A friend of mine is in South America on his KTM Adventure and sent me this email last night:
"Ecuador has finally ruined my front rim. I hit a really big change of seal at about 120kh and sure enough it put a flat spot in it so bad you could see the tube.
So anyway, turns out they can get Excel rims here in Ecuador and at about the same price as the UK I figured I may as well get it. However, I'm not convinced KTM Quito have built it correctly.
The spokes on one side are fine, the nipples are coming straight out of the rim and it all looks good. However the spokes on the other side all have a curve in them and the nipples look like they've all been cross threaded onto the spokes. Clearly it is not the correct rim but when asked the mechanic said that they had done this loads before and it will be okay. To me it looks as if the rim quickly crack where the nipples come out of the rim on the wrong angle and really, spokes should be straight should they not?
I'm going to take it back but the likelyhood is that they won't be able to get the proper rim and I guess the only other option will be to go for an original rim which is a waste of money. So my question is, what do you think of this (check the pics), reckon its safe? Should I just carry on on it or insist on the proper rim?
"
What do you guys think???
