Hmmm, we can theorise for ever but really what it boils down to is what lights your fire? All the suggestions here are good, buy the one you lay awake at night dreaming about. Virtually all bikes in the class can be adapted to what you want, some require more adapting than others.
If you haven't ridden much gravel, then you probably won't have much idea of what you like. And as you learn, what you like & want changes. Consider turning over a few bikes in the short term to find what you like and develop your skills before launching into a RTW trip. Or just buy something, f@ck off and learn as you go - either approach works.
Any bike will require suspension tuning to your weight & style. Higher quality suspension lasts longer, usually is cheaper to service/tune and typically has a bigger pool of tuning knowledge and parts availability. Apart from working better out of the box. Suspension tuning is a boom industry, there are now lots of people making cheap improvements to the most basic suspension.
A few words about the KTM: I bought the KTM because I didn't want to do much adapting. I've added heated grips, rewired low-beam to stay on with high-beam, removed an unnecessary front disc, swapped out the shock linkages to lower the bike 28mm and shortened the stand to suit. That's it, except I'd like some bracing/heat shields for the soft luggage.
Out of the box, apart from the obvious good dynamics, it has a comfort seat, 25.5L tank (good for 480km general riding, 495km during the Dusty Butt!!; the earlier bikes and the rallye have 28L), effective fairing & headlights, bash plate, hand guards, a dual-map ignition that handles either 95RON or down to 80RON (only parts of Siberia go down to 78?RON, lots of Africa, Eurasia, South America do mid-80s), and good wide metal footpegs with rubber inserts. And you can buy rallye stuff from the catalogue knowing it will work well.
Two critical weaknesses on the recent bikes: pre-2003 there is an engine/gearbox bearing that needs replacing, it was a warranty fix, retrofitted cheaply, 2003-on done by the factory. And it seems 2005-6 models have dodgy cam follower bearings that fail between 15-35,000km. Not enough info out there yet to know the extent of the problem. Every bike has a couple of these kind of niggles, eg KLR's doohickey.
The only other issues are minor; the rims are very soft, the air filter is too small for the engine so it needs regular attention, and most recent bikes develop a cam cover leak above the LHS exhaust port (readily fixed with the correct strength sealant). Everything else is fluff and bother - stuff you're gonna fiddle with on any bike.
In terms of reliability, I did a fair bit of research. I found so many stories of supposedly bulletproof Jap bikes grenading for no apparent reason that I figured luck was more important than the badge.
The aforementioned advrider.com is excellent, as is Horizons Unlimited. For tech info, sites like KTMTalk are good. Find one or two for your chosen make/model. There are plenty out there.
Oh, and try to do some dirt training courses too. You are the best value upgrade on any bike.
Lastly, enjoy your journey!!
Originally Posted by Steve McQueen
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