Moderators: Dan J, Diesel Dave, Crazymanneil, Stuart
Nothing like having someone right there who can check them out.
It's about time for a change anyway.
Much more appropriate 
oh well always thought the job should have stayed in good old blighty, maybe they could make them at Cranfield, they could have McGuigan on the tank. 
The story is getting more strange every day!! .... or is this only an emotional interpretation ? Who did start this whole idea of building this Kawasaki based bike ? And what went wrong . )can start at the end of 2007 after the evaluation of the first 50 . 
: Sure, I'm suprised if any of the parts would interchange besides nuts and bolts. If it were an exact copy, it would cause copyright and Patent infringement. I bet Kawasaki has lots of well trained lawyers. Sure it's modified, and I'll bet they showed you lots of drawings, blueprints, or as-built drawings. I'll pull up my auto-desk, auto-cad, or any other 3d computer generated drafting software, hit print and my plotter will print anything. If I had a 4-5 axis CNC milling machine, and a chucked up a block of aluminum, I could make anything. Like an almost exact copy, just slighty different so not violate patent laws.Stuart wrote:That KLR engine only shares one or two parts (outer cover and coil I think) with the old KLR engine. It is quite aways from a standard KLR petrol engine. I got to see where they designed the thing and all the castings that were laying about and the technical drawings. Stuart McGuigan was good enough to invite me into his office so a bit unfair to say it's a modified petrol lump.
Only not quite in the numbers we expected this far down the line. Shame that. I can't recall what models came out but one old KLR I saw had a huge (and I must say slightly weird) looking cylinder arrangment. That is opposed to a smaller capacity bike I later saw. Never was that taken with the original KLR engine myself. But I've heard Army sorces say it was 'stone-axe simple' so maybe that suited them? I'm not saying liquid cooling is the best (it's obviously has potential to be just another problem that has to be fixed in the field whereas aircooled stuff won't leak) but I'd say it was a nessessity if you gotta have a military Diesel bike. 
Anyways, my KLR is difficult to work on, I don't like the way it's designed and would not buy another. On the positive side, it's very quiet, gets great fuel mileage, and after the first 10,000 miles or so, you don't need to adjust the valves as they pretty much have worn in for the long run. What is strange about the design is this: engine should put out all kinds of HP (DOHC) but is set to deliver lots of torque thru the entire rpm range. This equates to no HP on the top end, period. There is no point reving the engine above 4,000 rpm as it will only deliver lots of vibes and tax the cooling system. When I was thinking about building a diesel bike, I would ride my KLR around and watch the tack, noticing where I was shifting and trying to relate to an engine that would only rev to 3,600 rpm. I was amazed to find that I never went over 3,600 rpm on the KLR!!! Shifting was always below that and performance wasn't an issue. I could outrun the traffic and never speed the engine. 
Would be an interesting read.
It's only a matter of time before someone thinks to mass produce, now BMW should take up the chance as they seem to have a chassis and gearbox that would work well with a 3cyl electronic injected turbo engine. Low revs and mass torque 