250-500cc First time husky owner of a 2012 wr300 with questions

First off I must say I have a love hate relationship with my 2 month old Wr300. I have been riding yz250's for about 10 years now and I have to say this Husky is so much easier to ride, but I am having some issues with it.

The first was the clutch was destroyed after riding it for 2 hours when the nut came off the the crank shaft. But I will say the dealer was awesome and had it fixed at no charge the day after I dropped it off. Now after putting about 5 hours on the new clutch it is dragging bad enough that it stalls every chance it gets and I cannot start it in gear. I have read some of the other posts and have sent my clutch cable off to Terrycable to have them do there magic. They told me they have fixed some of these for Ty Davis so I figured I would give them a chance. I am crossing my fingers.

Now to the one thing I am no expert in, the suspension. I have read some of the other post and will admit I am a bit confused. In the past I have just taken my suspension to someone and had them do a revalve since the moto suspension was to harsh on a yz for woods riding. I would like to try and get the stock adjusted a little better on my 300 but do not want to do to much because it turns so well. So can anyone point me in the right direction to help it from bottoming out so bad on g-outs and maybe add the ability to compress the suspension to jump objects a little better. I have adjusted the rear sag. Also I weigh around 170lbs. so I think the stock springs are correct for me.

Thanks for any help.

Conrats on wr 300 purchase. To bad about cranckshaft nut, i had heard other guys having similar issues. I can honestly tell you I am no pro, but I have been around dirt bikes my whole life. I think without a physics major or degree in rocket science setting a bikes suspension to ones liking near impossible. On my wr 300 it was real simple. Bike was set up for 175- 195 lb. rider according to dealer, I weigh 185, all I had to do was adjust fast, slow and rebound on front and rear respectively. I beleive in the KISS program (Keep It Simple Stupid) I first verified spring weight by cranking down all adjustments and trying everything possible to abuse suspension and bottom out etc., as bad as it felt it gave me a baseline. Because I mainly race hare scrambles I need the suspension as soft as possible. Most events I can set front and rear fast and slow adjustments to center and back off 2-4 clicks. I set rebound front and rear all in and back 2-3 clicks. After riding parade lap if arms tired or suspension bottoming I'll adjust accordingly, out to soften, in to tighten. I've known alot of riders good, bad, and average and they all seem to take a different aproach, probably the best rider I've ever known never hardly touched his adjustments.

I am having the same problem on the g-outs. I am 200lbs in my skivvies and went to a 5.8 rear spring. It helped but still bottomed. I then had the shock rebuilt but no revalve, better but would still bottom on g-outs no matter what I did with the clickers. I have now installed a 6.2 spring and will find out over Thanksgiving how it works. It works ok in whoops and jumps, just the fast two track I ride in the desert make it bottom. Fingers crossed. The forks are working acceptable with just moving the clickers. (once I figured out they were backwards from my old Kawi, That was a learning experience.)

do yourself a great big favor and get the whole suspension revalved. you wont reget it.

set your sag is the biggest thing after that and keep a log on what youve done then things you like and things you dont like. i had issues with mine where play riding and practicing i got along with the bike pretty good but at races it just beat the hell out of me. (arms/shoulders/legs) got my stuff back from my suspension guy and with a couple sessions of click/play/take notes/talk got things where they needed to be. ive found that the more you can talk with and tell the shop and the more they want to know the more happy youre going to be with the work.

If you look through the 2 stroke section you can find a couple of threads about clutch set up. You have to set the rod adjuster then get a good cable. That Terry cable job might do it, but the custom order Motion Pro terminator is the way to go, IMO.

The new bikes seem to have more transmission drag than the earlier ones did. I'm still trying to pin that one down myself.

Your shock spring should be about right, but you need to go to a .44kg/mm fork spring or possible a .46 if you are fast. Then set your oil height to about 100-110mm, to help with the bottoming. From there you can probable get the clicker to make you pretty happy.

And I totally agree with your statement that the WR is so much easier to ride. I love my WR.

Thanks for all the input. I am waiting for my new cable then I will go out and play with the clicker and see what happens. I tried to adjust the clutch rod and could not get the nut loose. I was afraid of doing and damaged if I tried much more. Any tips on what I might be doing wrong. I tried to hold the rod with a screw driver in the end of the rod and turn the nut, and I also tried to put a screw driver in the side slot and turning the nut and had no luck with either.

You may have to remove the rod and break the nut and top hat loose. You just have to remove the pressure plate to get the rod out.

After riding with the .62 spring, I like it better than the .58 for me. It didn't make the ride all that much harsher and eliminated most of the g-outs. The surprise to me was that even with the same sag (105) the bike handles much better in the turns. Must help hold it up in the stroke with the soft valving.