Fuel required - trail bike ride?

[Bill Douglas]

Guys, I need your help I've got a trail bike ride coming up that I'm planning for. It's on a four wheel drive sort of road/track where the average speed would be 25 to 30mph and quite a number of slower sections, so no top gear but also not much full throttle stuff either . Looking on the map it's a bit hard to figure out exactly what distance the longest section is, as they don't show all the twists and curves. But I'm thinking it's around 120 miles (200 kilometers). On a stock Honda XR 400R how much fuel will it take to complete this section?

If I survive it I'll post pic's.

[LakeCleElum]

16.3 liters....

[Bill Douglas]

I'll make sure I don't forget the .3

The tank is 9.5 (that's about two and a half US gal) and I was thinking of taking another 5 liters, but maybe that's not enough

[Yorkie]

I would think you should see 40mpg as a minimum for an XR400.

[Bill Douglas]

Thanks Guys. I'm playing the long game on this ride no falling off, no drifties around corners, not much full throttle just conserving fuel and enjoying the ride and scenery. It's given me a basis to work on. It was a bit hard to calculate because sometimes I'm amazed at how little gas it uses, but then 120 miles is a long ride on a dirt bike.

[jhynesrockmtn]

I would always carry some extra on a long ride. Just one idea from advrider.com

[javadog]

Put an over-sized tank on it and fill it up.

JR

[jorian]

I always bring supplementary fuel because I'm hard on the throttle, ride a two stroke and have run out of gas before. I usually have a couple of those red MSR bottles shown in the last pic and I have a 1 liter bottle strapped to the number plate up front. As soon as I have the space in my tank, I empty the bottles. Safer in the tank than in a bottle. Better balance too.

A friend has the XR400 and it seems to get about 40-50 miles per tank and maybe 5 miles on reserve. If your bike is stock you might get a bit less. Pipe, jetting and gearing make a diff. I don't think you'll get close to making the trip unless you bring an extra 8-9 liters (2.4 gallons) along with you. Oversize tanks typically give you about 50% more range which still isn't enough and they are expensive. Bring a tow rope - it saved my azz once.

[Bill Douglas]

Thanks Guys. I've just changed the rear sprocket from 47T to a 40T as I've got about three hours of road before I hit the trail. It really makes the bike a lot easier to ride I won't be climbing goat tracks with it so the longer gearing will be fine. The road/track is pretty easy so I don't think I'll be chewing up too much gas - but I will bring an extra two gal container of gas. Also I'll bring a tow rope. The great thing about having a plan B in place is "if you have it you don't need it" And I hope not to need it.