AJP PR4 240cc Enduro 2015

Lee, one of the lads we ride with bought one of these this year, he's done about 600 miles on it so far, both in the UK and in Spain on The Vince.

AJP PR4 2015

The main reason for buying this bike was that Lee wanted something light, cheap and fairly modern. He chose this one from his local dealer: Adi's Motorcycles in Selby. The bike cost £4200 and came with heated grips and the upgraded plastic bash plate.

To be fair, Lee has taken a fair bit of stick over this bike, especially from the KTM boys, with comments like: 
'What you need is a bike designed by 2 blokes in a Portuguese back street garage, ''Antonio & Jorge Pinto'' ''AJP'' using 1980's technology! The design was approved by their 3 sisters, Claire, Rachel & Ann Pinto ''CRAP!!'

However it has to be said that the little AJP is doing pretty good, it has handled everything that has been thrown at it so far, including altitude, rocky rough lanes, deep water and lots of jumps and slides as Lee is an ex motocross racer, so pretty handy on the little thing!

Is it a boat or a bike??

So the bike:

Its a 2015 PR4 bike and weighs in at 100kg dry. Cost new is £3850, then the usual on the road bits to add on.

On the positive side, it has good suspension, pretty modern and upto the job of trail riding. The Marzocchi forks are a bit stiff for me personally but give enough feedback and the Sach's rear shock is pretty stiff, which I'm guessing is how lee likes his setup.

The engine is punchy with power where you need it and also a little lazy when you just want to pootle. It seems to spread the power smoothly across the range, both on & off road. Top speed on the road with the gearing Lee uses is about 50mph.

The riding position is nice, it's not as high as a KTM, but you can add bar risers to it to bring the bars up a bit more. Lee is a little on the height challenged side of things so as the bike isn't as high as a modern trail bike, it's easier t get on/off it, yet when Lucy rode it, her 5'10 frame seems to fit to it well too. £33.00 for the bar risers at Adi's shop.

Posing again...

The wheels are the stock 18 rear and 21 front, like most modern stuff they do the job well and most tyres fit them. They are pretty lightweight but strong too, although not sure what alloy they are made from.

Braking is good, with a 260mm disc up front, you can play with it and feather it as you need on the trails, inspiring confidence.

The airbox is at a good height and doesn't suck air in every time it looks at water, unlike our more orange brethren!

We haven't had to use the lights for real as yet, but I suspect they'll be the same as all the other modern bikes, shite... time will tell!

So far all of the bodywork has held up well, through some pretty rough punishment and a few 'moments' where it's ended up on the ground for some reason.

On the negative side:

You can't get at the tick over adjuster as it's hidden behind the frame, so Lee has drilled a hole in the frame to get to it.

The kickstart must have a been a Friday afternoon  trainee jobbie as it catches on the footpeg and is virtually useless... Lee has took to taking it off and carrying it around  on trips like the Strata day otherwise it's not on the bike.

The gearbox is a bit 'agricultural'. It's notchy and overly stiff, maybe this will smooth out in time but we suspect it's just a part of the low cost of the bike, so Lee is just learning to live with it, with the odd grimace here and there.

Mr AJP Robbins!

Summary

We like this bike, for trail riding it's ace, the price is it's best selling point but actually it does the job fairly well too, there are little things to sort or to upgrade, but there are on all bikes, whether they cost £7k or £4k, so no difference there... It's proving the sceptics wrong and doing what it was bought to do, what more can you ask of a machine? Lucy wants one after riding Lee's bike for half a day in Spain and I'm seriously looking at one so that I can take the DR off the trails and get her rebuilt as she's taking a bashing from all I do with her.

After the Strata weekend, the AJP has been blowing some steam from a breather hose under the engine, so that needs investigation, but we suspect there may well be increased pressure in the engine if water has been sucked in and mixed with the oil when Andy swamped Lee and the bike in one deeper puddle! Time will tell... 

Update: It turns out the oil had emulsified, so a oil change and that was that sorted!