Husqvarna 701

A white Enduro Bike,

who thought that would work!

After much research and a few miles on a friend’s KTM 690 the decision was made. We wanted the same bikes and deposits were placed on some of the last 2017 Husqvarna 701s. Other Bikes had come close, like the CCM450, SWM650 and the Honda XL650L, they were all good but had compromises we could not overcome.

The Husqvarna was not perfect in stock form, you get a good frame and suspension package, a 6 speed gearbox and a powerful yet economic engine. However the bike was a little short on range and is quite tall, there is minimal crash protection and the seat is made of what feels like Oak!

Sales stock was getting low in the autumn of 2017, we sourced one bike from AMS motorcycles in Tewksbury, Gloucestershire, this a family business who are very knowledgeable and provide excellent after sales service. AMS have connected us with Husqvarna UK and  Husqvarna contacts in Russia and Canada which has been very useful.

What’s changed mate?

Fuel capacity

The first area was fuel, we needed to get the capacity up, to give us around 300 miles range, we wanted to keep the weight as low as possible and settled for the Rade Garage under seat tank that goes in place of the standard air box.  A Rally Raid tank built into the sump guard and a RotoPax external tank.

The Rade Garage tank (5.7 Litres) is connected directly to the main tank via an auxiliary connection just behind the rear shock, fuel can be isolated there (although I leave it open) and there is a handy on/off tap that came with the Rade kit, this is attached to the frame (which you can see above) before it was fixed with cable ties. More details of how to do this conversion at the bottom of this post or use the contact page if you have a question. Allow 3-4 hours for this conversion as you need to strip the bike down to modify the standard fuel tank. I did not re-map the ECU and the bike runs just fine with the new set up, just a bit more induction roar! Fuel consumption on road between 65 and 70mpg.

The Sump Guard tank (2.5 Litres) and the Rotapax (3.78 Litres) are independent and used to manually top up the front tank. So all in that is 25.5 Litres in total (approximately 5.6 UK Gallons), assuming 50mpg should give us 280 miles range, however I recently got 65mpg on a motorway trip fully loaded, so range on road looks higher than this, maybe 350 miles! I will update this post as we get a better feel for fuel consumption on and off road.

Screen and headlamp

OK so there are some great looking kits from Nomad ADV and Rade Garage that give you a real “Dakar” look, they are well engineered and add more space up front for controls and look super cool….we have gone down the “low weight” route, changing the standard bulb for a Cyclops LED unit (get the dedicated 701 Cyclops kit)  and a Laminar Screen.

The bulb takes an easy 30 minutes to fix connecting to the standard plug. you will note the sidelight is not part of this kit and a empty hole is visible, we will figure something out here before we leave.

The Laminar screen gives some weather and wind protection with hardly any additional weight and no loss of visibility, the screen attaches by 3M adhesive pads which seem to be strong and so far so good, I we will probably put additional securing bolts through just in case! So far its seems effective on the 300mile trip this week….or am i just imagining it, i will try a few test runs with and without at motorway speeds and report back!

Both the screen and headlamp have only just been installed, again i will update once we have more miles on the bikes.

The instructions tell you to fix the screen when the ambient temperature is above 21 degrees Celsius (good luck with that one in the UK!)  

Luggage

Soft of course, OK not so secure but minimal weight and not going to take your leg off in a fall.  Just nowhere to put stickers like all the Zega Pro guys!

We went for EnduroStan equipment, it was fitted for a while without a rack but the exhaust gets mighty hot (melted one strap in seconds into what looked like an oily pool of hot plastic)

The EnduroStan kit fills from the top (as opposed to from the end/side) and is bright red inside so easy to see stuff. We got all of our gear from Stefan Happe at Adventure-Gear  Stefan is based in Wales and is very helpful with lots of good advice along the way.

Racks

The Endurostan Luggage does not need racks, and many long distance riders fit the luggage this way, resting direct onto the rear tank side panels . We wanted a little more protection from the exhaust and to give more support to the composite tank. We went for the Perun Moto Rear Rack and extension plate, their products are very well designed and have mounting points for the Endurostan luggage and are even prepared for the RotoPax tank mounts. Perun products are well thought out and finished with clear instructions.

We went for the minimal racks, they do push the soft luggage out but filtering is fine and fully loaded the width is less the handlebars….just! The side racks are from Vanache Motorsport  another excellent company who ended up supplying us with Seat Concept seats, Cyclops Headlamps and the KoubaLink lowering links, Andrew was great to deal with and I would again recommend this company.

Suspension

The bikes are tall as standard and we are short! The bikes are very well balanced and this is not really a problem once your on the move, however there are times when you want to get a foot down off road and quite often there was nothing there! Vanache Motorsports helped us with the KoubaLink which takes the bike down 31mm. very easy to install. Now with the front forks dropped by 31mm the bikes are a lot more manageable for what we are going to be doing! I have not adjusted the sag at this stage (as recommended by KoubaLink) and the ride was excellent fully loaded on a recent 300 mile test ride. We will get a few more miles on the bike before we start adjusting things.

Seat

Yes its official the standard seat makes you bleed! We went for the Seat Concepts upgrade kit form the USA. You can buy complete ready to go seats,  but as i had a spare (due to the warranty issues with the standard seat) i went for the conversion. Fitting was OK and you can follow on online guide on youtube link here.

I found the process straightforward and it took me about 2 hours taking my time (with frequent references to the youtube video)

The new seat is slightly wider and the foam seems much more supportive. the colour is different from standard when put side by side, however the difference is marginal and the seat looks great once on the bike. On the 300 mile test ride…. Wow what a difference, I travelled 140 miles from Bristol to Nottingham without stopping!

Tank Bolts

There is lots of discussion on forums about poor quality upper tank bolts failing, this is quite fundamental as the tank is the rear subframe! I think these issues were resolved but i am glad we replaced ours!

The bolts needed to come out anyway to modify the main tank. The upper bolts are easy and replaced by a more secure two piece arrangement. The lower bolt was more tricky, the bolt is actually in three parts, a steel shaft (treaded at both ends) which sits inside the frame and external bolts (one big one small) secure the shaft in place from both sides. Now the big one came out no problem at all, the issue comes with the second smaller bolt (in my case) this just rotated with the shaft. I tried all sorts to remove it and in the end just left it for the evening frustrated! The following day in better light I carefully drilled out the head of the small bolt, I said carefully as you are drilling right next to the plastic tank!!!! (Interestingly Youtube videos seem to skip this part so i guess i am not alone) once the head was removed you can simply tap out the shaft as shown below.

In hindsight you could also stop the shaft rotating using a large stud extractor but mine was locked solid and i did not have an extractor large enough anyway. The good news is that the replacement Rally Rade part is a single bolt which sits inside a tube,  so should need to get the tank off during our trip (Unlikely i know) there will be no issues with seized bolts.

Garmin Zumo 660

I probably would not have gone with the Zumo as first choice but I already had it, several mounts on other bikes and it was loaded with a shed load of maps.

Quad lock mount for Samsung Galaxy S7

The S7 has a good camera and is waterproof, this was also my back up SAT NAV and is loaded with off line maps (Galileo) so I wanted it accessible, the Quad Lock Mount seems OK but i don’t know if its strong enough…..time will tell.

Other Bits

Ram mounts for the mirrors so we can fold them away, Husqvarna hand guards, Kriega Strap on the front forks.

Hard Modifications

Rade under seat Aux Tank – Following a recommendation from Stefan at Adventure-Gear we gathered parts for a direct connection into the main tank, this seemed a much more elegant solution to the standard connection from Rade Garage which involved entering by the fuel pump with an adaptor plate.

I removed the main tank so the front of the tank was vertical.

I started cutting the hole manually. before drilling on a slow speed carefully using a 7.2mm drill dipped in grease to collect the plastic swarf. Cleaning this off every few turns so it did not have a chance to drop into the tank.

as you can see I was not perfectly central despite taking my time! You need KTM part number 58507003200, these are easy to obtain from the excellent AMS motorcycles.

 I then used a sealant to hold the O ring in place used two marine quality stainless steel allen bolts to secure.

So far so good and not a leak in sight…

Side Stand – The side stand was way too long as standard but once the bike lowered it was useless, i have cut 30mm off the bottom and fully loaded it is still far to upright, I removed another 5mm and fully loaded this feel right, thinking about getting an adjustable foot made to finish the job.

Tyres

We will wear out the standards tyres in the USA, and probably change on route before we get to Colorado

I will update this page during our trip to let you know what works well and any problems we have with this set up so watch this space.