://img94.imageshack.us/img94/9412/dsc00679gu.jpg
Great conversion! It's a TransBaja! Where did you get the head light from?
VerwijderenNice bike
BeantwoordenVerwijderenSeb le Baroudeur
nice bike info share
BeantwoordenVerwijderenhonda 125 for sale
I would like to thanks for the efforts you’ve put in writing this web site. I am hoping the same high-grade blog post from you in the upcoming as well. In fact your creative writing abilities has inspired me to get my own web site now. Actually the blogging is spreading its wings rapidly. Your write up is a great example of it.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenBikemandu Nepal
Hi, I like the side fairings, are they the original ones that you've trimmed/cut to match the bike? (the ones that are attached to the sides of the fuel tank).
BeantwoordenVerwijderenHi Andy, all is true! These fairings are just trimmed by cutting them with a hacksaw. I used tape to get the best equal looking cut on either panel.
VerwijderenDo you intend to personalize your bike this way as well?
ciao Roemer