CRF Mountain Recovery

[The Bigfella]

I just stitched together some CRF video from Tuesday. Three 250Ls of mine and a mate on a KLX, who gave Deere, who is my Ops Manager, a hand because I was still laid up in bed with Covid (all good now). We had two guys who'd rented CRFs to go bush... and they called Monday evening - they'd left one of the bikes up on a mountain trail - the western approach to the helicopter crash site - having toasted the clutch. I hadn't briefed these guys - because of the damn Covid - and I always point out "guys, use the torque more than the clutch". Pity 'bout that... they rang me late in the afternoon from 175 km away. I pointed them to a place I thought would help to recover the bike - but they quoted 6,000 baht. We weren't impressed with that. Shouldn't have been more than 2,000 max to grab the bike in a ute and get it off the hill.

I tee'd Deere up with parts, tools and consumables, for an early morning departure and set him up with a mate, Hunter from Pai Enduro, who would help, given I couldn't. Deere set off at 5am, collected the two customers and Hunter... and off they went. As it turned out, the bike was nowhere near where everyone was thinking... and it would have been a lot easier to go in from the bottom of the trail.... but, whatever. They got there - after encountering a few blockages placed by the military (the bike was very near the Myanmar border).... and Deere had it running sweet in 60 seconds - without the need for an on the mountain clutch change. The video gives a good indication of some of the riding up there and of the usefulness of the CRFs. We hadn't been on this particular trail since Feb '20... and it has changed a bit.

 

[Gnasher328]

That's a horrible trail! I thought I was going to get stuck there a few years ago, deep narrow ruts I thought I was going to get a wheel stuck up to the axle in.