Just think how it would be if they could blend in some bacon grease!

Nobody would ever replace valve seals or rings... well at least none of the men...

 

I want to try some Beanol in the KDX. I hear it smells delicious.

 

LOL!...I'm old enough to remember the occasional bean aroma during my early enduro racing days. You knew you were fixing to overtake a bean burner when that odor would pop up before actually seeing the guy ahead. I never used the stuff. Higher tech synthetic 2S oils were becoming very prevalent when I started racing 2S race bikes that had to run premix. The good synthetics were clean and effective. Still, some holdovers continued to run castor for quite a few years but not many. My first motorcycle was a 2S road bike in '69...Suzuki 350 twin...and my later Kawasaki H2-750 triples had oil tanks and pumps. Even my first enduro bike...a '73 Kawasaki F7-175...had an oil tank...but I didn't race that bike for long.

 

Did someone mention bacon?
Mmmm, bacon...

 

A number of the guys racing KDX's over on the KDX forum swear by Beanol's superior lubrication qualities over the synthetics. And there is surprisingly not a lot of debate. Beanol is expensive . . . so it must be better.

 

I run Maxima 927 in my KDX once in a while, it smells great.

 

LOL!...well...that's why they call it an oil thread...LOL!

Up in your neck of the woods where cold is more of an issue, that's a fairly, widely, accepted negative for castor in a 2S motorcycle. Unleaded and leaded fuel issues were another debate area for synthetic vs. castor oils. In unleaded fuels, synthetics picked a small advantage IMO. There are so many factors between these two, and my fingers are not up to it. Castor oil is not bad. I just think castor does not offer the advantage level over synthetics that it had back in its heyday. Now, if you're talking about RC vehicles with certain engine designs, that's another debate.

 

Castor bean oil was quite common in use by flat trackers, both the two strokers and the BSA and Triumph racers. The stuff smells fantastic, but will gum up rings and foul plugs somewhat easier than the regular and synthetics. The two strokes ran premix around 20:1 or 16:1. I'm not sure how the stuff was used in the four strokers, if it was pure or if it was an additive.

One friend would occasionally dump a bit in his gas - nearly as good a smell as bacon!

On performance there was Blendzall two stroke oil that had an additive that was a power booster. I don't believe it was legal for AMA racing and I don't remember what it was, just that it was there.

 

The flat trackers that run methanol mix it in their fuel for some added lubrication. If you want the smell, but none of the downside, run Maxima 927. It's essentially a synthetic 2 stroke oil with some degummed castor blended in. All the good and none of the bad, and probably the best 2 stroke oil you can buy.

 

OK if we're doing an oil thread I would be interested in knowing how frequently folks change their oil.

Just to get us started, my '09 KLX250S manual says every 7500 miles (corrected on 1/5).