• 4 Stroke Husqvarna Motorcycles Made In Italy - About 1989 to 2014
    TE = 4st Enduro & TC = 4st Cross

  • 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 The previous version was outdated and no longer supported.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!

dumb questions about the TE's

kyle01

Husqvarna
AA Class
I bought a TR and i'm pretty sure my original intentions were fairly clear for this machine... well, one thing leads to another and turns out i'm not as fat and lazy as I assumed I was and my offroad skills have come flooding back to me...

I want to get rid of the TR for a TE. I still want to be able to digest some road miles (i don't care about how comfortable riding the slab is) i'm more concerned with how happy a TE will be on it... I'm not planning on putting tons of road miles on, but would 100mi on either of these machines in a day be a problem? I have the unique opportunity to swap (almost) for either a 2012 TE310 (brand new) or a 2012 TE511 (with roughly 500 miles on the clock) The 511 is 2 grand-ish more.

I've not ruled out selling the TR outright (TKC80's, Touratech sprocket, Renthal twinwalls, Motosportz skid plate - less than 500mi) and I've not ruled out just forgetting about even thinking about this whole deal... well, I have kind of. Don't tell my wife.
 
The 511 is a much better road bike than the 310, but that ain't saying much. You can gear the 511 up, add Seat Concepts seat and get the job done, but I wouldn't make a habit of it without throwing some trail riding in the middle of that 100 miles.
 
I have ridden my 450 on 200 mile plus days that had at least half of those miles, if not more on the pavement. I have ridden them with someone who had a 310, so both small and large bikes will do it, but it won't be the most comfortable and fast ride in the world.
 
I have a 2011 TE310, and I love it, but the 511 would be a far better long distance bike, specially if you're used to doing a lot of street miles.

Horses for courses; for the mostly-dirt rides I do, I wouldn't trade my 310 for anything.
 
I had a ktm 450 (rfs engine) which must be a lot like the 310/450 huskys- a lightweight, skinny, long travel offroad bike is never gonna be a treat to ride far on pavement. The killer with the rfs was maintaining it... 2 filters, 2 screens, 1qt oil capacity... I was changing oil every few rides and adjusting valves (at least checking them) every other oil change. That's the part I don't want again. I understand even the new ktm has addressed this issue and from what I'm reading the 310/511 engines don't require this much attention.
 
If you are under 200 lbs and under 6' then the 310 is a good choice. However, if you are bigger and like having more grunt the 511 is a clear choice. Factor in basic reliability between the two and its a no brainer...go 511.

I thought after a long dirt hiatus that my 449 might be almost too much bike, but my skills came back quickly and I now know I made the right choice. In fact I'm looking to get a 511 so my lady can ride the 449.
 
I weigh 175 with all my gear on. Threw a 45 tooth rear on my 511 and it cruises at 60 all day long now. The vibes were a bit harsh at first but are calming down every time I ride. The stock Metz's were POS's on the highway though. Make sure you have the shop balance whatever you have put on. Sometimes they "forget" to balance them because they think you wont be riding on slab, but it makes a huge difference. I put a D606 on my rear and it rides like butter on the highway and is great offroad. FYI, I am a 20% street 80% dirt rider.
 
Another 449 lover here.
I was working in Idaho. When ever I had time off I would ride. All over. Some days would be 100 milers. some More technical stuff.
Thing is, the Husky can do it. and it is a blast.
Keep in mind that you may realize that a second bike, "adventure type" may come into play.There are some extended trips I would like to take. Not that the Husky couldn't do it just, I prefer a little more power for some hauling my gear around.
 
thanks for all of the insight... i'm thinking maybe keep the TR after all since it's one hell of a pack mule and ditch my DRZ for a 310 since the DRZ is really just a mini version of my Hypermotard...
 
I recently bought a 2012 TE511 and I love it, but I don't have any intentions of it seeing an interstate. I know it
Could, but I bought mine for connecting the dirt, and light 2 lane..I have an 05 KLR for the longer stuff. It is cheap
Runs the highway pretty good and did I say cheap....the seat on th TE is really hard. It you do it get a seat upgrade,
I know I will, whatever you do, go with your gut. If it does not suit you, you can change it, have fun!
 
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