Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

Anza-Borrego Dual Sport Ride 1997 All( ~ OS THE 1997 ATK 605 OS is the only dual sport on the planet that combines futuristic, cutting-edge frame technology with a 15-year-old motor to produce a m torcycle that fits right into the '90s without the slightest hitch. The heart of the ATK is a tried and true 598cc Rotax powerplant with a bore and stroke of 97 x 81mm and a compression ratio of 9.5:1. The single overhead cam. four-valve motor is fed fuel by a 40mrn Dell'Orto carburetor. The design is dated but these motors are 1997 ATK 605DS reliable and produce a great spread of power. List price $7.695 Wrapped around this motor is one of the Displacement 598cc strangest frame designs we've ever seen. The Engine type Air·cooled. frame uses the motor as a stressed member sin91e-cylinder four·stroke and attaches to the motor in only two places. Bore" stroke 97.0 x 81 .Omm The best way to explain is that it looks like a Compression ratio 9.5: 1 perimeter frame with the bottom and right Carburetion .. . DeWOrto 40mm side removed. The frame tube still carries oil Ignition Electronic and the rear ~uspension is still a linkageless Transmission 5-speed. wide ratio design with the shock attaching directly to the Starting system Electric w/kick . swingarm (a design that KIM has been testing Fuel capacity 3.6 gal. in Europe). Wh_lbase 59.0 in. Suspension duties are handled by fully Rake/trail 27°/4.7 in. adjustable White Power suspension units proSeat haight ...•..•..........36.5 in. viding 11.8 inches of front wheel travel and Front tire 80/100-21 13.2 inches of rear wheel travel. The rest of the Rear tire. . . . 110/100·18 bike is completed with high quality compoFront·wh_1 travel ..•....... 11.8 in. nents like billet triple-clamps, Pro-Taper hanRear-wh_1 travel 13.2 in. cIIebars, Tallon billet aluminum hubs and an Front brake ............•...... Disc aluminum skid plate. Rear brake Disc When you sit on the bike, the first thing Final drive .. ' Chain you notice is .the low 36.5-inch seat height that Claimed dry weight 280 Ibs. ATK achieved with the frame design - a definite plus. The motor produces a good spread of usable power that always seems to be getting to the ground, which is very typical of big-bore four-strokes. It had the most powerful motor of all the bikes on the ride, but that can be attributed to the fact that the ATK is not restricted in any way by emissions devices or noise regulations. ATK seDs the bike as a dirt bike and the buyer hanclles the street registration procedures with the state in which it is to be registered. And that's basically what the 6050S model is - ATK's full dirt model 60SCCES with a factory dual sport kit on it It may be a hassle to go to the DMV, but the long-term benefits seem worth it to me. On the trail, the suspension handles the nastiest of obstacles with ease and the bike is a true joy to ride. At 280 pounds dry, the bike was the lightest on the ride and that became especially noticeable when switching from bike to bike. On the street, it becomes apparent that the ATK is definitely geared for the dirt. At 70 mph on the freeway, the bike is revving about 1,000 rpm higher than the other bikes, but it's not too annoying. It doesn't have a large gap in the lower ratios like the KTM has between first and second gea,rs, neither does it have the high vibration levels. The seat is also a little hard for extended street rides. If money were no object and I had to choose my favorite dual sport on the ride, it would be between the ATK 605 OS and the KIM 620 LC4 RXC. They're both hard-core dual sports made for the hard-core off-road enthusiast, but the ATK has a little magic feature called electric start which won me over. - Cameron Coatney the top 6f a loose uphill and smashed his thumb in the process (no airlift needed, though). After some 'photo opportunities, we eventually trailed over to Highway 79 and joined it before Highway 371 in Aguanga. From here, we traveled south along 79 into the town of Warner Springs for some fuel before heading toward Borrego Springs. We had to change our first flat lire of the trip here when it was noticed that the rear tire on the Kawasaki was out of commission. After pinching our single 18-inch tube, a 21-incher was quickly tweaked into the Kawasaki's dreaded 17inch wheel and we were gone in half an hour. While not recommended for longterm use, weve found 21-inch tubes to be the spare tube of choice on rides like this because they are smaller and lighter to carry, as well as being harder to pinch during hasty trail-side changes. From the rolling hills of Warner Springs we continued along Highway 79 for a while before heading southei'St on 52. We passed 522, which would have led uS directly into Borrego Springs, and instead continued down 52 until it intersected Highway 78. We took 78 east for a few miles until we came to some twotrack roads that Kinney knew would lead us right back up to 522 and into Borrego Springs. The two-track roads that we took to 522 were a blast and most of US had even more fun watching Paul and Jeff do the "death dice" at every tum. For the most part, these two were no more than a few feet apart and swapped more paint than Earl Scheib. It was downright frightening to watch, and most times if they got out of (Right) Associate editor Kit Palmer crosses a stream on the XR650L (Below) For us, changing an Inner-tube is a three-man job. sight you'd eventually find them in a pile after a comer they both overshot, lying desperately close to Cholla cactus and large boulders. Off-road racers these bikes are not. Neither are the riders, who were both very lucky, to say the least. Interestingly, we lost a mirror in this section. After a short bout of trail confusion, we eventually made it to 522 and hooked up with it in the mountains just west of Borrego Springs. It was near sunset and, after some more photo opporturtities, we checked around for dirt roads that would lead us into Borrego Springs, but eventually settled on taking the highway into town. The descending and twisty highway into town was a fun conclusion to our first day, as it was a beautiful, sunlit evening. We aU diced our way to the bottom and pulled into OUI hotel, La Casa Del Zorro Desert Resort, at abou t 5:30 p.m. We had logged over 220 miles and were very pleased to see that we were staying at a top-notch resort. Dinner was.set for 6:30, so we all headed to our spacious rooms, showered and met at the bar. We'd like to say that we met some of our big-tim~ friends in Borrego Springs for dinner, but we ended up settling on the only friends we had out" there Dorna's Dennis Noyes and his wife, Heidi. The prospect of donning our dusty helmets and jumping back on the bikes for our trip to dinner was somewhat less than Kawasaki KLX650R OF ALL THE OUAL SPORT bikes we took on our ride, the Kawasaki KLX650R was the one I previously had the least amount of time on_ I recently rode the ATK on an organized dual sport ride and liked it very much, a lot of this having to do with it being more dirt-oriented than street - I like that. The KIM R/XC620 and 1 go back a long way, and I've spent many hours commuting back and forth to work on the DR650, entranced by its "electric"-type power delivery. The very dirt-worthy XR650L has always been a favorite of mine, but the KLX6SOR is one bike that, for no particular reason, I just haven't ridden all that much over the years, so I was anxious to spend some extra time getting acquainted with the KLX during our ride, and I did just that. At first, the KLX did not impress me a whole lot, much of which had to do with the ultra-soft front suspension and nearly matching cushy rear end, but whenever we were on pavement I was happy. On the dirt, though, you could push the Kawasaki only so far before you ran out of travel. The KLX is comfortable to sit on, making those long stints on the tarmac between cool dirt roads quite bearable, and even on the dirt you can move around on it pretty good. The bike makes decent power, too. Nothing pecial off the bottom, but it does pull well from midrange on up, and there really isn't a whole lot of vibration to complain about. The overall feel of the motor falls somewhere between the DR's ultra-smooth motor and the XR's more vigorous mill. attractive, SO Dennis and Heidi were kind enough to shu ttle us to a rewarding and much-needed dinner complete with bench racing about the day's countless near-crashes and, well, the day's countless bona fide crashes. The next morning, we checked out, had breakfast, got gas and were on the road by 9 a.m. Our initial plan was to head north up Coyote Canyon and take it through all the way to Anza. At one time, this route used to go all the way through, but since we kept seeing "Not a Through Road" signs, we started getting worried. The two-track road was fun and even had water cr0ssings, but our fears were fulfilled when we reached a fence heavily decorated with "Oosed Area" signs. It seems that a four-mile section of the Coyote Canyon trail had been closed sometime this last year, so we had to make a decision. Since the through route was out of the question, our options were to ei ther backtrack over the same basic path that we had covered the previous day or add some coveted dirt mileage by taking our same route back up to Highway 79 and then take Highway 371 east into Anza and come down Coyote Canyon to the other edge of the closed area Based on the fun we had getting to our dead end, we ultimately chose the latter. Coyote Canyon is an epic dual sport area and we all wanted more of the same fun terrain. It took about an hour and a half to loop back around to the beginning of Coyote Canyon in Anza, but we were detem:tined to see th,e rest.of it. We fueled up in Anza and began the trek back down the canyon. The trail consisted of £un fire roads initial- It seemed that every technical traU we came across I happened to be on the Kawasaki, and I never really regretted it. The bike does feel a little heavy, more so than the DR and XR, and certainly more than the ATK and KIM, and it seems to have the least amount of ground clearance. On one trail, lifting the KLX over a log was major work as compared to the other bikes, though the DR gave its rider fits, too. Sti1J, the KLX and I tackled everything we encountered on our ride without any real problem, and the more I List Price $5.699 rode the Kawasaki the more 1 Displacement 651 cc liked it - could've used Engine type liquid·cooled. stronger brakes, though. single-cylinder four·stroke My biggest gripe with Bore " stroke 100 x 83mm the KLX, though, wasn't the Compression ratio 9.5: 1 • brakes but the shifting. Our Carburetion o4Omm Keihin KLX simply refused to shift Ignition .Digital CD from first to second cleanly. Transmission speeds : 5 Very rarely could you make Starting system Electric the transition from first to Fuel capacity 3.2 gal. second on the first try, someWheelbase 5904 in. times it would take three or Rake/trail 28.5"/112mm four stabs at the shift lever. Seat height 34.8 in. This got to be extremely Front tire . 90/90·21 annoying after a while. Rear tire 130/80·17 Despite th,e notchy shiftFront wh_1 travel , 1.2 in. ing, mushy brakes and soft Rear wheel travel 10.2 in. suspension. J £eel I could live Front brake. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Disc with this bike, but it wouldn't Rear brake .Disc be my first choice. That Final drive Chain would be the XR, but the Claimed dry weight 337 Ibs. KLX isn't too far off the pace. -Kit Palmer

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