Looking for an off-road tool, one of the guys got me thinking towards a Yamaha WR400. He'd had one and loved it, reckoned it was superior to the Honda XR400, (of course me being a Honda fan thought this the way to go … ho hum) and so the seed of thought had been sown. I sorted out a budget of £3000 and figured I should get a goodun for that, no worries. For a couple of weeks I looked through TMX and scoured the web sites, but what I found all seemed to be a bit out of my price league as most seemed to be in dealers.

Scouring TMX magazine at 6:30 Friday morning offered several options of Yamaha WR400s, Suzuki DRZ400s and if needs must, Honda XR400s.

So, on Saturday I went off to a place called Sonning Common to see a WR400 up for sale. Now, me being the type who likes to keep his bikes sparkly clean, going to see Enduro bikes was rather a shock as there is no such thing as a clean one, unless it's new of course. The one I was looking at was X reg, so it certainly wasn't clean. Roger by his own admission was a bit of an enduro nut, so the bike had been put through its paces a few times to say the least. All the paint was rubbed off in all the right places and the plastics has all been bent here and there and the thing was covered in scratches. But you have to look through all that and it's really the suspension, engine, frame and wheels you're buying. Plastics are dirt (excuse the pun) cheap, so are worth ignoring to an extent. Sound advice from Tony and he's right. I rode it up the road, it seemed to do what it should, the bars were a bit pissed, but could be straightened and after all, I'd probably be doing it again anyway as I'm bound to fall off it a lot. So I bought the thing and rode it away, about 50 miles in fact to my home. My arse was killing me after about half a mile let alone 50!!!! But it was a ride worth doing as it was a good test for the bike and me.

On the way through Guildford a guy on a XR400 SM with gold wheels and road tyres was harassing some poor chap on a ZXR and had left him for dead and then came past me, so I latched on to him. I pulled up alongside him at the lights and he shouted through the loud thud, thudding his and my bike were making, "You wanna get some a deez on it you do!!" pointing at his Gold Talon hubs, Excel rims and Michelin Pilot Intermediates. After all that was part of the plan, I just nodded. He then pulled a monstrous wheely and disappeared off to into a garage forecourt to fill up his bike, these things don't hold much juice with standard tanks.

I got the WR it back home, much to relief of my backside and started to pull the bike apart to see what it was made of, give it a bit of a clean, find out what went where and did what etc.

It seems to be worth the money. It starts OK when hot, once you get the knack of it, but it's a bugger to get going from cold. Maybe there is a knack to this too. I'll soon find it and get it sussed, but in the meantime it's good exercise for my right leg. No leccy start on these you see, you need a DRZ for that.

So, there you have it. I have added a WR400 to my stable and I really like it.

Just remember not to touch the throttle before you try and start it, otherwise you'll be kicking away for ages.

After a very wet and muddy escapade in various bogs and fields with John, I had decided that I was not cut out for winter off roading. Summer off roading seemed much more pleasant, purely due to the weather and being able to lie on nice lush green hillsides when a little exhausted for a breather and take in the warm rays of sun from a lovely English summer's afternoon. With this thought in mind the WR was not likely to get used much during winter apart from popping out occasionally for short trips. But this wasn't too clever on knobblies in the wet, so I thought I'd pursue the Supermotard route. That was the underlying reason I bought a 400 4-stroke in the first place anyway, just in case mud and I didn't get on!

After scouring through Supermoto magazine and finding out what it was I needed to make this little project happen, I then did a price a search. For all the bits and bobs I required the sum was fast approaching £1000 to get the job done. In the end I called Dave Black at FWR and asked him for a quote, which of course came in at considerably less than anyone else, and with Dave being a friend there was also an element of trust. Items required to complete the project were: 1 x Front wheel, 1 x rear wheel, (gold Talon hubs, stainless spokes and satin black Morad rims), a 320 mm 'wavy' front disc, caliper riser, (decided to retain OE calliper), a 42 tooth rear sprocket, (gold of course), 2 x inner tubes, 2 x rim tapes and 1 x rear tyre (160x70 profile). I didn't need a front as I had several 'part worns' that would do the job.

Eight days after ordering I get a call from Barbara at FWR advising my wheels were in! Next morning the City Link chap arrived with two big boxes of goodies. When I opened them up I was surprised at the brand name quality of some of the parts, which I just didn't expect for the sum of money I had paid FWR. The caliper riser was a delightful piece of billet aluminium with Talon embossed into it, the front 'wavy' disc was a Braking item, (top notch this), the wheels were just absolutely stunning and the rear sprocket was Renthal. All in all, bloody good stuff. Not sure about the Avon Azaro rear tyre though, but only because I'd never used Avon's before.

The rear wheel went in first only to find the chain was just catching on the lip of the tyre. I called Chris at FWR and he advised this was commonplace with SMs, but if I were to use a 150, I would be very limited as to what rubber I could have, so as the chain just touched it, ride it and see. Good enough advice for me, so the rear wheel stays where it is. Then came the front wheel, I chose a Bridgestone 010 from the archives accumulated over the years and slipped it on, with tube and rim tape in place. Everything slotted into it's location nicely, but I could not get the caliper on the disc with the pads in place, purely due to the size of the disc, easily solved though. Once in, the front wheel did not want to turn too well either, as it was catching on something, but I couldn't see what. I took the caliper off again and found the offending item to be the pad retaining clip that didn't sit quite flush with the Talon bracket, nothing a file couldn't sort out, so that soon rectified also.

With both wheels on, the end result was very pleasing to the eye. I rode it around the block a couple of times to ensure it all felt OK and then took her out for a 25 mile round trip of back roads and main roads which at present are all covered in salt and winter crap. The bike feels a lot lower at the front, but it has been reduced by 4 inches due to wheel size and 1 inch on the rear. Once up and running though she felt fine, the gearing was a good choice too, 15 tooth front, 42 tooth rear which makes top gear lovely for cruising at about 70mph at low to medium revs, but without compromising the acceleration of the lower gears.

The brakes seemed to work OK too, the front now much improved due to circumference of the 320mm disc, the rear disc remains OE. The chain did rip the edge of the tyre a bit, but it seems to be fine and I may make a mod to this in time, but we'll see how we go. Other than that though I was well chuffed with it, but it now needs a clean, I just want some dry roads now to really try it out. Can't wait!!

I received an e-mail from Fast Pete with a link in it to the Enduro web site. "'Ere Tet, this link is for a full Akropovic Titanium system for your WR, gotta be worth a look." So I did, but decided that spending £250 quid on an exhaust for a single cylinder bike was too much. Besides, I only wanted an end can - don't ask why, even I don't know. Anyway, the seed had been sown, so I started to scour the Supermoto mag web links and looked at various exhaust systems, all too much money for what they are I thought.

Then I got on the American Akropovic site to get Db readings and of course a price for a new system. Couldn't find the Db readings, but that didn't matter when I saw what one of these things cost on the other side of the Pond! $695.00 for a full new Akrapovic system! That equates to £500 here in pricey UK. Blimey, far too much for salty Brit roads on a super motard. Better call this bloke and see if his secondhand system is still about.

Got through to a chap called Tony from oop North and he still had it. "Why are you selling it?" I asked, "Ey oop chuck, I sold me 426 and have a 610 (something or other), so I took this off and still have it". "Right, best I send you a cheque then and you send me the pipe, once cleared" This was pretty much the extent of the conversation, my mind was made up.

It turned up, still in it's box, but it had been used Tony said. Upon opening the box I could see it hadn't been used much, it was far better than I thought it would be. It was on in about 15 mins and it looked lovely. It sounds fantastic, but gone are the days of no ear plugs on the SM now!!, Jesus, you should hear it! It sounds lovely. Does it kick out some back pressure? Does a Bear shit in the woods?? You know the answer.

A mega-test for the bike was a Sunday ride with the lads .. with them on their R1s and Gixers! They clocked me at over 100mph at times on the Yam, and it managed to keep up pretty well on the back road scamps, but I was thrashing it flat out all the time and it wouldn't last many Sundays at that rate.

In the end, after much fun and conderable expense I got rid of the WR. The seat was just too painful, and for some odd reason I went for a ride on my 'Blade and realised just how much better a comfy sportsbike is!