2008 WR250X project

This thing is a bit of a turd right now. It has had 6 owners before me; 25,000km on the clocks, and a bunch of random hack-jobs from the previous owner.

Bike came with two sets of rims, 21", 19"rear, and the 17" X rims; both with X rotors for easy swapping.

The stock 12" X kickstand is a bit of a pain, so if anyone lowered their bike and wants to swap for an R 13.5" kickstand I'd be game. Local for that is always better. I'm half an hour West of Toronto Canada. Shipping would work too. PO powdercoated it white, and its starting to flake at the base. I was planning on taking a wire wheel to it, and paint it flat black.

Subframe has been cut, and a pretty odd rigged up rack system has been added. A chunk of plate aluminum was used, some square tubing, and part of a water barrel... He said he has had 80 lbs on it... it shows, since the subframe has a crack... one more thing to fix.

The rack needs some modifications to work again, and its ugly... real ugly.

AIS has been removed. It has an FMF pipe and header. Header was cracked before the fat part. Sent it off to get tig welded.

Has a power commander, but the ground wire rubbed on the frame, through the housing.

Can anyone confirm what these plugs are? I'm guessing the front one by the regulator is for the AIS, and the rear went to some injection valve thing that was ontop the airbox? They were never taped up

Shock is a pogo stick.

When adjusting the rebound damping, there is no difference in the settings. Either its low on oil, or the nitrogen is gone... Spring is too light for my weight (and I only weigh 170lbs+)

That'll be going to my suspension guy in the new year. Then grease the linkage and the swingarm bearings. Fork oil is original... probably looks like grey sludge. Seals don't leak (unless all the oil has leaked out of them.)

It has fatbars, and risers. Righteous stunt clutch. HEL brake line up front.

Nice project to keep you busy through the winter.

As for the rear electrical plug, I'm guessing it was for the EXUP servo motor which was removed when the FMF muffler was installed.

It should have the servo delete in there somewhere. I'll do some research on that. Its not throwing any codes, so I'll just tape it up.

The lack of rebound damping in the stock shocks is because of the valving.
I added a few baseshims to mine, and it made a big difference.

Updates:

Forks are good. The oil is fresh. There was light pitting and rust at the bottom of the stanchion tube. 600 grit sandpaper and wd-40 did the trick. If there is any deeper pitting, I'll fill it with crazy glue so it doesn't catch the seals and sand it flush.

The rear shock rebound adjuster was screwed all the way out, to the point that it just free spun. I pulled the shock, cleaned it up, got the rebound working again, and lubed the linkage. I'll leave the shock as is, and order parts through GoRace and rebuild it myself if needed next year.

I spooned on a Dunlop Q3 I had off one of my previous bikes. Ordered a 150/60/17 Q3+ and spooned it on the rear.


Ordered a replacement DRC taillight lens. The one on the bike was cracked and held together with glue and silicone caulking.

Lots of cleaning, and rust removal.
Replaced a bunch of bent and corroded bolts.
Re-packed the head bearings.

It had DRC wide footpegs on it, but the P.O. didn't buy the spring kit, and used machine screws to keep the pegs from flipping up... he couldn't figure out how to make the stock springs work... or so he said. ORDER THE PROPER PARTS AND THEY WORK FINE... I'm sure I'll find more of this B.S. as I go.

Rad was bent. Nothing I couldn't fix with a propane torch, a piece of 2x4, and a rubber mallet. Shrouds were bent too... Replaced them with a $50 e-bay rad guard.


Need to weld a crack in the subframe.

Need to have the FMF header welded. There is cracks around the factory weld before the "powerbomb".
I'd like to repack the pipe.


I cleaned up the brakes. Light sanding to remove the slide pins, and grease with slide lubricant/ copper anti-seize.

The rear brake needed to be bled. It stopped working completely. I think what happened is there was moisture in the line that froze up. I was trying to bleed them in -6`c, and I kept getting tiny bubbles, and odd looking brake fluid. It was +6`c today, and they bled fine. The brake piston was pitted and rusted; it needed to be cleaned up too. 600 grit sandpaper did the trick.

Bought an airbox door, seal, pins, and c-clips. I'll keep it off on the street, but if I trail ride it with the R rims, I'll put it on so I won't swamp it out.

Fixed the P.O.s homemade removeable rack that was made out of a rain barrel. Used some diamond plate I had sitting around, and ditched the barrel portion.
The front wheel bearing on one side of the front X rim feel gritty... I'll just order new ones.

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Exhaust is welded. not the prettiest weld, but it'll hold up. Lots of issues with contaminants in the expansion portion of the header. an ugly weld is better than a crack.

With Covid-19 going around, we've been asked to self quarantine for 14 days... lots of time to get the bike back together and running properly. Probably do some work around the house that I've been neglecting.

Checked the muffler packing.  I bet its never been changed.

re-packed it with a packing kit I had stored away for another bike.  Moose racing? Good enough for me.  Blanket style rather than the loose style packing that looks like cotton.  Went in alright. Taped it, slid the sleeve back over, used high heat gasket sealant around the front sleeve connection, and copper anti-seized the bolts.

First impressions. I've riden the crf250L, and the klx250 quite a bit. This has a little more pep, but not much. Its off the limiter pretty easily. Topped out with 13/47 at 127kph. You have to be hard on the throttle to clutch it up in second, and the speed better be right, or it just lightly hops the front end. Might be hard to hop logs offroad. I will switch to 13/50 for that. It felt real boggy off the bottom end. I'll remove the airbox door and see if that makes a difference. There is alot of black soot out of the exhaust, so its probably running pretty rich.

Burned through about 5L of fuel before I hit reserve.
Fun little bike, but definitely not going to light my hair on fire... but that's not why I bought it. Rebound is maxed out on the rear and still feels like a pogo-stick.

Better with the airbox door off. The stutter is gone. AF ratio must have been way off. Still no rocketship, but it doesn't fall flat on its face at low revs

I have 14/49 gearing (roughly same as 13/46), and clutch mine up in 3rd. I would guess at around 40mph.

You'll get better at it :)

I'm going to switch up with another rider locally who has a wr250r, mostly bone stock, and see what difference there is in power.

You're right. I need more time on it to practice. My last dirtbike was an '08 crf450r. It would clutch up in any gear, but was too much for trail riding/single track (in my opinion). The wr will suit my needs better.

I have to get acquainted with it.

Got it dirty in some single track.

Picked up some gently used plastics off a 2019 wr250r locally.

I might go back to the black side panels.

I'll likely swap back to the ugly ones for off road use.

Wow, 6 owners in 25K! Was it a good price? The bikes looking better than when you picked it up, that's for sure. Nice work. That taillight contraption looks err, custom. Probably not hard to find a stock one out there for a few bucks. Re. speed/acceleration, the bike is not necessarily under powered, but I have noticed big differences using larger than stock (140/70-r17 tires are stock rear). You might notice more end with a stock exhaust with the exup valve. These come up cheap from time to time as well, and the stock set up seems to use less fuel than aftermarket.
One thing I just did on a new to me bike that was sat over the winter was remove and clean the fuel injector. I'll post in a the next few days, but cleaning the injector and in and around the throttle body made a big difference, I found.
ps-I think it looks better with the white side panels, ymmv.

woofer2609 wrote:

Wow, 6 owners in 25K! Was it a good price? The bikes looking better than when you picked it up, that's for sure. Nice work. That taillight contraption looks err, custom. Probably not hard to find a stock one out there for a few bucks. Re. speed/acceleration, the bike is not necessarily under powered, but I have noticed big differences using larger than stock (140/70-r17 tires are stock rear). You might notice more end with a stock exhaust with the exup valve. These come up cheap from time to time as well, and the stock set up seems to use less fuel than aftermarket.
One thing I just did on a new to me bike that was sat over the winter was remove and clean the fuel injector. I'll post in a the next few days, but cleaning the injector and in and around the throttle body made a big difference, I found.
ps-I think it looks better with the white side panels, ymmv.

I got the bike for $3500 Canadian, with the second set of rims, spare stock seat, spare gearing. People local are asking $5 grand plus for these... Cheapest I found recently was an '08 x for $4 grand, no spares, mostly stock.

The rack is... very custom... It works, but one of the last owners cut the subframe mounts where the stock taillight assembly attached. I'd need another subframe to swap it back to stock.

You're right on the tire size. There is a 150/60 on there now.

I like the 14/50 gearing on it right now. I used the rubber chain guide and shorter bolts and no sprocket cover with the 14 tooth. Its tight, but it seems fine for street use. I'll go back to the 13 tooth and no sprocket cover with the dirt wheels. I wouldn't want to get a rock, or a bunch of mud jammed in-between the chain guide and the 14 tooth sprocket. I'll get a Sandman case saver down the road (when this Covid shit is over...)

Did you just soak the injector in carb cleaner?

If I go that far, then I'll be checking the valves too. Maybe pull the fuel pump and see what kind of condition its in as well. I don't know if that was ever changed out.

Perhaps I'll do that in the off season.

The new bodywork looks way better. I'll swap to the old when I take it through the forest.

That seem like a similar price range to BC. Here there are lots of bikes to choose from, but a large demand. I just sold my 2008 with 36,000K for $3400, but it was well maintained. Definitely used, but not abused. That's ridiculous about the cut sub frame:suspect: Cleaning the injector doesn't take too much time.I did it the same time I replaced my spark plug. You pull it out of the throttle body, and attach a 12" piece of 7/8" dia clear tubing to the inlet side of the injector. Fill the tubing with 1:1 ratio of Seafoam:Gasoline (or straight carb cleaner), and attach an air nozzle that is connected to about compressed air at about 50psi.
Attach leads to the two electrical pins on the injector to a 9v battery (this will open the injector) then immediately use the forced air to push the cleaner through the injector under pressure.
I run 14/51 on road, and will use a 13t off road as well, but 14t is usually fine, even in the gnarly stuff, and saves me having to adjust sliders, and saves my swing arm protector.
The sprocket guard fits over the 14t CS, BTW, but is tight.
I had some photos, and post them if I can find them.

Long term update. Still have the bike. Its nearing the 40,000km valve check interval. Mostly been riding single track with it. Did a track day at a go-kart track in 2020. I could outbrake drz400sm's, but I couldn't pull them in the straights (for obvious reasons). Doing winter maintenance right now. Linkage bearings. Doing a full diy GoRace suspension upgrade soon. I keep lusting after a ktm 350exc-f, or a 500; but its not going to make me any faster offroad...