Kawasaki KLX300 Lengthy-Time period Check [Beyond the Beaten Path]

Constructing a best-selling motorbike should be tough. The producers attempt yr after yr, tweaking every area of interest market with new intelligent designs and options. The fantastic thing about a twin sport motorbike is it may be used on the road and within the dust, although it has challenges of its personal. Do you design the bike to be extra avenue or extra dust? You may’t have each. The Europeans concentrate on race-ready bikes modified to be street-legal, whereas the Japanese dual-sport bikes check to be a lot inexpensive and comparatively docile. For many who need an reasonably priced, fairly succesful, extremely dependable, low-maintenance twin sport bike, there’s the Kawasaki KLX300, a dual-sport motorbike with a beginning MSRP of $6199 in 2023 (together with Commodity Surcharge). Nevertheless, my Kawasaki KLX300 long-term check bike was born in 2021.

What the Kawasaki KLX300 is able to satisfying is the fundamental want to get out and discover. Many fans wish to get out and really feel nature with out feeling it within the checking account. When you demand larger efficiency than that, you’ll spend significantly extra hard-earned money.

My first expertise on the KLX300 was attending a press experience in Northern California. After the preliminary experience, I introduced it dwelling for this prolonged check.

My first concept was to change it extra for added energy. I anticipated extra from the DOHC, liquid-cooled, fuel-injected. I attempted a fast repair of eradicating the airbox cowl and its restrictive snorkel. All I received was the loud sound of it gasping for extra gasoline—I couldn’t hear the exhaust.

For the novice rider, it performs as anticipated. It’s not a monster. It doesn’t intimidate or scare. You experience it like you don’t have anything to show and easily take pleasure in its basic objective. Bettering it in your private wants remains to be an choice—350cc large bore kits are on the market, although I haven’t tried one.

Given {that a} dual-sport bike usually ventures removed from gasoline stations, particularly within the California mountains and desert, I needed an extended vary. The KLX300’s gasoline tank holds simply two gallons. Even with the effectivity of gasoline injection, you possibly can run by way of pretty rapidly. Though the KLX300’s sprint has a low gasoline warning, what it presents in vary is a guess, and never one I wish to make in the course of nowhere.

Let me provide you with an instance of a typical experience.

Leaving my city on the most southern level within the Sierra Nevadas at an altitude of 4200 toes, I head to my vacation spot of Pete Brewer’s outdated Ponderosa Lodge—roughly 125 miles and 4 hours away, 7200 toes above sea stage in Springfield.

My route there takes me to the bottom elevation—1300 toes—at Caliente. Caliente is a historic railroad city that’s almost a ghost city nowadays. It sits a few miles north of California Freeway 58 and was the warmest spot on my summer time experience.

There’s no gasoline station in Caliente or Ponderosa, so I stuffed up at Camp Nelson on the Normal Retailer—sure, that’s what it’s referred to as. I used to be taking an opportunity, because it was July 4. Using down California Freeway 190 to Porterville—the identical Porterville made well-known by Credence Clearwater Revival—was a time-consuming choice. Or, I might experience down The Nice  Western Divide Freeway and Mountain Freeway 999 to Kernville, and hopefully make it. That may be the higher choice as a result of it leads me again dwelling. If I did run dry, I might have had the chance to attempt to scrounge some gasoline from one of many a whole bunch of campsites with gasoline readily available to run their turbines over the lengthy vacation weekend.

I added an SAE energy provide wire with a USB charging port extension on to the battery so I might carry and cost my telephone. I used a easy Ram bar mount with a SlipGrip cellphone holder for my Samsung with an Otterbox Defender case. I stored the house charger and twine at dwelling. A full cost will final by way of an evening if staying in a single day. I left my Garmin GPS unit at dwelling. I most well-liked fast entry to my smartphone for pictures over monitoring the experience.

With a near-full tank, I headed to the Ponderosa Lodge, which had the grill in operation. I loved a burger and headed for extra dust, avoiding the busy canyon drive among the many water fans alongside the Kern River. The following gasoline station can be in Lake Isabella—shut sufficient to my dwelling to make me assured of getting sufficient gasoline to take the extra scenic dust route. As a substitute of using different favourite routes to Lake Isabella that late morning, my experience can be an extended one. It ended after 265 miles, with daylight to spare.

The Kawasaki KLX300 creates loads of warmth within the chin and leg areas on sizzling days, so the radiator fan kicked on a number of occasions throughout my many stops. Fortunately, the warmth wasn’t insufferable.

The unique plan hoped that the Ponderosa Lodge had an out there room—with out one, I’d experience again dwelling. I might have extra saddle time and an opportunity to jot down this story from my 14-inch laptop computer I carried in my Tourmaster Elite saddlebags whereas sitting over a beer on the saloon. The baggage included an evening’s change of garments and toiletries. Nevertheless, I couldn’t safe a room, so I used to be homeward-bound.

The baggage additionally carried snacks, water, and my trusty USFS map, which I by no means depart dwelling with out. Nonetheless, this was a forest I traveled all through the Nineties, and my reminiscence nonetheless works. I organized the AMA Nationwide Twin Sport-sanctioned experience from Lake Isabella and knew every little thing concerning the space. I nonetheless know the place my favourite trails are; some aren’t on the map. Sadly, a big portion of Sequoia Nationwide Forest turned the Big Sequoia Monument throughout Pres. Clinton’s final two weeks in workplace. We misplaced all the nice trails I opened, maintained, and received Inexperienced Sticker funds for signage.

The Kawasaki KLX300 received a style of many various terrains at the present time, and nearly each mile is a curvy, winding, tight two-lane (or much less) USFS street. It even received a style of difficult single-track and a few 65 mph on California State Freeway 58—alternately described on Google Maps because the Blue Star Memorial Freeway and the Bakersfield-Barstow Freeway, everybody calls it “The 58”.

This form of experience is what makes the Kawasaki KLX300 such an excellent bang for the buck. My first motorbike showroom buy was a 1987 Kawasaki KLR650. I rode the massive KLR arduous and quick to work in direction of that Paris-Dakar Rally participant fantasy. I did lots of racing and raced navigational rallies every time there was one.  And right here I’m, 34 years later, on a KLX300.

At 60+ years outdated, I’m within the Assault Mode temper much less regularly, so the Kawasaki KLX300 performs properly. It accomplishes all of the duties I ask, and I’m in no ache, although at six toes even, I might use a taller bar and seat for extra room. The KLX300 has aftermarket following.

The suspension works simply high quality. The KLX300 arrives with a 43mm cartridge fork with 10 inches of journey, and the linkage-assisted shock controls 9 inches of wheel journey. The distant reservoir shock is totally adjustable, whereas the fork has solely compression-damping changes. With a 180-pound rider aboard, it’s plush. For my informal using—no Assault Mode—I had no complaints.

The clutch and brakes are high quality OEM elements. The KLX300 is assembled and well-engineered at an reasonably priced value, and has small passenger pegs. Using two-up for a number of days isn’t any simple job on a 300 dual-sport; that’s what the KLR650 is for. Nevertheless, for a day journey, go forward and share the expertise! One other favourite factor to do!

I realized the arduous manner that for those who don’t flip the ignition off comparatively rapidly, you’ll have a lifeless battery. Kawasaki diminished the battery measurement and added a spacer to the battery holder. When you’ll be touring far off-road, set up a higher-capacity battery, or deliver a compact battery bounce starter, such because the Weego or Fanttik T8 Apex. As is commonplace within the twenty first century, the KLX300 has no kickstarter.

The Kawasaki KLX300 jogs my memory of the sooner pleasure of simply being cell and having the ability to roam our lovely nation. The sights, sounds, and smells of the cattle ranches, cedar bushes, and big sequoias are simply a few of the explanation why I’m a motorbike fanatic on the whole, and a dual-sport diehard particularly. Apart from the battery, the KLX300 by no means let me down in over a yr of various use. Twin-sport bikes have been round for 55 years, and it’s nonetheless a viable platform for exploring past the overwhelmed path, as I found on this Kawasaki KLX300 long-term check.

Pictures by Damon Powell

Kawasaki KLX300 Specs

ENGINE

• Sort: Single-cylinder
• Displacement: 292cc
• Bore x stroke: 78.0 x 61.2mm
• Compression ratio: 11.1:1
• Valvetrain: DOHC; 4 valves
• Fueling: EFI w/ 34mm throttle physique
• Cooling: Liquid
• Transmission: 6-speed
• Ultimate drive: Chain

CHASSIS

• Entrance suspension; journey: Compression-damping adjustable 43mm inverted cartridge fork; 10.0 inches
• Rear suspension; journey: Linkage-assisted, totally adjustable piggyback-reservoir shock; 9.1 inches
• Tires: Dunlop D605
• Entrance tire: 3.00 x 21
• Rear tire: 4.60 x 18
• Entrance brake: 250mm petal disc w/ 2-piston Nissin caliper
• Rear brake: 240mm petal disc w/ single-piston caliper
• ABS: None

DIMENSIONS and CAPACITIES

• Wheelbase: 56.7 inches
• Rake: 26.7 levels
• Path: 4.2 inches
• Seat peak: 35.2 inches
• Floor clearance: 10.8 inches
• Gas tank capability: 2.0 gallons
• Curb weight: 302 kilos