Yeah, I was so looking forward to telling you I had already doubled the miles.

I guess i shouldn't have waited until 3000 miles to check the valves again. But the bike was running so well, I had no indication that anything was wrong.

Charles.

Heh that tube you said was leaking, I never noticed more than a couple psi loss so I kept running it. It failed yesterday. The valve stem separated from the tube I didn’t see any other damage to the tube.

Replaced the tube and the tire now. Shinko 705 on the rear now!

Charles.

It's a good thing I bought that tube. I'm sure it's better quality than the original.

I’ve been busy making it mine.

https://advrider.com/f/attachments/0...-jpeg.2668282/

Removed all the decals on the tank and swing arm. Added some bags to the crash bars and pannier bars, tank bag, Zhongshen hand guards, led headlight bulb, shinko 705 rear tire, and more.

Charles.

This bike is now my winter bike and commuter. The wind protection is exceptional as it is, but I’m getting a bigger windshield from Thailand and heated grips and hippo hands so I can ride until the spring. I can’t wait to take this thing a long distance cruises. The bags on the bars block the wind and force Warm air from the radiator over my legs. I’m thinking if I make deflectors for the lower crash guards I might end up being comfortable into the 40s if not 30s. My heated vest as well, but my legs get cold. I’m going to get some plexiglass after Thanksgiving and see what I can come up with.

Charles.

good write ups! Glad it all worked out

Bike looks good! :tup:

For the legs, get a pair of rain pants. Being waterproof also makes them windproof, which really cuts down on the heat loss due to wind chill. I'm currently running a pair of $30 hi viz rain pants without issue. If you're still too cold after that, try adding a pair of armored shorts to the mix. I use Forcefield Pro Action shorts; the armor pads are literally over 1/2" of multilayered foam rubber. The Pro Actions are no longer made, but there are similar shorts out there from other manufacturers.

You want to be careful running this bike in the winter with both radiators in use, the NC250 runs pretty cold blooded in the RX3 as it is even in warm temps, in cooler weather it tends to collect enough gas in the oil to dilute it pretty badly; this gets even worse as the temps drop further. Make sure that you are checking and draining the crankcase contaminate/condensate separator vent line often; after each ride for sure, multiple times on long rides. I run mine with one radiator blocked off with a piece of inner tube rubber that I cut to fit and wedged in between the radiator and the plastic rock deflector that snaps in front of it. This usually keeps me at two to three bars on the temperature gauge, with three bars being what I shoot for most of the time. In fact, I don't unblock the radiator until temps get into the mid 80's F and higher.

The cooling system on the RX3 appears to have been designed for a much hotter and humid environment, like what they have in Southeast Asia, Central America, and equatorial South America. It's total over kill for most of North America and our mainly temperate climate; the deep south, southern Texas and the desert southwest excepted.

Where is this drain you talk about?

Charles.

I think he's talking about the doohickey on the left side, front of the engine that has a clear tube pointing toward the ground with a plug on the end. Yours won't have the plug, it fell out a long time ago and I never replaced it. With the plug in you would see condensation build up in the tube over time and once in a while you'd have to remove the plug to drain it.

It looks a lot better without the decals.

Ah yeah I wondered if that might be it, and I was missing a part.

Charles.

Working:I run mine with one radiator blocked off with a piece of inner tube rubber that I cut to fit and wedged in between the radiator and the plastic rock deflector that snaps in front of it.

Have you considered running with smaller pieces of inner tube on both radiators. You would get more uniform coolant temperature between the two, and less temperature drop in both that you get blocking one. The coolant on both sides would loose heat rather than circulating hot coolant on one side and cooler on the other. I have no idea of where/how the coolant returns from the radiators and whether it merges the two flows before entering the water jacket. If the coolant goes to two different places, one may assume the bits inside are not getting equal cooling. More or less.
tom

The coolant goes from the head to a thermostat, then to the left radiator, then over to the right radiator, then down to the water pump. The OEM thermostat is set too low (IMHO) so I replaced it with a hotter one I got from ThermoBob. He sells them for the KLR650. I had to mill out a bit of the thermostat housing so the thermostat would fit. In the end my engine seemed to heat up faster but not overheat. It seemed to me that the engine is grossly over cooled. That leads to condensation in the oil, as evidenced by the water buildup in the drain that was mentioned earlier in this thread.

Charles, you will note that I sent you a small hose. That goes from the engine to the valve that is supposed to strip water vapor from the engine blowby. The clutch cable tends to rub on that hose and in the end will rub through unless you are careful with how you position it. The RX4 does not use the same system so that hose was excess to me.