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This is an amazing feeling

Kerugoya junction accident report
11 December 2019
Bike rebuild test ride
19 December 2019
 

I have received quite a good number of inbox messages of people asking how I manage these daily long trips alone on such a small bike. They are genuine questions and I appreciate such courage.

N ow, this is me, I want to say explain something here with honesty.. Karizma is a small bike, just 223cc only producing about 21bhp, that is about 5.5times less than R6. But behind this small single cylinder, oil cooled, 5 speed nylon tyres motorcycle lies a secret that most people who have never purchased it don't know. Karizma is made for gear 5, just do what you can do and get back to gear 5 and rpms of below 7.

Karizma is a sports touring bike not a race bike, you won't ride Karizma on gear 2, 3 on the highway, it wont give you 2 mins, she want gear 5, you give it that gear and she will become smooth and very comfortable

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Another secret is that the 2 rear shocks are heavenly, you cant hurt your back even if you miss a bump and fly over it, just rise up from the seat and don't brake, let the bike fly.

 

I have flown a couple times on new roads, so many bumps are not marked in this country and some of them are illegally erected on blind spots, hill climbings so as long as you are an ADV biker you must fly a couple of them.

karizma is comfortable even on murram roads, you cant compare zmr with a supersport, she will hit those rocks like a GS, just reduce the speed and you should be fine.

Third thing is that Karizma is properly positioned in terms of handle bars and it is not heavy. Just like 156kgs dry weight, add like 15l fuel and 85kgs of your body weight you should be fine.

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Fourth thing is that Karizma is a slow accelerator so don't push it, just let it crawl, it will eventually run after 5 seconds so don't risk yourself overtaking trailers like a racer, Karizma is a tour bike as we said, not a racer so ride it don't race it.

 

Fifth item is speed.

Karizma only gets you to 130kph when completely new, after 10k miles a lot has changed no matter how much you service it, it will get you down to 120kph, so if you are a 120 guy be sure you will always be riding your bike at top speed which is seriously bad for you and the bike because even racers can tell you, top speed is not a riding speed, even if your bike has a top speed of 50kph, just do 45 you will be fine.. whenever am on the highway i do 100 to 108kph but my average speed if 95 and i have never missed a target in terms of distance, because the secret is not acceleration from 0 to 100 then back to 50, break hard, overtake back to 120... that is not touring, the secret is constant speed.. if you decide am going to Nanyuki which is about 198kms from my house, i want to do a speed of 95, just be sure you are ranging between 86 to 105 when overtaking and you will get there, comfortable, not tired, mentally refreshed, fuel saved, a lot of near misses are eliminated.. but most people will not admit their slow speeds.

I am a biker who usually do 3500kms to 4200 kms and above monthly shared between commuting to work, errands and randoms, going upcountry to see my folks and i always service my bike at every 2000kms meaning some months i spend twice on service, like this month i serviced the bike on 5th and after today's ride i have to service it again because between 5th and today am hitting 2000 kms.. i do alot of stuff myself that makes me so comfortable riding along in the jungle because i know my bike from the inside.. if i was to get a chance of buying another Karizma i wouldn't think twice. I have done over 700kms a day and still ride the next day.

Finally Karizma is the most economical bike of its 200-300cc class, Karizma gives you an average of 40kpl and it has an estimate gauge on the dashboard so before you finish a full tank of 1700sh be sure you have done over 600kms or 500kms at high speed which is very uncomfortable. so you cant fail to ride because of fuel issues of stall in the jungle because of fuel unless you are not careful about reading the dashboard gauges. so my secret is simple, dont look at speed, look at miles and you will be fine, accept that this is a small tour bike, so obey the engine limits and don't modify the bike major drive components, let it remain stock..

Exhaust you can chance, i have changed mine this week because my bike was becoming so silent and i realized most drivers don't realize there is a bike coming until they see the LED lights and they start behaving like ghosts especially on long rides where drivers doze off on the wheel, so i got a premium race exhaust and fit in the inner components of the stock exhaust to maintain the engine performance at stock but only increase the sound, it is a long struggle of getting that modification done but i did it to save the bike from the tears of last time i tried changing the exhaust and the bike behaved like a demon.. today am on route to Nyeri, so we have like 350 kms to cover before the end of the day God willing.

See original post on Africa Motorcycle Diaries - Facebook group

2 Comments

  1. Jeremy says:

    Good review

  2. Waksi says:

    One of my favorite bikes for commute and touring. I rode my ZMR to Mombasa, Namanga and nakuru. I have personally owned 4 of them. I wouldn’t mind another one. They are as reliable as the sun rise and good value for money. Great review by the way.

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