Be sure to order a complete set of hip graphics/ BNG baby. Like I said in my post even if they are old , they must look cool!!! Gotta look the part!!
It's basically an open canvas at this point. It also needs a rear fender and mud guard. Once I get it back on its wheels I'll take it for a local day to get it broken in and see if there's anything else that needs attention. If it goes well then it will get some bling.
Good news! My suspension is done!!!Hope to get it back on it's wheels this week. Maybe I can sneak out and ride it on Sunday.
Well, it's back in one piece! I got it together after work today. I even had a chance to run it around the block before dark tonight. Runs pretty decent without all that piston slap.
Got some seat time yesterday. Nothing like a hot day for a good bed in for piston and rings. Got in 2 short rides for heat cycles. Second ride was my warm up loop at this riding area. After that, checked the plug and it was chocolate, but light. Third ride was a 10 or so mile loop in 100°+ temps. I did feel the motor was really getting there and the light switch started to come on. It lugs pretty good for an MXer but man, when it wakes up the front wants to reach for the sky. The thing turns like crap, but I wanted to start with the forks almost level with the top and work my way down, so not a mystery as to why. I started to get some surging under slow deceleration and also have a small flat spot in the middle and could use a little more fuel on top. I didn't do anything but replace some screws that were missing or ugly on the carb, so now it's time to mess with it some. The Fatty pipe has a small hole right before the chamber opens up so I'll need to patch that up as well. It dumped spooge all over the frame and right side of the motor. I couldn't get it off so I sprayed some WD40 on it. Took that crappy silver paint right off. So now it gets a complete tear down and repaint on the frame. Since the motor runs decent and shifts well, it has earned the right to a proper resto.
and then will come the bling---it really needs a graphics package as the final dress up..........after all the other stuff!!! PS my 125 see thread, is getting with the program and is very close to spot on, FWW and more carb work and she will be 100%
OK, one more test day. I dropped the clip 1 on the needle. It was blubbering down low till it cleaned out around the block. Then it was much better through the midrange and up top. I haven't ripped it apart yet but I did order a new Fatty pipe for it. Think I'll do one more local day and mess with the air screw some. Would be great to know it's close to dialed before I go whole hog.
It's really starting to wake up now. Changed the trans oil yesterday. Some sparkle in there but not too bad. After raising the needle (dropped the clip 1) it was blubbering still this morning, but transition to mid and top were smoooth for a MX bike. I ended up opening the air screw about 1/4 turn over three small adjustments and it's running pretty sweet now. Ran into a guy out on his 99 CR250 so we decided to go for a quick jaunt on the old Japanese machines. Having someone to pace with was good. I was caught by surprise more than once today when the motor hit the power valve. Third gear wheelies cruising up hills with little effort on my part got some hoots from me. We might go ride Gorman next weekend when The Marine comes to visit so it will stay together a little longer before the bling session. At least I threw a set of grips on yesterday, nice improvement. Hope the new Fatty shows up at the shop this week, that will be a nice change from the broken and carbon/oil filled Fatty on it right now.
We decided it was just too damn hot to haul the trailer up this weekend, plus some work stuff has made it so I kinda need to be on stand by.
The new fatty is on, and I might just wait to get it all pretty until after our race in October. It's good to know I have a spare bike for the work and race weekends. I've been going back and forth on frame color. I think the stock color was a fitting for the 90's purple. I was going to to just do Rustoleum white, but that color on robertaccio's 125 frame is starting to grow on me. The Marine helped me pick the BNGs but I'm holding off on dumping too much money into it right away. Might become a winter project to kind of do it all at once.
by some coincidence we did a fairly tough A level ride in the local mountains and with us was a guy I had never ridden with before on a beat up 94 or95 WR250........well I gotta hand it to him we never had to wait long for him...also he had no handguards and the trails have grown over bigtime from last winters rains....
That's it. Is one can good for a frame? Seems easy if it covers well. These old bikes are not too bad. As soon as the USD forks got good, both ends had disc brakes, and power valves became normal, it was and still is a matter of refining the same basic design. If it holds together for a couple of years when I'm done with polishing the old turd it will probably last forever. If not, I'll still get my money worth out of watching it get ridden. When I'm not out riding it.
The old YZ got pressed into service over the last 2 weeks. My friend couldn't get a water pump seal in time for his bike for the work weekend, so I brought it along. He rode it 2 days in a row and easily put 80 hard marking miles on it. Then my shift lever stripped on the 449 just as I was headed out for race sweep, so the old girl put in another day and a half with me and another 70-80 miles. It sure doesn't like to sit still every 60-100 yards pulling ribbon and cards, but with cool down breaks and careful riding, she held up pretty good.
