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$3,000 Bike Test Extras! – Dirt Rider Magazine

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Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Bart really likes dirt bikes...maybe too much?/></a> <p class="wp-caption-text">Bart really likes dirt bikes…maybe too much?</p> </div> <p>After our popular Buck25 story last year (March 2007), the Dirt Rider family once again took to the used bike market to find some gems. While the full story of these bikes is in the August 2008 issue of Dirt Rider, we asked these lucky “new” bike owners to give you an update on their rides as well as a more in-depth look into their 3,000 reasons to buy a bike.Enjoy.<strong>Worth It By Miles</strong><br /><strong>Bart Allen’s YZ250</strong><br />Story by Bart Allen<br />Photos by Bart Allen, Drew Ruiz and Pete PetersonWhat a great excuse to get a dirt bike! There’s nothing like the “honey, I need to do this for work” line to justify getting a big-boy toy. Still, the decision process of getting the “right” bike, keeping the tab to $3,000, and figuring out how to make the wife happy took way more hours and effort than I care to admit.The first step for me was figuring out what bike to buy. Though I ride a bunch on the street, I’m still pretty novice on the dirt, with all previous experience riding trails on an XR400. While trails are where I’d spend the majority of my time, I also wanted something that I could take to tracks and have some fun. With the budget constraints of this story, a two-stroke 250 was the logical choice.Which one? I wanted to spend about $2,000 on the bike itself, so that got me into the 2000 or so model year, and since I wanted something that gave me a little more peace of mind, I narrowed the field to the CR or YZ. In deciding on the specific bike, I chose to rely on the recommendations of those I trusted. Sure enough, a work buddy knew a neighbor getting rid of a “perfect” ’01 YZ250 – so I made it mine.From the get-go, the bike was rideable with no major flaws or needs, though it was pretty much set up for the track. Thus, my extra $1,000+ of mods would be spent on making the bike more universal in usage. The FMF Gnarly and silencer was the single largest single expense. This was done to make the bike more useable at the lower revs. An IMS 3.2gal tank would give me the range to take longer off-road rides. And for some reason, I just had to have a Pro Moto Billet kickstand – justifying it with the excuse of wanting it for off-road rides and the possibility of riding with my up-and-coming kids. Smaller expenses were the Ricochette skid plate, Cycra hand guards, and aFe air filter (I wanted to try this new dry system because of the ease of use.)And last but not least, I had to get a $100 hoist from Amazon.com. This was what sealed the deal for the wife, as it allowed me to park the bike in the garage without asking her to park outside on the driveway. Now I can park the bike above her car and everyone’s happy. A side benefit of the hoist was that it’s much easier to work in your bike when there’s zero chance of it falling over, and you can lift it up to eye level when working on hard-to-reach areas.<strong>Lessons Learned</strong><br />1) If you’re a novice, and want to get a used bike, make sure you have some friends with experience. You’ll need them to help with the initial purchase, and to help with any fixes/mods you may be considering. If you intend to take this voyage on your own, get a new bike from the dealer.2) Use locktite! My kickstand lasted about 2 hours of riding without it and the result was nearly disastrous. While on the first lap of the day at a local track, one of the bolts jettisoned itself and the kickstand swung back into the rear tire, taking two spokes with it.3) Aftermarket parts are often not compatible. The original bike I purchased had some cool Works Connection radiator braces and frame guards. But to mount the larger IMS tank, the braces had to be removed. Same for the guard on the left side as the kickstand required the mount point.4) Two-strokes eat spark plugs. A simple fouled plug can be the death of valuable riding time. Have extras ready.5) Budgets were made to be broken. While the parts I purchased came to the $3,000 limit, there were other costs that pushed me over the line. Things like taxes, registration, tie-downs, oil, spark plugs… You got to get them all, so if you’re really confined to a strict budget, think well beyond just the cost of the bike itself and the parts.6) “Experts” can’t agree on anything. No matter whom I spoke to, they all had different ideas on which bike to buy and how to spend the money on mods. And if you read a typical magazine shootout, it’s not uncommon to find “experts” differing on which bike won. Too much analysis can easily lead to paralysis. Just go for it and don’t be afraid to give the world the bird.<strong>Conclusion</strong><br />Was it worth it? Hell yes! If this were an experiment, it was proven that you can easily get a fun, quality bike for under $3,000. In fact, I’d say that you can get a decent bike for $2,000 and for the extra $1,000, customize it to your own tastes and make it a little special. Will it be the best bike at the track or on the trails? Probably not. But to get caught up in finding something that is the “best” is a no-win game. Whether it’s bikes, jobs, or girlfriends, there’s ALWAYS something better. My goal was to get a bike that would get me riding again, either at the track or on the trails. I don’t care about racing, just having a good time. And with my “new” bike, I found the perfect companion. <div><a href=Jimmy examines his CRF50

Jimmy examines his CRF50′s bent frame. Nothing Jimmy can’t handle, but not what you want to find in a used bike you just bought.

3000 Reasons
What I Learned
Story by Jimmy Lewis
Photos by Jimmy Lewis and Pete PetersonGetting three solid bikes for $3000 was an accomplishment in itself, but was the deal really that good? In hindsight, I say yes. What I didn’t need was another bike, less three. (Four actually since I got that YZ400 in the deal.) So now I’m trying to figure out what to do with my newfound toys, besides let other people ride them.The XR 50 was easy. I sold it to a good friend of mine whose kid was just at that age where he needed a mini-bike, for about what I paid for it, $400. OK, maybe that was less than I budgeted for the 50 but its making kids happy and I can live with that.The XR400 will stay in my fleet of bikes since it is a really strong running one. I have a couple of others that are not as fresh I’d sell first. And I don’t have the need to do anything to this bike but regular maintenance since it is set up perfect for the trail riding I’ll do on it.Then there was the YZ125. Remember when Chris Denison wrote in his opinion that he knew Jesse unloaded it because it was going to blow up. Funny, I read that comment just the day after the YZ125 ate a circlip and seized over a triple-jump. No, not funny! How did Chris know this? Was it a conspiracy? Not really, but Jesse isn’t the mechanic he thinks he is, especially when it comes to installing those pesky little clips. The one that came out wasn’t much for telling stories, since it was mostly embedded in the cylinder wall and head. The one still intact was not exactly a springy circular clip, but a mauled, plier beaten piece of wire that looked more like the “C” of the Cincinnati Reds. Herein lays the risk in buying a used bike. It was running great, worked perfect, and because of something in the bike’s unknown past, blammmo! You now have a problem.Luckily I didn’t crash when it happened and I sort of heard and felt it coming. I thought the big end of the rod let go until I pulled the cylinder. So my formerly smoking good deal on a YZ125 was now a smoking pile of parts on a bench, with me trying to figure out the best way to get it all back together. Luckily my job position affords me the ability to test out some cylinder replating services and possibly a big bore kit for the bike. Truthfully these would have been the routes I’d have taken with my own hard earned money too. But I couldn’t wait to ride the bike and I just ordered up a new cylinder from Yamaha and a Pro-X piston kit to keep the bike running while I’m lining up the fix-up for the thrashed cylinder. Because I really like riding this bike. The suspension is so good (it was done by Pro Circuit) that I like it better than the fresh 2008 we have in our fleet of test bikes. Since then I’d freshened up the look of the bike with www.RidePG.com Groovy graphics kit on fresh Polisport plastic from Powermadd and added Fasst Co. Flexx bars, because that is the stuff I do to a lot of my bikes. OK, the graphics are for my wife, after all it is her bike in the first place.

It almost goes without saying the 2005 RM250 turns great./></a> <p class="wp-caption-text">It almost goes without saying the 2005 RM250 turns great.</p> </div> <p><strong>LIKE NEW(ER)</strong><br />Story by Pete Peterson<br />Photos by Jesse Ziegler and Pete PetersonWhen the idea for this $3000 bike test was being thrown around, I thought $3000 was way too low of a budget cap. I knew I wanted to buy a newer bike in great shape, that needed nothing, and just freshen it up a bit. I thought $3000 would drop me into the market for an abused bike, and I did look at plenty of those, but I wound up getting lucky.The bike I bought was actually the first one I saw. On my first day I checked out both it and a nice ’06 KXF250. Both bikes seemed perfect, so instead of snatching one up, I assumed the used bike market was better than I’d anticipated, and decided I would search around a better deal. Wouldn’t you know it, I then found a perfect ’04 RM250 and talked the guy down to $2000 – then scrambled for a bank that was open on Saturday afternoon only to come up empty. The Dirt Rider Torture Test kept me busy until Wednesday, and when I called the guy back the bike was gone – lesson learned – if you want to grab a good deal, have the cash in hand.I looked at a few more RM250s and started to find more of what I was initially expecting – bikes that were pretty beat. It’s amazing how many people, when writing their bike ads, forget what ‘perfect’ ‘mint’ and ‘like new’ really mean. I wish they’d describe the whole bike not just the new graphics kit. So I scrambled back to the first bike I looked at with cash. I knew it was a good buy, but couldn’t help being concerned at how happy the seller looked to be getting the cash. I kept visualizing that “Three Stooges” bit where the Stooges trade their dying car for a boat. As the boat seller walks away, the Stooges laugh, “Wait ’till he tries to drive that car,” and he laughs back even louder, “Wait till you try to sail that boat!” Well, all that worry was for naught, because the bike has been perfect so far.So what did I learn from all this? Nothing (except the part about having cash in hand). I learned everything last year when I tried to bring a hammered 1994 KX250 back to life (The Money Pit Bike, September 2007). I learned then that parts costs add up when a machine has been abused, and time keeps racking up when you find more and more wrong the further you get into a bike. I was glad to be done with that old bike, and did not want a repeat performance with this project. So I bought a bike that was very close to stock and had very low hours on it. A bike with higher hours on it would be okay if the owner had kept up on routine maintenance. I was lucky with my find.I paid $2800, so I only had $200 to play with for mods. Normally I would spend nearly this much in addition to even a new bike, so the challenge was on. The first thing I did was take apart the rear linkage and steering stem to inspect and grease the bearings. The bearings all looked good, and none were bone dry. Some had a fine amount of grease still there, others were getting dried out. There was plenty of dirt threatening to get into the linkage, but none had made it in. The swingarm bolt and some of the linkage bolts were corroded, but I cleaned that up with some fine grit sandpaper and a Scotch Brite pad, and put everything back together slathered in Maxima grease. I picked Maxima as my ‘sponsor’ for this bike for lubricants. I won’t tell you if it’s because Maxima makes great products or because it was RC’s oil on his RM.I drained the old gas and put in fresh premium with 32:1 Maxima K2 premix, and changed the transmission oil with MTL Fluid 80wt. The oil coming out did not look bad at all. I threw on a brand new Bridgestone 402 (110/90-19) since the last time I’d ridden a RM250 with a questionable rear tire I separated and broke my wrist. The tire was not nearly desperate for changing in terms of knob height, but the knobs were pretty rounded. Let’s face it, two-strokes don’t get the traction that four-strokes get, especially here in So Cal with the hard pack tracks. If my tire budget goes up a bit with more frequent changes than on a four-stroke, so be it. The bike still had the stock chain, so I replaced that with a top quality DID ERT2 gold chain. I threw in a fresh NGK plug since the bike wasn’t starting too easily and the reeds looked perfect, and I stickered up my race number on all three plates with Factory Effex Factory 7″ numbers. Individual numbers don’t look as good as pre-prints, but I’d forgotten how easy they are to put on.I found the air filter rim foam was partially disintegrated, so I got a couple Twin Air filters. Then, since this bike was just for me, I cut down the bars just a bit. I find this makes turning take less effort, and makes the bike easier to keep leaned over. A good rule of thumb is to do a push up in the most comfortable position, then note how far apart your hands are – that’s likely your ideal bar width. I took less than 1/2 off each side of bars (with feels like a lot more once you’re riding) and put on fresh Pro Taper grips. My last task was to sticker up the bike with all my great ‘sponsors.’ <div><a href=Fresh knobby, greased linkage, and a brand new sticker! Time to moto!/></a> <p class="wp-caption-text">Fresh knobby, greased linkage, and a brand new sticker! Time to moto!</p> </div> <p>Okay – greasing the bearings, top quality chain, aftermarket air filter, race numbers, and comfortable grips – how many of you do these things to even a brand new bike?Then I went out for my shake down ride. It was weird to be excited about a used bike when I have nearly every 2008 bike to pick from, but I was excited. I went out to Perris Raceway, where I’d ridden two weeks before on my favorite 250F, the KXF. Here are my notes from that first day. Is it okay to quote yourself? Well, I’m doing it -”The bike turns like a dream. There was headshake coming in the corners, even at slow speeds, but leaning back during braking seemed to help. The power was perfect and railing out of berms was a blast. I was jumping neutrally, and one of the jumps I wasn’t doing on the 250F looked tiny and I was doing it smoothly. The 2-stroke motor was magic in getting lift in the rhythm sections – just a tiny blip and the bike wanted to get into the air. Also, that magical line selection is back – okay to slide in, square up, and accelerate out. This bike loves that. The brakes, however, seemed weak. Not mushy, just like there wasn’t much power. Maybe like the pads were glazed or something.”My lap times slowly came down through the day, and my fastest, in my last session, was two seconds faster than my best on the KX250F from 2 weeks before on the same layout.Then we had the “3000 Reasons” test, and one thing I figured out there was that I think the bike’s rear spring rate is too stiff for me. Jesse, who outweighs me by 15 pounds, was in love with the shock. I also realized this might be the reason the bike felt better when I exaggerated leaning back under braking.So after the test I dropped the rear spring from a 5.3 to a 5.1, and am happier. I put on an FMF Fatty pipe and Power Core silencer. I wanted to test a Gnarly for MX, but was told by none other than Danny LaPorte that the Fatty was the way to go. I must say it made the bike’s power both smoother and stronger – I like the change and am glad I listened to the former World Champion. Oh yeah, his personal bike he had out that day? An RM250.I have a set of cool graphics on the way, a set of ASV levers that fit an RM250 that somehow never made their way out of my office way back when we had a budget limit, and, as way to prove that budget cap is really lifted, I have an Ohlins rear shock coming to try out. I’m also going to look into my weak brakes. I know there’s more pucker power to be found.Before I start throwing money at my bike and lose the perspective this project gave me, I’ll hurry and sum up – this test really did show that you can get into the sport relatively cheap. I’m not saying $3000 is chump change, but it’s not a lot of cash to lay out for the thrills motocross provides. The two-stroke may be dying, but what a deal you can get on an old race horse.<strong>Pete’s Parts List</strong><br />Bridgestone<br /><a href="" onclick="javascript:window.open(www.bridgestonemotorcycletires.com
110/90-19 402 rear tire $67.85Maxima
www.maximausa.com
800.345.8761
grease $5.99
MTL-R 80wt trans oil – $5.99 Pro Taper
www.protaper.com
951-736-5369
grips $7.99 NGK
www.ngksparkplugs.com
1-877-473-6767
BR8EG spark plug $4.56 Factory Effex
www.factoryeffex.com
800.866.0709
3 sets Factory 7″ numbers $20.85Twin Air
www.twinairusa.com
800.749.2890
Air filter $26.99 DID
www.didchain.com
ERT2 Gold chain $47.97 Total
Bike $2800
Parts $188.19
Karel

Karel’s bike didn’t feel modern, either. But this test showed that’s not entirely a bad thing. Danny LaPorte was able to rail on it.

3000 Reasons
1989 Kawasaki KX285
One for the Money
Story by Karel Kramer
Photos by Drew Ruiz and Karel KramerAs the final part of the 3K bike story, we were asked what we learned from the project, and what we would do differently. Apparently I never learn, since I wouldn’t do much differently. The important aspect of buying a used bike is not to buy a junker. I picked this bike for a variety of reasons. One, I have a mortgage, a wife and two teenage daughters, so cash to buy motorcycles when I already have a couple in the garage is hard to explain to even my extremely understanding wife. I’m picky about riding position and suspension set-up, so I’d be making some mods if the bike was brand new, so I needed to have room in the budget for those items as well. A 250cc two-stroke is a pretty great bike even going back a few years. Normally, I wouldn’t have gotten a bike so old, since parts and accessories get rare. But the ’89 KX250 shares a chassis with all KX500s right up to 2004, so aftermarket support is strong and parts are available. Even though the bike wasn’t pretty, it had seen regular mechanical care as evidenced by the nickel-plated frame and new kick start lever. A thrasher would just leave the floppy lever. Only a pretty serious rider buys a new one unless it falls off.Having this old bike as my only ride would be a step down from the brand-new test bikes I pilot now, but it is a solid, comfortable and plushly suspended off-roader. Not bad for $1600. Even with a full engine rebuild, the total will be under $2000. And all of the common wear items like tires, brake rotors and pads, chain and sprockets and controls are brand new. The bike benefits from modern technology as well. The Sunline handlebar radically cuts the vibration reaching my hands, so in ways the bike feels better than it did new. I’d like to keep an eye on eBay for some later-model brakes, and give the engine a freshening, but this is a fine off-road bike for the money.Parts and Supplies
1989 Kawasaki KX285 $500
Dunlop D756 front tire $65.88
Dunlop D952 rear tire $59.95
Rocky Mountain MC front rotor $59.99
Rocky Mountain MC front brake pads $17.99
Rocky Mountain Primary Drive chain/sprocket kit $77.26
IMS footpegs $96.00
Kawasaki peg pins $7.82
Kawasaki exhaust gasket $3.75
Kawasaki KX500 clutch perch (used) $10.00
Kawasaki KX500 clutch lever $8.90
Carb vent hoses $3.00
Dicks Racing fork guards $29.95
Race Tech shock seal $9.99
Race Tech shock dust seal $6.29
Race Tech shock bushing $9.99
Race Tech shock bumper $19.19
Maxima shock oil $12.12
Guts seat foam $54.90
Sunline OSX bar $89.95
Sunline grips $9.95
Sunline bar mounts $79.95
Sunline front brake lever $9.95
FMF pipe $195.00
FMF turbine core S/A $119.95
Pro Moto Billet kickstand $149.95
Factory Effex black backgrounds $14.95
Factory Effex white numbers $3.49
Shock Sox $24.95
Total $1632.06

New stickers. New bar. New budget./></a> <p class="wp-caption-text">New stickers. New bar. New budget.</p> </div> <p><strong>More Tweaks and Tunes<br />Marty’s ’99 KX250</strong><br />Story by Marty Estes<br />Photos by Marty Estes, Pete Peterson and Drew RuizIt was a lot of work to rebuild this bike, and I took a chance when I bought it sight un-seen on eBay that it would be OK. Jimmy Lewis instilled a little fear about the many possible consequences of lack of maintenance, which this bike clearly suffered from. I was definitely worried when I went to pick it up. I think I got a bit lucky though, in that the bike actually was low-hours and pretty fresh under all that thrashed/broken plastic. The low hours saved it because the original owner did nothing. NOTHING. Ever. Except change the tires once. And even that was too difficult – the bike came with no rim locks.It was a rush deal for sure to rebuild this bike in time for the test, and unfortunately I was up until midnight the night before just trying to get it all together. Having never ridden the bike before, I was worried about how it would perform. Mostly, would the suspension pummel the lesser men in this test? Would it handle, would the brakes work? Would the brand new motor stay together? Answers: Yes. Kind of. No. And yes.Now, with three rides since the test, I’ve got the bugs worked out. My KX is better balanced, broken in and working well. Most of what I’ve done is tune the suspension. It had been revalved by K5Suspension with Race Tech springs significantly stiffer than stock. I needed to set the sag a few times to compensate for the new spring breaking in, and turn some clickers. The shock is surprisingly good. Both magazine shootouts I read agreed it was the best shock in ’99 and even by modern standards it’s pretty darn good. The forks are on the stiff side, and I need to lower the oil height a bit to get a little more compliance, and to allow the bike to settle into turns better. Currently the front end is riding a bit high, and even with compression on full soft it’s not quite soaking up the small hits as it should. The bike is solid on the big hits though and the valving feels good, just a tad stiff for my tastes.The brakes were a real problem on the day of the test. I spent most of the day trying to get the front to work better. The rear was OK-A little weak, but decent enough to ride on. The culprit was a missing piece in the adjustment mechanism of the front brake lever, and I wasn’t familiar enough with older KX brakes to even know something was missing until Brad Banister pointed it out. It kept backing out and engagement was moving towards the lever. I was never really able to get the free play <i>out</i> of the lever (didn’t engage early enough). Not good, especially with weak power even with proper adjustment. I fiddled with different brake pads, bleeding and many adjustments. Nothing really worked until I got it back to the garage. With the proper part ordered and installed, some thoughtful blows from a mallet on the Tusk brake lever (which was too spread out even for my big paws), proper adjustment and yet another bleed, it’s passable now. Kawasaki brakes from this era weren’t particularly good, and compared to modern bikes they’re downright questionable! Next step – throw in the towel and find a CR master cylinder on EBay. They’re pretty cheap…$30-$40 but I keep missing that winning bid.Yes, I am a cheap ass.The wheels were in rough shape when I got the bike (no mention of it in the eBay listing!). Nobody ever tightened the spokes – they were seriously loose and/or missing and the rear wheel in particular was out of round. With new spokes and my modest truing skills, they’re decent now, but not perfect. Who knows what the previous owner did to scar the swingarm. Though 100% functional (all bearings were in great shape), it’s thrashed looking.The motor was solid from the start – crisp, reliable and fun. The revised jetting specs I got out of the Dirt Rider 1999 250 Shootout were spot-on and the bike runs super clean. I must have gotten the power valves installed right – bit of a learning curve for someone who had never rebuilt a KX250 top-end before. It definitely needed rings at the very least, and it was gratifying pulling the old piston out and replacing it with a fresh Wiseco setup. With the new FMF Fatty pipe and fresh packing in the stock silencer, this old warhorse runs and sounds fantastic. I like it more and more. It’s snappy, not so fast that it pulls your sockets out and barks like it should. But even completely fresh and running properly, there’s no avoiding that I’m giving it up against diesels and newer 2-stroke 250′s. Especially at corner exits, where the bigger bikes positively leap a few bike lengths ahead of me unless I execute the turn <i>perfectly</i> and come out on the pipe. Down the straightaway, when the bike gets percolates it’s fast and can hang. But at the next corner exit, I lose another couple lengths…and so on and so forth. Riding it back to back with Pete’s RM was a shocker. The RM has so much more bottom and mid than this KX that it made my bike feel positively 125-ish! Clearly the Japanese OEMs made great strides with the 2-stroke motors in their final 5 years of development.Since the test, I haven’t needed to do much: just routine stuff like transmission fluid changes, chain adjustments and the like. I found some really cool carbon fiber Berg Racing “wings”, which remedy boot-hanging-up-on-the-side panel problem I’ve read about but never experienced! I found them on eBay for cheap, and just had to buy them. Also, I swapped out the bars for my favorites – Fasst Co. Flexx bar. The Tusk bars that I received had more sweep than I like and I had the Fasst bars in the garage – really straight the way I like them. These units soak up those hard hits that try to make it through the front end to your wrists. They demand a little time to grow accustomed to but they feel normal before too long.To mount the larger 1-1/8 bars I bought some Turner mounts from Motosport Outlet that fit into the stock clamps and open up from 7/8 to 1-1/8, effectively raising the whole bar assembly even <i>higher</i>. If Pete hated my ergos the day of the test, he’d positively despise it now. I don’t expect people to like my set-up, but I do point out that if they were 6’3″ like me, they’d probably do the same thing. It takes getting used to, especially when cornering, but the tall/straight bar, combined with higher overall bar height and taller seat allows me to crawl around the bike like a 1999-era David Vuillemin. It forces me to ride over the front of the bike (both sitting and standing), which is where I need to be to save energy, weight the front tire and stay lower off jumps. It also encourages me to stand more and ride smoother. I’m not losing any sleep over “normal-sized” riders who don’t dig it.I’ve also since installed some Factory Effex graphics. For the original test, I had ordered some cheap, close-out graphics on eBay. But the picture didn’t show it…and the seller didn’t list it. They were Flo-Green, clashing horribly with the stock green KX frame paint and plastic. Oh well, it allowed more room for my “sponsors” stickers.I like the bike. I have fun on it (especially out in the desert where I prefer 2-stroke power). I think for a less experienced rider, a 2-stroke 250 of this era is a great buy, especially if it was taken care of and doesn’t need much money pumped into it. But I’ve been riding dated bikes for a few too many years now, and I’m feeling the need for a truly competitive bike for the track. I can’t ignore it any more – the 450 is the perfect bike for me. As a 2-stroke die-hard, much as I hate to say it, I think I’m going to put the KX up for sale to help fund a 450F. I’ll look for a very clean, low-hour ’05 or ’06 450F and try to find somebody who’ll sell me one for around $3000. In looking at used 450 prices and it’s clear that there is significant supply and prices are low. In a couple year’s time, I’d like to get another 2-stroke, something newer than 2005 because 2-strokes are fantastic bikes. So lightweight, reliable, flickable and fun. But what I learned was that power-wise, maybe I went a little <i>too</i> far back on this one. <div><a href=It

It’s always sad when they can’t hold themselves up.

Marty’s Parts List1999 Kawasaki KX250
$1,130.00
www.ebay.comRocky Mountain MC Hardparts
$296.33
www.rockymountainmc.com
1-800-336-5437RockyMountainMC Details
Primary Drive O-Ring Chain/Sprocket Kit $75.99
Tusk Front Brake Pads $17.99
Tusk Rear Brake Pads $17.99
Tusk Aluminum Handlebar $27.99
Tusk Front Brake Lever $5.99
Tusk Clutch Lever $5.99
Tusk Gas Tank Valve Vent $6.99
Tusk Engine Kill Switch $9.99
Tusk Front Brake Pin Kit $3.49
Tusk Rear Brake Pin Kit $6.98
Tusk Top End Gasket Kit $19.99
Lexx 2-Stroke Silencer Packing $5.99
Tusk Front Rim Lock $7.99
Rusk Rear Rim Lock $7.99
Tusk 180 Piece Metric Bolt Kit $29.99
Tusk Front Braided Brake Line $44.99
Total in RockyMountain Parts: $296.33Attack Graphics Custom Numberplates
$29.99
www.attachgraphics.com
1-800-336-5437Maxxis
Maxxis Maxxcross IT 110/90-19
$52.99
Maxxis Maxxcross IT 80/100-21
$45.99
www.maxxis.comAcerbis
Replacement Plastic Kit*
$119.99
Front Chain Slider
$17.99
Airbox mudflap
$11.99
www.acerbis.itPro Grip 790 Grips
$12.99
www.progrip.comKawasaki Parts**
$186.00
www.kawasaki.com
949-460-5688FMF Platinum Fatty Pipe
$199.99
FMF O-Rings/Springs
$9.49
www.fmfracing.com
310-631-4363D2Moto Replacement footpegs
$17.90
www.d2moto.com
626-442-8522SDG Tall Seat
$89.99
www.sdgusa.com
714-258-1224Boyesen Reeds
$9.99
www.ebay.com
CloseoutAcerbis Fork Guards
$3.99
www.ebay.com
ebay auctionWiseco Piston Kit
$94.99
Wiseco Top-end Bearing
$11.99
www.wiseco.com
800-321-1364Motion Pro Throttle Cable
$12.99
Motion Pro Throttle Sleeve
$9.90
www.motionpro.com
650-594-9600No Toil Pre-Oiled Filter
$10.99
www.notoil.com
877-688-6451Racetech
Racetech .46 Fork Springs
$109.99
Racetech 5.2 Shock Spring
$109.99
www.racetech.com
951-279-6655Suspension Revalve
$280.00
www.k5suspension.com
818 261-8518Pivot Works KYB Fork Rebuild Kit
$68.99
www.pivotworks.com
515-402-8000Total Cost: $2,945.44* includes Front/rear fenders, sidepanels and radiator shrouds asdf dirtrider.wordpress.2012-04-30-final.xml splitter.sh tmp wordpress.2012-04-20.xml wordpress.2012-04-30.xml Crash damaged parts, missing bolts/collars, exhaust mounts, power jet, diff needle etc.Brad’s 2002 YZ 250F Project Bike

Part Brand Motorsport Outlet pg. # Price Size
Athena Big Bore (292cc) Athena 195 $578.00
Auto Decomp Cam (stock) Hot Cam 195 $190.00
Timing Plug Kit (blue) Ride Engineering $40.00
Wheel Spacers Ride Engineering 232 $32.00
Axle Blocks (blue) Ride Engineering 215 $40.00
RK Chain / Sprockets 13/48 RK Excel $140.00
Swingarm slider Acerbis 214 15.00
Roost deflectors (uniko white) Acerbis 248 $35.00
Body Kit Acerbis $129.00
# plate Acerbis $19.00
Fork Guards Acerbis $30.00
Grips Renthal $10.00
Graphics ONE Industries Rocky Mountain $54.00
Techno grip seat cover ONE Industries Rocky Mountain $45.00
Desert IT tires Maxxis 229 $110.00 (110-90-19) (80-100-21)
Skid Plate Utah Sport Cycle Rocky Mountain $75.00
Fork Seals $35.00
Fork Oil Maxima $20.00
Lightspeed Wide Steel Footpegs $99.00
Total $1,696.00
Budget $1,800.00
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