"As you can see from the above picture, those great guys at R.M.C.S. invited me along to see the new machine and even went so far as to let me loose on it. I completed a route of around 5 to 6 miles, in damp conditions, circling the nearby town before returning. I can report that the bike performed and handled well as I shifted up through the five gears and got it up to speeds in excess of 70 M.P.H. down the local bypass. The engine revved very freely up tp 5,500 R.P.M. and being water cooled was surprisingly quiet for a diesel. The harsh knock normally associated with such engines was absent to be replaced by a muffled thumping only marginally louder than a normal KLR. Indeed, I suspect this machine, whilst running, could easily pass unnoticed in amongst a group of similar petrol bikes. I did not get to take the bike off-road though but the 5 new gears seemed very well ratioed to cope with any eventuality. I think the 584cc Diesel engine's output can be compared to that of a 400cc petrol machine with added low down grunt. I was told that some riders had felt excessive vibration but I experienced nothing until the engine reached its highest revs. Even then it did not seem unduly troublesome. Anyone expecting the engine to be heavy will be pleasantly surprised. Compared to others of a similar capacity it is compact and lightweight and perfect for a motorcycle. I'm told the many hours of testing have gone well and the future is looking exceedingly bright for this bike.

I must say it's one thing to read that this machine has a totally new engine and quite another to actually get you hands on it. You begin to realise just what these guys have done in designing and building this engine from scratch. After almost ten years in the making it's great to see this progect coming to fuition. This kind of venture is incredibly expensive and it has to be done right if it's to make a market for itself. I'm pleased to report that this rider gives it the thumbs up and looks forward to the day he can get one for keeps.

Lastly a big thank you to the guys at R.M.C.S. (you know who you are) for giving the author of these humble pages a day out to remember.

I'm hearing that an order for 500 machines is expected any day now. It's thought that Kawasaki USA may start to manufacture the machines.

Latest: HDT have received a $2.2 million order from the United States Defence Dept to manfacture the KLR.

Check out some fact files on the bike in PDF format here and here.

The Latest Press release:

Production of the civilian version of our military diesel KLR has had to be delayed for a short time.

We are just a small company and have been working on this engine for about six years now, however we have been unable to attract any financial backers or partners to the project.

Even though the US Government has pretty much paid for all of the development of the engine, we still need private funding of around $2 million, a very small sum considering the huge market for this particular, world's only high performance small diesel engine, especially in light of current events and current gas prices.

This funding is required for EPA and DOT testing, crash testing, reliability testing (even though we have thousands of miles on the military bikes and upwards of 60,000 miles on a couple of the earlier test bikes), production facilities, marketing, advertising, warranty and spares programs, etc., plus a million other details that we are not required to perform on the military units.

All of our resources are currently being used on the new USMC contract for 600 Diesel Combat Motorcycles.

Scheduled delivery of the first production bikes to the USMC is August 2004, with production continuing through 2006.

We had hoped to be building engines for the civilian version alongside the military unit, as this would have reduced cost quite significantly, the cost of 5,000 sets of engine castings from the foundry is obviously a lot less per engine than 600 sets. The same goes for everything else in the engine.

So, although we are still actively searching for a partner / backer, we are sad that we have not yet been able to get this great machine out on the highways. We do however, still hold out hope that someone with the financial resources needed will come along to help us continue on with the project.

Meanwhile, yes we are continuing to build the diesel engines for use in the USMC Diesel Combat Motorcycle, and of course our development program continues on alongside the production line.

With NATO's new requirement for "one battlefield fuel" several NATO countries are currently testing our bikes, all have given glowing reports on the bikes performance, especially the ease of riding even with amateur riders, and of the quiet, smoke free, easy starting diesel engine.

We now have software engineers working on mapping the engine for a new common rail fuel injection system, the same system used on the new Ford Powerstroke and GM's Duramax.

This should give us quite a boost in horsepower over the current mechanical unit and make the machine very tractable under all conditions.

The production USMC version of the diesel KLR is now right at 40 horse power at 5700 rpm with 45 foot pounds of torque. With a power range from 1200 rpm thru 7500 rpm!!

The very latest version now running on the dyno has a lighter weight flywheel, a new cast aluminum cylinder and a re-designed cylinder head.

This engine is producing horsepower up to 8500 RPM and has extremely good throttle response through the whole power range.

Dry Weight: 369 lbs.

Fuel type used during tests; Diesel / Aviation Kerosene / Biodiesel (20% and 100%)

Performance: 0-30 mph, 3.3 sec. - 0-60 mph, 8.6 sec.
Maximum speed as tested; In excess of 102 mph.
Fuel Mileage as tested (full military load); 105 mpg @ 55 mph.

We are hoping to run one of the bikes at the Bonneville Salt Flats in September, we have managed to talk the organizing body into making a series of new classes for a diesel engined motorcycle, one of the planned runs will be on 100% biodiesel if we can get a little backing from the biodiesel or soy industries etc.

Our future plans include a v-twin diesel engine for ATV and Cruiser use, we have our engineers already working on this engine and several other variants.

For those of you that are looking to replace your gas engine with one of our diesel engines, unfortunately at this time all of the units are being produced under a military contract and, until we start production on the civilian unit with private funding, we are not able to offer any of the engines, engine components or complete bikes for sale.

Thanks for your interest, and if you know of an enthusiast or someone with the financial resources available that might be interested in our project, please let us know, we need to get the word out there."