85 250WR

To me a 35 year old seal is begging for a Swedish train wreck. In comparison to the cost of the potential consequences, the cost of replacing crank seals is negligible. I started tearing down the 84 250WR right after I purchased it. I had to pull the engine because I could not get the cylinder to clear the cylinder studs in the frame. So the engine came out and found a worn piston with .008" clearance. So silly me think Ok, just need to bore to the next oversize and I will have a nice bike to restore. The bore was egged shaped and went from STD to 2nd oversize on the first bore in its then 24 year old life.

Seems easy enough, right? But wait, there's more...

Pulled the flywheel off the ignition and found the magnets rattling inside the flywheel.

Pulled the pristine clutch cover and found a knackered clutch hub so need to replace a couple posts on it.

Seeing I have everything I need to split the cases I figured I might as well just split the cases and replace the crank seals and centercase gasket because I could see the last person inside these cases assembled it before it went into a frame on the assembly line in Sweden.

Found that one of the POs had replaced a worn piston without boring and fitting an oversize piston. The piston removed had broken it's skirt and left an artifact embedded in the crankwell wall. Just the 250 reduction web but did not perf the 400/430 wall.

The point is that buying a vintage machine with a string of questionable POs comes with some risks. Especially since so few come with service records. We do not know anything for certain until you investigate. This may be about bragging rights for some but since the only mechanical failure I ever had was a stripped countershaft spline on my MR250 in a gully on a mountain about 7 miles from home. I had to pushed it uphill to get out the gully to pull it over rocks and med size boulders to get to the street at the bottom of the mountain. I got it to a friend's house and he gave me a ride home to get my car and my father's bike trailer. That was a 2 year old bike at that point. We are taking about machines that went out of production before the majority of the current riding stars were even born. My point is prep like you will run the ISDE and that is your best chance to finish any ride you set out on.

My credit card just exploded reading this thread! ha ha! All good stuff for this Husky newbe.

Don't you just love how every 35 yr old bike is all original and has "never been apart" lol

Well written Jim. I will say that my attitude regarding rebuilds depends on what I find when I do the initial look-over and pulling apart the easy bits to check on condition.
Low compression, worn footpegs, sacked suspension, beat plastic all point to a hard life. The more worn, the more I'm inclined to pull everything apart.
The '86 400 I bought was definitely low hours, well maintained and original plastic in decent shape. I didn't change the clutch side seal because it's the one least likely to cause a failure. It didn't smoke abnormally when started so I'm betting it's OK for a while.

Betting

unless your me, you will have no problems ...if it was mine, it would fail catastrophically at the furthest point from the trailer

I was going to tear down the low hour 85 400WRX that is almost finished. The clutch cover was rotted from corrosion at the pump so that was the worst I encountered on that. But after getting the cover off and checking the clutch, I found that the clutch basket was likely replaced when Husqvarna took the bike back from the original owner, rebuilt it, and gave it back to him as reward for the season he gave his sponsoring dealer. So I am going to do a leakdown on that, everything else is apart waiting for replacement or rebuilt crankshafts. Half of the 4 Huskys I got as my basket case bundle needed con rod replacement

"And catch on Fire"
lol

I tear down every used Husqvarna I purchase. I'm saving more $$ than I'm spending. If the crank is good. Why try to save a few bucks and ride it till it blows up. A few hours work to disassemble it, inspect it, bore it, new seals, crank bearings, new piston and rings. Do it right. Before I'm many miles in the trails away from the trailer, my point is it's a long ways to push. Never don't a long push yet. I'm never gonna too.