KTM700RR with Craig Hartley

This entry is part 17 of 22 in the series Adventure Rider Issue #2

Why, what, how and when.

Your standard 690 could look like this.

There’s been a lot of interest in the build of a specialist, Rally Raid-styled 690 featured on the Adventure Rider Magazine website. We went to Dalby Moto’s top dog, Craig Hartley, and asked him what was going on. Here’s the story in the Ol’ Dingo’s own words…

The project probably started about five years ago when one of Dalby Moto’s customers asked Darren Wilson if he’d build a fairing, nav tower and down pipe for the customer’s 2008 KTM 690 Enduro.

A lot was learnt from that project, and combined with the ideas from the beautifully engineered masterpiece of a genuine KTM 690 Rally, the knowledge has now been put into a kit form that will give 690 owners the benefits of a bike similar to a KTM 690 Rally, but at a fraction of the cost.

Why would we build it?

Because there’s nothing available to the adventure-motorcycling world in a serious, single-cylinder bike with proven reliability, awesome handling and performance combined with 30 litres or more of fuel storage and a fairing. There’s some good rally kits on the market, but they’re still only offering around 20-litre fuel capacity. The Safari Tank for the 690 gives a total of about 26 litres, but that’s not a fully faired, rally-style kit. There’s an overabundance of larger-capacity adventure bikes from all the brands, but many of these don’t suit the average rider who likes more serious terrain.

Another reason is that there are a whole stack of adventure riders who have no plans on giving up riding any day soon, and a lot of those blokes are over 50. All those riders are going to want lighter, single-cylinder adventure bikes so they have half a chance of handling them in difficult conditions and picking them up when the inevitable happens.

What do you get in the kit?

The kit for the 690 is being engineered so it can literally be bolted on.

The fairing will hold a steeringhead-mounted headlight and fairing tower, rally-replica headlights that far outshine the standard headlight, rally-replica style fairing, and a carbon-fibre fairing/dashboard insert that takes the genuine speedo.

This last will also be designed to accommodate an array of switches and other items an owner might like to put around the cockpit area. When the fairing is removed, the dashboard

stays on the tower for easy maintenance in the area behind.

In the fuel tank department the kit will have two approximately nine-litre-perside polyethylene tanks giving an easy 30 litres plus, KTM fuel taps, all mounting brackets, genuine KTM rubbers, bolts, fuel lines and brackets as well as extension wire and plugs to power the fuel pump. For the rear tank there’ll be block-off plugs and taps so the fuel pump can be removed and relocated into the right-hand side front fuel tank. There’ll also be an extension wire and plugs to relocate the reserve fuel sensor into the front tanks, allowing roughly 50km to 70km on reserve. The rear tank gravity-feeds into the front tanks.

you have to turn taps off when you’re fully fuelled as fuel drains from the front tanks and out the rear overflow. The kit is so well balanced that all three tanks can be filled and all the taps can be left on.

The graphics on the tank will be moulded into the plastic.

The kit will also include the carbon fibre/kevlar bashplate, designed from the 690 Rally. The rear mounts are taken straight off the genuine KTM bashplate and the plate simply pushes into the locating holes under the rear of the frame, while the front is held with two eight-millimetre bolts. The front bashplate mount also doubles as the lower fuel-tank mounts and holds the regulator/rectifier relocated from the righthand side of the frame.

The exhaust department has been designed to retain the original or aftermarket muffler. You receive a muffler-mount bracket and modified header downpipe that runs to the lefthand side of the bike and uses the genuine KTM mounting points on the fuel tank. Some have asked why not put the header pipe on the right-hand side, but then you wouldn’t have genuine muffler location mounts in the rear fuel tank.

How did it evolve?

I won’t go into the nitty-gritty of exactly how it’s all been done. It’d take a book to explain it, but I can say there’s been well over 1000 hours of Darren’s time alone put into the project, and so far it’s cost over $40,000 in materials. This investment hasn’t been taken lightly, but we’re building a high-end product that we plan on distributing worldwide in 2014.

The original photos actually showed unusable fibreglass tanks built by Darren and a fibreglass fabricator that then had to be sent to Mick at Nomad Tanks for him to put his experience forward and add his comments, criticisms, improvements and changes, and all of this before the oven moulds could even be looked at. The steel, two-piece moulds to cook plastic tanks in are an engineering masterpiece that take many hundreds of hours of work to create. A similar thing has to be done to build the fairing, bashplate and dashboard insert, but not to anywhere near the same level as fuel tanks.

The end result was tested over an eight-day ride across Australia from Byron Bay to Steep Point and down to Perth, which included the French Line in the Simpson Desert. The trip saw us average 800km a day, and all on dirt roads apart from the final day.

From a rider’s point of view

As a rider who’s travelled over 150,000km on V-twin KTMs, it was a little daunting getting back on a singlecylinder bike for such a large trip, but it soon became apparent that the bike was really comfortable. The August run from Dalby, Queensland, to Byron Bay, NSW, arriving at 1:30am, proved the fairing did its job admirably and kept the cold air away from all parts of the body. This was underlined when I had my foot out at an angle and my toes got cold in the breeze, but angling the foot back in fixed the problem. So even the bashplate gave protection from the elements.

The tanks gave a natural thin feel when sitting on the bike due to their rally-inspired design, but more importantly due to the fuel being carried so low on the bike. Even with fuel bladders full and a total of 50 litres on the bike, plus saddlebags, swag and tank bag, the bike still had a nice, light feel in even the worst of desert conditions.

Another good thing to note is access to the fuel pump is easy. Just remove the bashplate, tilt the bike on its side and allow the fuel to drain to the left tank, then unplug the wires and remove four bolts. If you had more than 20 litres of fuel on the bike you’d have to drain some from the right tank.

After owning a 660 Rally years ago, I remember thinking a few times during the ride how I’d always wanted to get another rally bike, but considered it out of my reach. I’ve ridden Darren’s 690 Rally before, and I honestly felt I was riding a 2013 690 Rally when I was on the kitted bike.

The bashplate offered good protection for the low exhaust, foot brake, gear lever and rider’s feet, even when hitting ’roos, and it was also a breeze to get on and off for servicing.

The low exhaust gave no problems to the bike’s mechanicals. At the muffler end it worked well with luggage and swag, and for the rider it didn’t get in the way. We didn’t have the heat guard fitted that the production kit will have, and it still didn’t heat up a rider’s foot.

The suspension was absolutely stock except for heavy fork springs and a bit of fine tuning with a screwdriver.

What worked?

The fairing, fuel tanks, exhaust and bashplate and their corresponding mounts all stood up to the pounding admirably. Of course the KTM 690 itself excelled. We had a fuel vapour lock early in the ride that has now been fixed by rerouting the fuel lines.

As it was only 14 weeks since I’d broken a bone in my pelvis, I wanted to make sure the seat was comfortable, so I fitted a KTM rounded gel seat, an AirHawk medium seat cover and a big lambs’ wool seat cover over that. It was unbelievably comfortable. I was offered the KTM1190 a couple of times and I declined.

What failed?

We were using the genuine headlight and speedo mounted forward and high in the fairing, and had bolted a reasonably large LED light under the headlight. First up we learned the genuine headlight was not that good, even with a HID kit fitted. Then the LED light mount cracked so we zip tied that back on. The mounting position for the speedo was at the wrong angle and was hard to read as well, so basically our headlight and speedo mounting wasn’t acceptable. We’ve since redesigned a far more substantial headlight and dashboard using the genuine 690 Rally headlight and mounting system.

I’d fitted ’pegs that were adjustable to a lower position. I broke one off in the desert, so I guess we won’t be using those ’pegs again.

Success

The overall quality of the kit far outweighed our expectations and the couple problems with relatively minor components were really nothing and we’ve made suitable amendments. The good thing is that the trip across Australia found any weak points, and even though the Rally headlight adds a little extra cost to the kit, it’s well worthwhile.

By the time you can read this we will have already had a finished model displayed at the Sydney Motorcycle Expo and will be taking orders. For more details contact me, Craig Hartley, on 0428 621 211 or emailchartley@dalbymoto.com.au. You can check for updates on www.dalbymoto.com.au

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