450 Enduro

[Brook877]

The Chinese 450.

I thought I would knock up a little introduction to the reason I'm on this site...

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Here in the UK it’s called a WK 450rx, but the variations of the same bike have been available throughout the world for a few years now-
Argentina (Heikon TT450 and Backfire BXF450),
Australia (Odes MCF450E),
Brazil (Tokens TXR450),
Chile (Takasaki LX450),
China (Asiawing LD450),
Czech Republic (Václav Vizinger VV MX450),
Finland (Menopeli LD450),
France and other border countries (Upower PZF 450),
Germany (Borossi BT 450 LX),
Italy (GioItalia 450 Motard),
Netherlands (Asiawing LX 450X),
Russia (Forsage 450),
South Africa (BigBoy SMR450),
Spain (Impormotor IMR 450R),
Sweden (Monstra 450),
United States (Christini AWD 450, CCW Hooligun 450X)
United Kingdom (WK 450rx, Christini 450)

I was looking to buy a used jap 450 and for the money I was looking to spend I was going to be looking at bikes at least 4-5 years old, for the same money I have this, brand new, from a local dealership and with something not even Honda would offer on a brand new 450x, a warranty!

First impressions,
I was actually really impressed overall, I was expecting to see some tat and poor quality areas but to be fair those areas are really only items like reflector brackets and final fitting of the graphics, small things like that I can live with.
The tires fitted to the off road wheels are awful looking cheap nasty dual sport “kings tires” these have been removed and replaced with some lovely Maxxis, these wheels also came with discs and a rear sprocket, but I have replaced and upsized the rear sprocket as standard both wheels use the same gearing.
This upsize has also required a longer chain, swapping the chain on a week old bike might seem daft, but now I have a chain perfect for the road/super-moto set up and for a enduro wheels,
The switchgear is not up to jap standards,


On the plus side the overall build quality looks really good, the welding on the frame looks as good as I’ve ever seen on a jap bike, the suspension is multi way adjustable,
the engine looks great, no traces of sealant splaying out of joins, no leaks or nasty noises..
I have however changed the oil as I’ve heard the OEM fluid isn’t great, and it holds less than a Lt so its cheap piece of mind.
My first ride was when I collected it from the dealership, pouring rain, fading light, heavy traffic, couldn’t have been much worse.
But the bike worked perfectly, never got hot and flustered in the traffic,
The next day I had chance for a little bit of a better ride, and again I have to say it did well, while removing it from storage I noticed the twist grip assembly wasn’t as tight as it should have been, this was nipped up and I ran over the rest of the bike looking for things to tighten but didn’t find anything worth worrying about.
The engine runs well, but was far from aggressive, much more like my old WR426 rather than the CRF450r I had,
oh and the grips are the hardest plasticly rubber available, made from melted down cd cases and frying pan handles I think.
These will be changed as soon as.

That afternoon I got on with the couple of mods I had in mind, first was too shorten the rear number plate mount, on mine this is an aluminum stay that required cutting down, I think this is plastic on the earlier bikes.
My next, and much more important was to change the exhaust, I had been told this was very restrictive and true to what I had been told had a cat in the center section, I had bought a “Bill’s pipes” exhaust for a 2006 CRF450, with a bit of trimming of the front pipe this fitted a treat, not only has this lost a few kg off the bike and made it a little (lot) more vocal it feels a lot more willing to rev, so much more aggressive, I am still treating it softly as its about 60odd miles old, but feels better already.
It’s mush closer to the feel of the CRF now, with a carb upgrade I suspect it would be pretty much there.

Brief conclusion
It’s a lot better than you might expect, the important bits seem great, “consumable” bits like the grips, tires, graphics and final finish of the plastics show where the corners have been cut.
It’s less half the price of a new Honda, but it offers so much more than half a Honda..



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