Project KTM 390 Adventure – The Plan
Fed up of waiting for KTM to launch the 390 Adventure, I finally decided to build one myself. Yesterday I bought a KTM Duke 390 and have started drawing up plans to transform it into a 390 Adventure.
This is how the motorcycle looks today. I’m not interested in making it simply look like an adventure motorcycle. I’m more interested in making it feel and ride like one. By that I mean, it may not have the fairing of an adventure motorcycle, but it will have the riding posture of one.
One of the first things I’m trying to figure out is how to raise the front of the bike and relocate the foot pegs along with their controls forward so as to yield an upright riding position. I’m toying with the idea of swapping the front shock absorbers for longer ones or adding handlebar risers. Or maybe a smart combination of both.
Every modification I make will have a specific and useful purpose. I don’t intend to do serious off-roading using this bike. So I most probably won’t add all the bells and whistles that come with proper adventure bikes like spoked wheels and stuff. All I want is a powerful, reliable and lightweight motorcycle that can deal with Indian roads where I cannot and should not ride Blackbird, my Harley-Davidson Fat Boy.
If my experiment fails or I’m not too happy with the results, I’ll return the bike to stock condition and ride it that way or maybe get rid of it.
I have named the motorcycle Ratchet, after the Transformer. I hope to document its transformation on this blog. I guess this project should keep me busy for a while. 🙂
