Coolant hose upgrade

As part of my rebuild, I'm redoing the hoses.

As good a time as any to do an upgrade - so am evaluating a few options. One is is the Samco precut silicone hose kit. Spendy, and I can recreate it by hand buying silicone straight, 45 deg, and 90 deg silicone hose stock.

I've seen folks with braided steel coolant hoses - am curious about that. Assuming that's to protect the hose from the rash and the heat from the header pipes. But I'm thinking that would only heat up the steel, and warming the hose and the coolant, no?

I get steel braided hydraulic lines for pressure consistency - but not clear on how well braided coolant lines would work in an enduro bike application.

Thoughts on this from the group?

Thx

C

FE350 said:

Buy the silicone hoses and forget about the steel braided lines as they are only a show and pressure item. Its like the guy who chromes his oil pan and other engine parts and wonders why he has an overheating problem lol. The silicone hoses are excellent

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Thanks FE,

Yes, have upgraded my DRZ and other past bikes with silicone - that's definitely the way I'll go one way or the other (Samco kit or self-build). All except the thermostat hose with the S-bend (80035027003) are either simple straights or basic 90 deg / 45 deg elbows, So going with self-sourced and cut silicone will be only a small extra bit of work for a handful of cuts. No worries.

And as for the thermostat hose, I wish one could buy the Samco segments individually. Instead, I'll probably just order the OEM rubber for that one. Otherwise, I'd be coupling 2 90 deg sourced silicone elbows in quick succession to form that S-bend, and not sure the resulting constriction of flow is a good idea. So OEM for that part to keep it simple.

My interest in the sleeving came from a few points where the stock rubber has sat (and consequently rubbed) against the engine - wearing it quite thin. Maybe figuring out a standoff solution for those particular points instead might prevent this.

Eucl1d said:

Where do you plan to get generic silicone hoses from?

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We've got a number of industrial hose suppliers who have storefronts for walk-in customers. They stock 45deg and 90deg elbows, as well as straights. They'll also custom order dual diameter/reducer profiles, but I don't think that's necessary here.

They stock 1/2", 3/4", and 7/8" diam. So for this bike, the whole set of 5 hoses could be reproduced fairly easily. I'll only do the 4 main hoses that way, though, as I mentioned above, building the thermostat hoses (a roughly 8" long straight with an S-bend at the top end. Not sure I want to have couplers in such quick succession - but other than that hose, the rest I can easily recreate with stock hose.

cm

Eucl1d said:

I came across this. Also found the SAMCO ones but they are not cheap!

https://www.ktm-parts.com/D4702532.html

They're on my to-buy list.

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Thanks - yes, wondered about those, since one of the hoses doesn't at all match the equivalent OEM. But yes, better pricing than Samco. I believe DRC was the brand I bought for the DRZ - can't recall - was years ago.

Good product, by the looks of it.