Zentralasien 2017

Hallo,

mein Deutsch ist nicht gut so nur Information mein Frau und ich hat tour nach Zentralasien mit NC700X. Ich kann mehr Information schreiben ob es Interesse gibt, aber in Englisch Total es war 14.000 km und 37 Tage. Nur ein Gummidefekt aber Honda ohne Mangel. Immer noch nicht glauben es war so gut. Off-road 800 kms, 92-oktan Benzin, schlechte Strassen, zwei Personen und viel Gepack. 3,79 l/100 km Verbrauch... Danke Honda Wir haben FB Seite aber in Kroatisch aber es gibt automatisch translate. Link http://www.facebook.com/StansExpress/

Ok. I'll start with the information about the NC. I knew nothing about NCs just until few months ago. I bought the bike less than 2 months before we started the trip. In general, I did not know much about Hondas at all. For the last 10 years I owned only BMWs. The first thing to caught my attention to NC was this helmet compartment where the fuelt tank should be. I thought it was very clever design. Reading more about NC and about its simplicity and reliability, long service intervals, I got a feeling that it is the right bike for us. I found a nice looking bike in Germany and bought it not even seeing the bike. My friend from Germany went to see it and left the deposit. The logistic company from Croatia picked up the bike and transported it to Croatia. The bike was year 2012, 28 thousand km, one previous owner and documented service history. The cost was much less then any other bike I was taking into account. So quite a lot left to buy all additional equipment we would need for the trip and still something left for the cost of the trip itself. It came very well equiped - Givi protection bars, heated grips, SW Motech handguards and additional 12V socket. In upcoming month I did some 2 thousand test kilometers and bought additional parts I identified as necessary for the trip. Comfort was not a big let down as I was not expecting much after owning R1200RT, but some things had to be improved. I have found a taller Puig windscreen. Later had to install a spoiler too as wind buffeting was very strong. Seat was not very good so I bought comfort Shad seats with the heating option. That was not enough so I bought AirHawk seat pads too. That made it much better. I am thinking now maybe I could save the cost of Shad if I tryed with the stock seats and Airhawks. We wanted to go to Pamir Highway which ment a lot of hard gravel roads and climbing 4500 m altitude. So alu skid plate was a must. Additionally I have raised the front for 20 mm and the rear for 35 mm to get some more ground clearance. Front suspension was very stiff so the cheapest fix was instaling YSS valves. I wanted to upgrade the rear shock but could not find anything affordable in such short time. What else.. Hepco&Becker alu boxes, radiator guard, SW Motech mount for Garmin, sport exhaust as the stock exhaust was too quiet and I wanted to be heard for safety reasons. Some other small bits, but I think I have listed the most important upgrades.
In the end, the result was very good. We had to cover a lot of kilmeters day by day in order to meet visa requirements (30 days 2-entry visa for Russia for me and for my wife Kazakhstan 5-day transit visa). We wished to spend at least 2 weeks in Kyrgyzstan. Otherwise it will be too long trip for not so much to see there. The bike was very comfortable. We returned 2 days ago and do not feel tired at all. Anyone doing such a long trip, this mods will make this bike very comfortable. Maybe some more serious suspension upgrades would make a bigger difference. We did not have time nor money to do more before the trip. I was also considering off-road tire options, but it was not so simple and I did not have time to go deeper into chain and sprocket ratios, etc. I would definitelly benefit of more off-road capable tires for this trip. We had some 800 km of gravel and off-road. Street Michelin tires were great but several times I got lucky not to loose control. It was very close. I will attach some photos of the bike preparation. In my next post I will tell more about the trip itself. If you have any questions about the bike, I will be happy to tell more.

... and some photos of the bike in action. It was a lot of dust and dirt all the way so not looking very fancy as it was in a garage before the trip