Reviving a KTM 950 Super Enduro
The first time I saw a KTM 950 Super Enduro was in Laos while on my trip around the world. An Australian couple we had met just two days before were travelling on one. I loved it! The looks, the sound(!), the Akrapovic exhaust, the 30 litre Safari tank… I wanted one, and exactly like that one! But as only 3000 or so were ever made and production had ended more than 15 years ago, the chances of finding one were low. Add to it that only a handful were sold in The Netherlands, as we don’t have a lot of off-road options around here, and chances of finding one for sale were slim. So much so that I was looking for the next best thing, the 950 Adventure. I had been scanning the Dutch version of Marketplace for more than a year for a good 950 Adventure when I suddenly saw a 950 Super Enduro for sale… and in mint condition too. The price was high but I was willing to pay that, but alas personal circumstances threw a huge spanner in the works so I reluctantly had to let it go.
A year or so later the same bike came up for sale again! I jumped at the chance and bought it sight unseen! What arrived however was a 950 SE in a sorry state. It had been trashed by the then current and unsympathetic owner, who sold it again because all his mate’s had Yamaha Tenere’s… I think he also sold it because he couldn’t ride it. Had he continued riding it the way he had done, it would have ended up on the scrap heap, with him probably with it. |
From a mint condition it had deteriorated to a wreck, in a matter of months. It was a real sorry sight to see… my favourite bike, trashed! There wasn’t a single part which wasn’t bent, damaged, mangled, scratched to shit or broken. It ran poorly, had a pair of cheap and horrible sounding exhausts which were badly dented, a chain which had almost morphed into a solid bar of rust and a rear tyre worn through the canvas.
What was wrong with the bike?
|
|
My dad thought I was mad, grandma thought I was mad and quite frankly so did I. What had I let myself in for, and why? Let’s not forget that I hadn’t actually ridden a 950 Super Enduro, never(!), I just loved the looks and the sound. They say you shouldn’t meet your schoolboy heroes as they always disappoint in real life, maybe the 950 Super Enduro would too. After all I liked this bike so much that it couldn’t possibly live up to my high expectations, could it?
So I did the right thing, ignored all the good advice and started ordering parts from all over the world to restore it! Safari could still supply the 30 litre fuel tank (original tank on the bike was badly damaged), so that was ordered from Australia. MSC Moto, also in Australia, provided a steering damper for a 990 which fits with a small modification. In the UK I found a set of brand new Akrapovic exhausts at a KTM dealer, in France I found a whole stash of parts which I was alerted to through a customer of ours in Belgium. In Germany I found a set of beautifully hand made carbon fibre plastics to replace the badly scratched and faded originals. The sticker designer we use for our Nomad kits made a faithful copy of the original and now unobtainable stickers. From the US came a Rottweiler air filter kit and jets while Cyclops provided me with a headlight as used for the Baja 1000 (yet to be fitted). Meanwhile the parts guy at my local KTM dealer searched high and low for any new old stock parts still lying in warehouses all around Europe. So many parts came in that my dad thought I was building a second one from parts… I even found a spare 950 engine for sale, so I bought that too!
Many months were spend rebuilding the sorry looking 950 into my dream Super Enduro. Despite the previous unsympathetic owner, the engine internals were found to be fine. So much so that an oil and filter change and valve clearance inspection was all that was needed. I decided to replace all the cooling hoses with silicone ones from Samco as they are much better than OEM rubber ones. The fuel pump was replaced with a unit from Poland, which leaked and dumped the whole engine full with fuel overnight… Had I not noticed that and attempted to start the engine, it would have been very costly. I replaced it with a new old stock original one, which works fine. |
I spent hours and hours doing up the original headers as new ones were no longer available anywhere. I rebuild, tuned and balanced the carburettors 3 times before I got them right (or at least I thought I did) as the jet information is a bit contradictory. I sourced a new seat and the last seat cover for a 950 from Seat Concepts before they stopped making them. The forks were rebuild and serviced, as was the rear shock, new brake discs and pads were fitted, the wheel bearings were replaced too.
It was a huge amount of work, and on a bike I never worked on before. As luck would have it I managed to get in contact with the Australian couple I had met in Laos! They still had their 950 Super Enduro… which had now covered a staggering 400.000 km…! So if I could get it running properly… at least I knew it should be reliable! |
After a lot of hard work, time and money came the dreaded moment, would it start? Would it keep running? Would I finally be able to ride it now and most of all, would I even like it?
Well, I can honestly say that the starter motor is fine… as it eventually did fire… sort of. It clearly wasn’t happy. Running too rich and seemingly running more on one pot than two. We had checked the compression on both cylinders, which was fine and very little between them. The carbs had been cleaned, tuned and balanced but something was not right. But what? The front cylinder was running hotter than the rear, while it would be more logical the other way around. The carburettors balancer showed differences in vacuum between the carburettors depending on the revs. The carburettors clearly still weren’t working as they should. At times like this you realise how much easier it is to tune a fuel injected bike... What didn’t help is that the 950 carburettors must be the most complicated ones ever invented. |
My dad, who is from the carburettor era, knew what each part is for and how it should work but even he sighed ‘why did they have to make it so complicated and so inaccessible?
We got it running decent enough for a short test ride, or better still I just couldn’t wait any longer! The first thing that jumps out is that engine! What a gem. It pulls so hard from low revs. It’s absolutely what I always wanted, and then some. Schoolboy heroes sometimes don’t disappoint! It feels a little top heavy, a bit like the 701/690 does, but as my 950 has a 30 litre tank that’s hardly surprising. The seating position is great, for me anyway. The engine though is what makes the bike super, despite the carburettors not being perfect yet. And then there’s the soundtrack… a proper v-twin with a deep sound, a deep growl almost but luckily not too loud. A 950 with Akrapovic exhausts is hard to beat!
There are downsides too… well, only one so far. It’s a little heavy on fuel. In fact my dad calls it a binge drinker…. It returns 14 km per litre, or a little over 7 litres per 100km when ridden slowly over country lanes on a Sunday morning. Compared to an EXC or even an 890 Adventure, that’s slightly ridiculous. Both the EXC and 890 ridden in similar fashion use about half what a 950 does… |
What kept puzzling me were the carburettors. What the @#&! was wrong with them. I studied diagrams, contacted mechanics with 950 experience (who all said they had never seen the issues mine had…), I even found a second set of carburettors for sale, so I bought them too. I was just about to fit them when I wondered if it could be the vacuum balancer I had bought. It wasn’t electronic but just 4 tubes, what could possibly be wrong with that? As it turns out, lots! All 4 showed different readings on the same carburettor! Don’t you love it when people make crap and don’t test it before they sell it to you?
So I balanced the carbs by ear/feel and it ran fine ever since. The heat from both cylinders is the same now. The already great engine is now even better! The torque and power is seriously addictive! What a shame they didn’t put that engine in the 890, but I guess the environmentalists bureaucrats will probably be the cause of that… So what’s next? Well, I love Avon TrekRider tyres. We ride in all sorts of weather. From cold freezing winter temperatures to hot and dusty summers. Late autumn is the best ‘test time’ for tyres, when the roads are coated with wet mushy leaves, or mudfests from farmers getting their produce out of the rain soaked ground. Add low temperatures to it and most tyres will fail miserably. But not the Avon TrekRider. The best tyre ever for muddy roads in my humble opinion. They are seriously underrated. Unfortunately they no longer come in the 950/EXC rear size. So I can either get a wider rim for the rear or get a set of Haan Wheels and store the originals… hmmm. It’s a hobby so it can cost money, right? A few years ago my grandma said I needed a hobby… not sure this is what she meant… To be continued… as there is a lot left to be done! |