wayneg

Yes I did it too - after the bottom part of the airbox door wouldn't seal on my '00. I had to file away the material where the rear shock connects to the frame. It looked good in the end, and was much more waterproof. It ended up only costing me about NZ$200 from memory.

And you beat NZ and the Ozzies too..... :-( Enough about Rugby lets focus on Netball now instead

The rear mudguard, subframes, airbox and air filter worked out to cost about NZ$400, although our local Beta distributor keeps his prices very low. You do need to remove some metal from the frame on the top rear shock pivot, and also move the rear muffler mount for everything to fit. I was lucky and had my brother's '04 bike to compare it to.

I stuck the airbox, mudguard and rear subframes from the 2004 model on my 2000 Rev3. I hated the old airbox setup, and my rear mudguard was knackered. The newer design of airbox is much better as it makes air filter servicing much easier, and it is also more waterproof. The new mudguard was shiny too....

Try adjusting your clutch a little bit - sometimes the clutch will not fully disengage because the clutch plates are a bit worn etc. This worked a treat on my '00 Rev3.

I have the tapered bars that were originally supplied with the '98 Beta Technos - as Ron says they come with both an upper and lower clamp, and will fit straight on with no machining. These bars have about 1" lower rise than the normal Tomaselli handlebars supplied with the '04 Rev3, so once they are installed with both the upper and lower clamps they work out to be about the right height. These handlebars have been on my '00 Rev3 for the last year or so and will be moved to the '04 Rev3 that I have just purchased. I can vouch for their durability, and have crash tested them relentlessly. I do go over the handlebars quite a bit, so with not having a cross brace, I get a greater freedom of movement on my way over. This opens up much greater marks for artistic expression. (I think that some of the observers at one particular event late last year are probably still laughing at one of my better efforts - pure poetry in motion!)

Be careful not to overtighten the bolts holding the inlet manifold and reed block in place. I did this and suffered major pinging for a while because of an air leak which only happened when there was lots of vibration (higher revs that I should probably be using due to rider incompetance!). The inlet manifold bent a bit because of the overtightening which opened a bit of a gap between it and the reed block which caused the air leak. I have learned from this mistake and won't be so brutal with spanners ever again.....

Yes the bars are off the '98 Techno - and surprisingly haven't been bent just yet. I have also spent quite a bit on the bike such as tyres, chains and sprockets etc, and for its age it really isn't all that bad. The main difference between my bike and a 'real' 2004 model is the front end - the newer bikes steer a lot better, so yes I hope to move to a newer bike at some stage, but are still pretty happy with the one that I've got at the moment.

Someone asked about changing the airbox on their '01 Rev to a later model; I have just recently changed the airbox, subframe and rear mudguard on my '00 Rev3 for the '04 parts. It really didn't cost that much NZ$400, which should be about GPB140 or US$200, but will depend on the parts pricing from your lcoal importers (I think that I got a pretty good discount from my local importer as he was trying to stop my whinging!). It has made a huge difference with the power characteristics on the bike. This is mainly because I am not a jetting guru, so the bike was not set up all that well. I really hated the old '00 airbox and airfilter arrangement, and I am much happier with the '04 setup. We ride in creeks a lot, and I used to drown out quite frequently with the old system no matter how much silicon sealant that was used. Originally I had a lot of pinging problems, especially when the weather was cold. So when BillyT came up with the float level adjustments I tried to follow them to the word. I had lots more problems then getting any low end performance out of my bike even with a 45 pilot jet. So I readjusted the floats to about half way between BillyT's instructions and stock. I then kept trying smaller and smaller jets as the bike was too rich, and have ended up with a 27.5 pilot with the airscrew at 1 turn out. This seemed to be pretty much spot on for me and my riding style. After the airbox change the bike has run much better again, but more in the mid range which logically should mean that the needle was a little bit rich. My conclusion is that the airbox swap was well worth the money because; (1) the bike wasn't setup properly by me, so performance improved (2) I really hated the '00 airbox/airfilter setup and am happier with the '04 (3) the rear mudguard was pretty scungy looking and needed replacing anyway, which has tidied the bike up a fair bit (4) my local importer can sleep better at night knowing that I won't be whinging at him at the next trial

I use a very small G clamp to press the pistons back in - saves on scratching anything and you get a nice even pressure.

Yes I have had them for at least a year, and have bent both footpeg mounts, one worse than the other. Anyone who hops on my bike for a try out seems to think that the handlebars are bent, but its just the right footpeg bracket I must straighten it one day.....

Are you over tightening the bolts on the cover warping it a little bit?? Just a thought.....

I had a similar noise once only it turned out to be something really silly. I had broken the headlight off inside the plastic bracket and every time I went a bit faster it would bang against the steering head making an extremely strange knocking sound. It took me ages to find the problem as it only happened when I was going faster. It never occured to me to look at the headlight.....

I did a bit of a brochure for our club which we hand out at events, and to new prospective riders. If you want I can email it to you, it is quite large as it has several photos on it (around 2mb). Send me a mail if you want it.

Stu It will probably be difficult as there aren't that many riders over here, and the market is a bit limited. The best way is to contact the distributors to see if you can get a bike off them, but don't be too surprised if you get a luke warm response as most would be lucky to sell 10 new bikes a year!! Beta importer is Kapiti Motorcycles phone/fax +64 4 2970240 Sherco importer is TrialsportNZ phone/fax +64 3 579 2106 Montesa and Scorpa importer is Nelson Trials Centre phone/fax +64 3 572 7599 Gas Gas importer is Peter Boettcher phone/fax +64 9 522 4810 There are however many companies that rent out normal off road bikes, and some companies that do guided off road tours. I have a friend in Christchurch that does guided tours around the south island - they are more like extreme trail rides with some pretty amazing scenery. Saying that he can also cater for more inexperienced riders as well - his web site is http://www.adventureride.co.nz so go and have a look if you are interested. I will ask around to see if any of the trials guys can come up with something anyway. Cheers Wayne

We get the Sidi's over here with a goretex liner in them - they are called the 'discovery' and are also aimed at adventure riders. Very comfy and waterproof, and mine are at least three years old and still waterproof.

So the idea with the washers is that the back of the rear mudguard will scrape some mud off the tyre and stop the mud getting stuck between the fender brace and the tyre further up??

Hebo footpegs? Carbon fibre protective bits? Polish the frame and swingarm?? Get Marky Boy to completely repaint it??

I only have very small fingers, so my brake and clutch levers are probably further inwards than a lot of people would use. But I need to be able to use the controls effectively so am sort of stuck with the problem as the taper only ends about 1/2" from the grips. I'm sorry about the picture being so big, I had shrunk it down a fair bit and then got feed up with fiddling with it......

Tapered bars are fatter in the clamp area and then taper gradually to be the same size as normal bars at the grips. I use the Domino tapered bars as introduced on the '98 Beta Techno, but similar bars come standard with the newer Scorpas, and also Hebo are offering them now as well. The important thiing to remember if getting some is that they need to be in a trials bend, and that you do need to change the handlebar clamps which isn't really all that hard. I crash a fair amount, and due to a lack of control the handlebars do take a hammering - I still haven't bent the tapered bars after having them for about a year now, whereas with the standard Domino bars they were bending every few months or so.

From the look of it they are just standard tapered bars. Beta had them on their '98 Techno and Scorpa have them on the SY 2 strokes. Both come from Domino (I think) and would be better than Pro Tapers as they come in a trials bend. You do need different clamps for either. About the only problem with them is that because your front brake and clutch lever assemblies do not have a taper they always some a bit loose part way through the day. I have started taking my small set of allen keys with me to periodically tighten things up. Heres a picture of mine anyway;

I've put some '98 Beta techno tapered handlebars on my bike last year which seem to be really solid. I used to bend the normal Domino bars fairly regularly, so I think that they are pretty tough. I am a clubman level rider so don't do any of the advanced stuff, but do manage to crash fairly often and don't tend to save the bike as I worry more about saving myself first!

I would still get a higher amperage converter and a higher voltage capacitor if I were you - the part number is basically the same for the converter, but where it says 2 then use 6 or 8 (this is the maximum amount of current that it can handle before it blows up). Then have a look around for a connector that will slip onto the new converter - the one I had was basically a rectangular block and the sockets were spaced perfectly for the converter. Then if you solder the old wiring directly onto each connector socket in the same order then you shouldn't need the wiring diagram. Then you just need to solder the capacitor across the pins on the converter - be careful of the polarity of the capacitor as they only go one way. I did have a spare one which unfortuneatly I gave away when I sold the bike, and I can't find the part numbers as I've lost the document for some reason. Good Luck

You can replace the Ac/DC converter and capacitor with uprated parts from Radio Shack or some other electronics supplier (I replaced the converter which was rated at 2 amps with one that was rated at 8 amps and a higher voltage capacitor as well). I will try and find the part numbers which I used on my Techno, but its been a few years and I'll have to have a look on my home Pc tonight. When I had the same problem on my old '94 Techno I found that the soldering was crap on the converter, which combined with some water caused a short and killed it. So I found a plug that would plug directly onto the new higher spec AC/DC converter and just soldered the wires to pins on the plug. The idea was that if it ever crapped out again I could just unplug the old converter/capacitor and plug in a new one. The problem of course never happened again as the higher amperage converter never crapped out, and the soldering was much better.....

Yes I've used it a lot over the last few years - the cheaper transmission 600 seems to work better than the more expensive 800 in my 2000 Rev3.