An Expert’s Opinion on the TM MX 300: Some Quick Notes

I’ve been torture testing the MX 300 for about 15 hours now and have learned a few things, had a couple of issues, and have some positive things to say. These are the things that I haven’t talked about yet or that have came up since my last installment.

• The bike handles very well, it doesn’t feel any different than a jap bike – obviously each bike has its own characteristics, but you won’t feel out of place with TM’s Ergonomics and Geometry
• 3mm were taken out of the shock to level the bike out a bit (people do this to many of the modern bikes)
• The suspension is as good as (if not better than) what comes on other bikes – Once you get it set up
• Marzocchi USA has fork springs in stock and it takes about 4-5 days to receive them using standard UPS shipping
• You can order an OEM spring, but your local suspension guy probably has a spring that will fit.
• It takes four days to receive parts from the distributor in California using standard UPS Shipping (I’m in Michigan)
• My silencer broke, I landed really hard off a jump (back wheel on a big rock – the only reason I know this is when it happened is because the bike started sounding weird) and the welds that hold the core in place broke. Somehow the last 2 inches of the core broke also. I’m not sure if this happened at the same time, or because I kept riding since I couldn’t see anything wrong and thought the fact that the bike sounded weird was all in my head. This definitely made the bike run like crap before I found out what the issue was. If you’ve read my story on the KTM 250sx, you know I have had a history of silencer issues.

• There was a little leak where the metal ring that the air filter seats on connected to the air boot. The nuts that tighten the metal seat to the air boot were slightly loose. I tightened them and it still leaked a bit, so I sealed it with silicone. Hopefully not too much dirt got in the engine, there wasn’t a ton of dirt in the boot so I’m not super worried about it.
• The spokes are still tight and the rims are straight. I still haven’t tightened the spokes.
• I’ve only tightened my chain twice and the sprockets are still in great shape. I don’t know if this is a testament to the quality of the TM sprockets and Regina chain or the design and placement of the swingarm pivot.
• I believe I have fixed my seat tearing issue by cutting away the seat base, and covering the plastic with a thick piece of fabric. This made it so the seat cover wasn’t directly in between the hard plastic of the seat base and my knee braces.
• I weighed the bike and it weighed in at 218 lbs on my super accurate bathroom scale – bike was ready to ride, but with an empty gas tank
• I’m really starting to feel comfortable on the bike and I really enjoy riding it.

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