250-500cc 2009 WR250 Long Term Update

I have been able to log some great hours of riding on the WR. It seems to get better with time after 14 hours of trail riding. Check it out

Only Trail Bikes WR250 Long Term Update

Luke

Before you re-valve you may want to try what I did. I felt the forks were stiff compared to the shock and since I weigh 205 I put a 5.6 rear spring on my shock and it balanced it out nicely. I was able to achieve proper sag with about 10mm spring preload. I to was going to send my forks off for a re-valve but thought instead to service them and see how they acted. Following a recommendation by LTR I used 10w oil and filled the 50mm Zokes to 130mm level. This change in oil level and cleaning the hard assembly grease out of the valving was all my forks needed and now they are very close to the re-valved Ohlins on my GasGas. I only woods ride and the terrain consists of roots rocks and logs. I use Tubliss front and back with an MT43 on the rear and a Bridgestone M59 on the front which is really about the same as the stock Michelin and I agree that stock front was a good tire. I did change the gearing to 13:52 and I like it a lot better. I like my current set up a lot and intentionally made it plush and trials like. I realize a hard riding motocrosser would probably not like it but it sounds like you prefer the same kind of riding as me.

good work
ride it more, only 14hrs

LoL...still running in the motor

Oh, I have more than 14 hours now. I did the review about 2 weeks ago and just made time to finish it with pictures yesterday. I probably have 25 hours now because I took some time off. Thanks for the tips lankydog I will give it a try. I am close about your weight so I will try out a new spring, and check out the forks.

Anyone have a pipe on theirs yet?

No idea how many hrs or total miles I got on my 300. On secone set of tires half way through. Got my 300 last June and ride every other weekend all year long with and average ride of 30-45 miles and have had absolutely zero issues. Bike is still very crisp and tight. Its really is just the best undiscovered secret out there.

Where do you ride at in Indiana? I have an FMF Gnarly on my '08 that I am happy with...

+1 on the FMF Gnarly

ebay cmor68 feedback

In Decatur, we ride a lot around here. How was the power difference with the FMF pipe compared to the stocker?

Private or club land? I used to live in Indy a few years back and we had either Haspin Acres or the Badlands....

I think the FMF helped the low end.

Private - about 60 acres and a nice 2.5 mile trail loop with hills, and some singletrack. Good enough between Haspin trips, because that is a whole day process.

Do you know what springs come stock and where did you get the shock spring? My suspension has been revalved by the P.O. so I hope a spring change will suffice, I weigh the same as u. Thanks.

My stock spring on my 09 WR250 was a 5.4. A Sachs and an Ohlins spring will interchange so I traded my stock Ohlins 5.2 off my GasGas for a 5.6 from a guy on the GasGas forum and used it on my Husky Sachs. Halls had a good selection of new aftermarket springs so you could give them a call if you want new. http://www.halls-cycles.com/

The nice thing about the Husky for me was that the stock shock valving was a little stiff so when I changed to the stiffer spring it came out just right without having to re-valve. On my GasGas I had to go from a 5.2 to a 5.6 and I bought the bike used and had no idea if it had ever been serviced so I sent everything to LTR for service, re-valve and spring change. In your case it would depend on the P.O. and what he weighed and how they changed to valving. I would give the spring change a try and see how it handles and if you can get what you want out of the clickers all it will cost you is a spring (which you will need anyway) and a little time.

My thoughts exactly. Your comfortable with the front stock springs? Their .44's right?

I kept the stock fork springs but cleaned the assembly grease from the valving and used 10w Bel-Ray fork oil. The clickers came out in the middle of their adjustment and the front is balanced perfectly with the 5.6 rear. I did not have the fork springs checked but decided to give them a try since they were much stiffer than the stock 5.4 rear shock out of the crate, since it came out so balanced I'm glad I tried it. I do mostly single track trails not big jumps or motocross and I'm really happy with my set up. I do think that if I rode more wide open terrain with big jumps I may be happy with a 5.8 rear spring and maybe even 4.8 fork springs but for what I'm riding my set up is a smooth traction beast and rivals my LTR Ohlins on my GasGas.

I did the same to the forks, cleaned the grease out, replaced the seals. I tried 10wt Bel-Ray and it felt like I had molasses in the forks, changed it to a 5wt honda oil, much better

I should clarify what I meant about the 5.8 spring. The spring rate has nothing to do with whether you bottom out on jumps or not, that is a function of the dampening. What I was getting at is some riders prefer a spring rate on the stiff side. In other words if you were on the cusp of choosing a 5.6 or a 5.8 you might choose the 5.8 if you prefer less rider and/or static sag.

Rob578 I had my dampening clickers way off center to get the ride I wanted with the 5w but once I switched to the 10w the sweet spot was in the middle of the clickers on both compression and rebound dampening. BTW what do you have against molasses?

agree

BTW what do you have against molasses?
agree- fermented molasses makes the best rum

If you guys don't mind, I'd like to resurrect and hijack this thread. I just picked up a 2009 WR 250 and I'm blowing through the travel completely on the forks with ease. I haven't measured sag yet, but I tend to like a stiffer (riding higher in the travel, but plush) fork than the bike feels now. Now, it's still plush, but it seems to ride rather low in the travel. I usually weigh in at between 207 - 210 lbs. I only ride woods with this bike. The PO reported that he did nothing suspension-wise to the bike. So I have to assume that I'm working with stock springs.

I've been to Racetech to use their calculator like I did for my TE 511, but they don't have the 2009 WR 250 as an option. According to the service manual the stock fork oil is 7.5? One of you guys went up to 10 weight and lowered the oil level by quite a bit, and the other guy went down a 5 weight oil.

Since I weigh about the same as one of the posters I'd be interested in some specific spring rate recommendations for front and rear. I'm thinking I want to put a stiffer spring in front but I'm not sure which rate to use up front. Looks like for the rear, a 5.6 or 5.8 would be a good starting point?

And, the big question is where to buy the springs?