Cold weather engine temps too low?

Hey everyone, it got down into the fifties here in Nevada from the high eighties it was the last time I went riding and I pointed my infrared temp sensor tool at the barrel and the highest temp I could get was 125-130 degrees. (Highest temps are near the front). Didn't have the tool before but my temp sticker would read 150+ when ambient was 85+. (after a lot of ripping around) I taped over some of the radiator and was able to get more heat in the engine, which made it run better.(more heat is used to push piston than heating the lump) I remember from two stroke roadracing that we liked the temps to be 150-170 and those bikes had thermostats. Also do chamber protectors help keep heat in the pipe when it gets cold? Anybody else put some tape over their rads? Oh by the way, happy Thanksgiving!

I haven't ridden my WR yet in cold weather, but yeah my KX kept itself really cool never boiled over ever. So in the colder weather I did tape one of the radiators off partially. Definitely helped.

Hi. I cover at least one whole radiator when we go iceracing. It,s still a little cold sometimes.

Johnny

you could try a inline thermostat.

I don't worry about it unless it's really cold, or I'm going to be doing a lot of high speeds. But, then I do like the others and cover one rad up.

As jo360 suggested, you could up date to the new cooling lines / thermostat from the 2011 plus WR's. Then you wouldn't have to worry about it.

I have inline thermostats on some of my KTM's and it really helps.

Thanks for the replies, I'll call Bills or Halls and see if those parts are available for '09 cr144's.

I think an added thermostat would make jetting a little easier. At least you could remove one variable.

That's a very good point and related to this: When I switched to a PC pipe from the (very thin) stock KTM pipe I noticed that the bike was less sensitive to temp variations. We all know the stock KTM pipes are very good in terms of their power character, but they are very thin. The PC (and similar FMF) are much thicker metal. I attributed the improvement to the fact that the pipe will hold it's heat better in the on-off-on throttle woods riding I do. Interesting...

Getting the engine to run in the temp range will help but unless you can warm the air coming into the carb, it will still be dense and tend to make your mixture lean.