250-500cc WR 250 09 & older ignition > new Ducrappy

Has anyone noticed that you almost never read a post about an 09 or older WR with an ignition problem or a blow-up caused by faulty ignition timing? It seems to me that the older ignition was much better and puts out a generous 55 amps to boot. The newer ignition has riders posting things like "won't start with the headlight on" "kicks back and engine blew up" "died on the trail".

I was considering changing my 250 to a 300 until I started reading posts about 300 seizures but almost never read one about a 250 seizure and especially an older bike with the older ignition. I think I'll wait until the jury is in on wether the failures are ignition related and erroneously blamed on jetting or if the 300 is just not as tough and dependable as the 250.

I'd like to hear other opinions and experiences on this if anyone is willing to share.

The older ignition is more reliable, the new one is supposed to make more power.

Do you know if the newer ignition produces more power because of a different spark curve or because of less parasitic drag?

i would never of bought a new wr 300 if i knew it would cause so much trouble with the faulty from new ignition.the moron dealer who sold me the bike had 4 goes at fixing it but only applied band-aids.found competent mechanic locally who only charged a few cases of beer to fix it properly

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i have found heaps of probs on wr's with ducati ignitions on cafe husky,mine included.stator replaced as a partial fix,then replacing the reg/rectifier seems to have completed the fix,at least in the short term.

i seized my 99 250 with less than 10 miles on it, failed to warm her up properly.

ignition touch wood so far is good on the bike if it fails i will buy pvl and be done with it.

250-500cc - WR300 stator recall Cafe Husky.htm

When I bought my 09 WR250 from Bill's, Bill told me that he had only replaced one certain failed ignition stator on a 250 since he had been a dealer. Maybe a good fix for the newer bike is to replace the newer ignition with the older one. I haven't ridden a newer 250 but I like that I have a 55amp stator if the need came up to mount a bunch of lights on my bike. It also acts like a flywheel weight and smoothes out the power in the woods.

My 2010 Wr has a 2002 Cr ignition Runs perfect every time Plus a few months ago I found a brand new still in the box complet electronics for a 2002 CR Thank you Jeff at Halls

Pretty strongly worded against a bike that is properly functioning now, isn't it?

What did the problem end up being?

If you think thats bad. I had a 225 ttr (my first dirtbike), that failed to spark. I took it to a small moto shop in town hoping for better service than the big boy dealer.

Didn't hear from him for a bit. When I finally did his cashier said the bill is $1200.00 . I asked what he did and he basically replaced every single electrical component on the bike!

I couldn't afford the bill and ended up selling him the bike for 400 bucks. It's why I ended up with a 2-stroke husky. I've owned 2 of them. With a worn out spark plug cap being my only problem with a husky in 5+ years of riding.

dang, he didnt call you to say the bill was going to be that high? sounds to me like he played guessing game and started replacing stuff till he got spark. too bad that last part changed is what finally gave it spark. i find it hard to believe every component was bad! at least you ended up with a far more capable bike!

my strong words are directed at my incompetent husky dealer and incompetent husky importer who screwed me around for nearly a year,costing me weeks in time,4000kms in travel for warranty repairs,one year of rego and insurance lost,and many many hours of e-mails,then getting ignored by the dealer and importer,then e-mailing BMW head office,then getting more b.s. from the importer,eventually getting another warranty repair that still did not fix it.

Have you thought about golf?

hey doug my 300 is a 10 model with kokusan so not just the 300 itself maybe just the model years? ducati came in 11 so the 09-10 model 300s were ok. I do notice starting my 13 model 165(ducati) with light on is harder than it is with it off, not all that much maybe an extra kick or extra oomph in the kick to fire her up but noticeable!

Thanks for the reply, I wasn't sure when the switch was made only that it was shortly after I bought my leftover 09 in 2010.... Probably in late 2010 when the 2011s were coming out. Except for some front fork changes and the ignition the WRs are dang near identical for a bunch of years.

My 2012 WR 300 has about 150 hours on it and not a single ignition issue. Yeah, it doesn't start well with the headlight on. Just turn it off to start, it's not a dual sport. I don't know about any issues related to blown motors from incorrect ignition timing.

I think that the ignition problems with these bikes are blown out of proportion. A couple guys have popped motors, but it's usually due to incorrect jetting, incorrect warmup, or something else. I am not very nice to mine but I keep it jetted right and warm it up and it takes heaps of abuse.

(I do not doubt that the CR ignition runs better and makes more power, it's probably a better system, but the WR system seems fine).

My 09 300 powers heated grips, trailtech evxplorer gps, trailtech h2 light, taillight and blinkers all the time.Zero issues
I wonder if people with newer huskys could retro fit an older one on?