• Hi everyone,

    As you all know, Coffee (Dean) passed away a couple of years ago. I am Dean's ex-wife's husband and happen to have spent my career in tech. Over the years, I occasionally helped Dean with various tech issues.

    When he passed, I worked with his kids to gather the necessary credentials to keep this site running. Since then (and for however long they worked with Coffee), Woodschick and Dirtdame have been maintaining the site and covering the costs. Without their hard work and financial support, CafeHusky would have been lost.

    Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been working to migrate the site to a free cloud compute instance so that Woodschick and Dirtdame no longer have to fund it. At the same time, I’ve updated the site to a current version of XenForo (the discussion software it runs on). The previous version was outdated and no longer supported.

    Unfortunately, the new software version doesn’t support importing the old site’s styles, so for now, you’ll see the XenForo default style. This may change over time.

    Coffee didn’t document the work he did on the site, so I’ve been digging through the old setup to understand how everything was running. There may still be things I’ve missed. One known issue is that email functionality is not yet working on the new site, but I hope to resolve this over time.

    Thanks for your patience and support!

2015 450 MX shootout...

Hmmm sounds highly suspect. :cool: How can two bikes with very little difference and the exact same front forks "feel" so different. They bitch about the plastic subframe, but their scale says it's 5 pounds heavier? Did someone leave a stack of cash or 12 pack of energy drinks on the scale during the Husky weigh in? Then they stuck the RM between them, like hmmm REALLY?

Articles like these just re-enforce my decision to stop subscribing to moto mags years ago. The only thing I agree with is the Yami is surely the best bang for the buck, and it's almost nice to see that they don't just think the most expensive bike is best. Also intersting is the Husky is like $150 more than the KTM and priciest of the group.

I dunno, these "testers" claim to have such refined abilities to rate bikes, but you never see them racing at anything near the top level. They probably go out for mani-pedis, nut waxes, and chai tea lattes after a "hard" day at the track.:busted:
 
I called Ryno out on it a few years ago.... They had 7-8 ex-pros and they all picked the bike that they raced.... he got pissed off.... which i didn care but he knew i was right.... its really hard to do a test and pick a winner a true winner....

What works for you may not work for me.... everyone has different riding style and tastes.... I hate Yamaha ergonomics and handling.... Kawis are built cheap.... i like honda and suzukis but just dont want to do a crap load of work to be off road ready..... Like KTMs but way too many here.... leaves me with husky, beta, gasser and sherco....
 
Humm take the e-start , battery, and throw in the new Factory KTM and it's then the lightest bike by 10 lbs or more ;). I place very little importance to what the mag testers have to say.
 
No real loser? then why rank them.... just give the facts and opinions on what you felt.... but I agree everyone will have a different fav
 
I read the tests and agreed with alot of what was said. My Husqvarnas airbox is airtight. It's forks are grim. And the Yamahas I have ridden do have great suspension. My KTM/Husky dealer is the difference to me.
 
Pretty amazing how much like a paper magazine and a magnifying glass that link is.

It doesn't say the husky would come in last in a race, kind of says the husky rider would be the last one to finish suspention adjustments.

It does a good job (seems anyway) listing the model year changes to the various options. I would like to have that article be the whole magazine or a much more detailed.

It explains to some degree what sort of control/adjustability $200 buys with the Yamaha to tailor the engine management to one's liking. If available, how much, and what they do for the others is absent or I skimmed over them.
 
Before I bought my TE 511 I read a review or two (okay, as many as I could find). One guy (a so called world renowned tester and racer) said he got on it and within 30 yards on the MX track he decided it wasn't any good. So he turned around and rode it back and hopped off with it still rolling. Sounds like he had a tantrum about being forced by his sponsors to test a bike he didn't want to. Bottom line, he said, he wouldn't recommend anyone buy these -- they're no good.

In another 5 paragraph review, one guy mentioned how bad the tires were 7 times. He said the bike is slow and under-powered because the tires suck and the rear-end won't hook-up. The bike corners badly because the tires suck. The bike can't climb hills because the tires suck and there is no traction. The bike has bad dual-sport road manners, because the tires suck. His conclusion, without changing out the tires and giving the bike a fair chance, don't buy one of these, there are much, much better bikes out there.

I'm glad I listened to the actual user reviews. Sure my bike had some issues when it was brand new. But without spending too much money, I've got them all sorted out. I wouldn't trade my 511 for any bike.
 
The FC450 came in last because of it's suspension. A tuned, well working suspension will make any bike feel thirty pounds lighter and the 4CS suspension is just awful. We race the FC450, with Marzocchi Shivers, not 4CS. And not only is it sporty fast, its 5 speed transmission is solid, 30% stronger than the 6 speed Jap bikes. For non-dual sport riding, I like it, it is my favorite of the new bikes so far.
 
Just got my dirtrider mag, full shootout on the 250Fs. KTM and husky tie for last. Reason weight and... FORKS!!! They nicely said they hated the forks and they has a very narrow range of adjustment.
 
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