I'm now part of the "I installed bars and found my bike laying down the next day" club :smile:
You will come to see this as the best quality of your bike, if you have not already. You come to see each mark on your engine bars as something that is NOT a damage to your tank shrouds, bar ends, bar end mirrors, control levers, radiator, and to some extent muffler
Has anyone weighed them?
The only response I've heard is "heavy"
They are heavy, though appreciably lighter than the cat. No guessing which I place more value upon.
Then again I'm just happy to have a bike under 350 lbs. Until that point I don't care about weight.
I am with you here, until you put power into consideration. This bike NEEDS to be light, because there are many occasions where it's power is disappointing. It makes up for its power issues with its cornering and braking deftness, but I care about every pound of its weight too.
I never put cheap ebay parts, especially ones from hong kong, on my bikes. It's not worth it.
This challenges me, I don't understand it. Do you have objective reasons to be so skeptical? Leaving out the concept of Chinese world domination by ruthlessly copying manufacturing techniques, why are you so anti-Chinese?
My Kato dealer (Newcastle) is no slouch, they are knee deep in awards, which only means they sell a lot of schit. But to sell a lot of schit, they have to maintain the customer's loyalty. They have at least two large competitors within an hour's ride/drive. My region of Australia is arguably the dirt capital of the Southern Hemisphere; it has produced many greats including Chad Reed, Toby Price and Casey Stoner. My point is that the market is competitive around here, lots of riders, lots of suppliers. I would think that would make them serious "pushers" of Kato bits, encourage you to be 100% KTM loyal.
I went to my dealer one arvie and said, "order me the Scotts version of this", pointing at a Chinese eBay listing of a steering dampener. I had already purchased and returned a high end dampener from KTM-Twins - they had not advertised accurately and the part did not fit the Duke. KTM Newcastle opened the page on their computer, examined it, and ADVISED ME TO PURCHASE the eBay dampener from China. A dampener kit has two components, dampener and brackets. Scott/Ohlin dampeners are all roughly the same regarding dimensions, but Scott/Ohlin do not make brackets for the Duke. The dampener would fit but you cannot purchase the brackets to mount it on a Duke. KTM Newcastle advised me to purchase the Chinese kit because the Chinese kit (containing both dampener and brackets for the Duke) was cheaper than what Ohlin quoted for any of the dirt bike mounting brackets WITHOUT THE DAMPENER. If the Chinese dampener bothered me, I could throw it out and use the Chinese brackets to mount an Ohlin dampener. But the Chinese unit arrived, we inspected it and I fitted it, and it works just fine. It's only failing is that the anodising fades quickly, so it is nothing like Orange anymore.
More recently, I was interested in beefing up my brakes without investing a Prince's ransom. The standard Brembo caliper appeared to be the best part of the system, so I considered getting a Brembo or Magura radial master cylinder. Then someone here posted two examples of Chinese radial master cylinders, one Taiwanese, each of which was about a tenth of the price of the top shelf kit. Using the same rationale as I had with my steering dampener, I bought the non-Taiwanese cylinder, the CHEAPER of the two, because that model offered adjustability to the length of the lever arm. It appears to work well so far, but I am still lacking bite in the brakes.
Thankfully, I also found YOUR posts and you have given me another avenue to pursue that I had not considered, namely, bypass the next-to-fcuken-useless ABS system. I WAS like Weldertron in Quebec who has a deep respect for gravel and all things slippery. I did believe that my ABS was chock full of magical-guarantee fairies that constantly saved my arse from binning it every time my tyre had a chance to break traction. But now I am cured. I find ABS a pain in the arse, not an arse saver.
So now my STEERING and BRAKING are vulnerable to "Chinese failure", because one product is not manufactured by anyone other than the Chinese, and the other being roughly 10% of the Italian cost, yet I have no fear or signs of either product failing. And it is endorsed by KTM Newcastle, at least verbally.
Crash bars would have a significantly less vital role to play in your bike's performance.
Why do you think that is "not worth it"?