Where are your XT250's...let's see them.

[qwiksilver]

Originally Posted by empanadaman

Put a Wolfman Express tank bag on tonight. I'll take some better pics tomorrow during the day but you can see the reflective sections of the bag in this photo.

There's a nice rear rack for that bike on ebay for about $70. I have one.

[empanadaman]

Originally Posted by qwiksilver

There's a nice rear rack for that bike on ebay for about $70. I have one.

Pics? I've got some Happy Trails panniers on order but I'd still like to see what you got!

[hypoman]

hi guys,
i previously posted a pic of my old xt that i recently bought here in the Philippines.
basically its a pretty good bike but the frame has been painted 3x and needs stripping back and powdercoating... next step.

ive fitted a T4 power pipe to it and a new seat cover.

next step will be painting the frame then maybe a disc brake front and rear...

come on guys, show us your older xt's!

[empanadaman]

Hi Hypoman,

You must have some really nice places to ride there I bet. I'd love to see some photos of the areas you ride. Good to see older XT's still alive and kicking!

Originally Posted by hypoman

hi guys,
i previously posted a pic of my old xt that i recently bought here in the Philippines.
basically its a pretty good bike but the frame has been painted 3x and needs stripping back and powdercoating... next step.

ive fitted a T4 power pipe to it and a new seat cover.

next step will be painting the frame then maybe a disc brake front and rear...

come on guys, show us your older xt's!

[empanadaman]

Originally Posted by Short'n'Spikey

First day out on the Serow 225

Phew - thought I'd lost my bike for good!

Glad u got your bike back finally LOL

[Gregulator]

Does anyone know where I can get a hold of a shop manual for this bike for a reasonable price? (downloading would be great). I've read elsewhere that xt250report.com used to be a go-to repository, but it went down this summer.

I just picked up an '08 with 360 miles for my wife (from someone who hurt themselves just after buying it). We've only had a 2-hour ride home with it yesterday for me (including a few stops for big puddles, washed out logging paths, and random hill climbs beside the road) and some time in the parking lot for her, but we're both in love with it. Her because as she put it, "It's like someone actually made a bike for someone my size!" and "I feel so confident!" and me because I finally have something I can flog in the dirt without guilt (the things I do to my SV650 really aren't fair to it ). I'll share some pictures with you when we can get it out in the daylight again.

[RawRats]

Originally Posted by Gregulator

Does anyone know where I can get a hold of a shop manual for this bike for a reasonable price? (downloading would be great). I've read elsewhere that xt250report.com used to be a go-to repository, but it went down this summer.

Sure. Here you go:

[empanadaman]

[QUOTE=RawRats;14966260]Sure. Here you go:


Nice! Thanks RawRats!!

[zzo]

Has anyone tried the Corbin seat for the XT250? I have a flat Corbin on my KLR and think it is great. But the seat for the XT250 is almost $400. So, I'd like some feedback before I buy. I rode several hundred miles in a few days last summer and got a sore bottom, so I think a better seat is in order.

I don't have a picture but here's a thread with a picture of my bike just before starting the Montana1000 last July. http://www.advrider.com/forums/showt...503890&page=43 I have Happy Trail racks with their tiny Imnaha boxes. I carried the sleeping bag and tent on top in nylon bags. The set up worked well once Shady Rascal sawed a board to fit across the seat and supported on either side by the Panniers. This supported the nylon bags. Without the board the bags sagged down and blocked air flow over the muffler. Without the airflow, the exhaust melted my tail light. Once I restored the airflow, all was well.

[artbone]

Originally Posted by JollyMeanGiant

artbone:

Here's my experience with jetting the XT250 for higher elevations. I got the main jet part number from a parts fiche and then I tried variations of that number at www.ronayers.com to find the other sizes. These jets were used by a bunch of Yamaha thumpers in the 1980s and 1990s.

Yamaha part number - main jet size

288-14343-70-00 is #140
288-14343-68-00 is #135 standard main jet for 2008 XT250
288-14343-65-00 is #130
288-14343-63-00 is #125
288-14355-61-00 is #122
288-14343-60-00 is #120
288-14343-59-00 is #118

I ride from 5000ft up to 12000ft. On long hills and full throttle in 4th and 5th gear, my XT (with #135 main jet) had a bad rich stumble. I drilled some holes in the airbox, but it wasn't enough, so I got the smaller jets. I finally ended up with #122 main jet. I did not make any changes to the needle. The bike runs much better and I'm happy.

I found the jet kit on Ebay and it's from 6sigmajetkit. I think you can put in 6sigma jet kit and go to their online store. When I got the kit I was impressed that they included a sheet that address my bike specifically. I had sent them an email that the bike was rich and that I lived at 6500 ft and they sent me 2 smaller jets (#125 and #130) and several small shims, etc.

As far as the needles are concerned, on my bike the needle only has one groove. There is a thick plastic shim under it. They sent enough shims that you could adjust it up or down but, after changing the jet, I didn't feel that I needed to do that.

The kit included a drill bit and wood screw to pull out the alum. plug that covers the low speed adjustment screw, which I did as per their instructions and that is definitely something that anyone that has one of these bikes needs to do. My bike starts so much better with just that change. The stock position of the air screw on mine was about 1 1/4 out and I changed it to 2 1/4 out and it really made a difference.

The last thing I did was take out the spark arrester and saw off about 6 inches and reinstall it. With these mods the bike will now touch 80 MPH on downhills and hold about 75 on level ground. More importantly, it starts easily from cold after sitting a few days and doesn't have any weird lurches and stumbles when I roll off the throttle or on transitions from full throttle to part and back to full. It runs like it's supposed to.

The kit includes a small drill to drill a hole in the metal part of the vacuum diaphragm which is supposed to improve the throttle response but I elected not to do this. I ride in the dirt and am more interested in smooth, predictable response in low traction situations than in peak power.

The kit cost about $40, the shipping was about $9, then I had to pay another $10 customs so it wasn't cheap but it included everything I needed and I didn't have to take the carb off, figure out what I needed, order it, and wait 2 or 3 weeks to finish the job. Whole thing took me about 8 hours from taking the tank off to completing the test ride.

If I had it to do over again I would just order the jets from motorcyclecarbs.com for about $8 each. I've already got all the drill bits, wood screws, etc.

The hard part of this job is getting the carb off the bike without screwing something up. I'm thinking of taking a lot of the unnecessary EPA crap off. Has anyone taken the carb heater off? It never gets to freezing where I live so what do I need with a carb heater? Also, the little plastic box that mounts above the intake boot between the air box and carb, and the sort of pump or valve that mounts to the frame on the left of the carb and attaches to the airbox with hoses and vacuum lines. I'm thinking of taking all that stuff off and plugging up the holes. That would really make the bike much simpler to work on and I don't think any of those things has an effect on performance.

Any thoughts on this?

Art

[Gregulator]

Does anyone know the bolt size and thread pitch for the skid plate/bash plate mounting bolts? I'm working from the suggestions in this thread, but the dimensions he gives (4x0.6mmx30mm) don't make sense. An M4 is much too small, and 0.6 pitch isn't commonly available. I'm starting to think he might have meant 4 (quantity) M6 bolts in 30mm length. Does anyone know the size?

Heck I probably should have just tried putting a fairing bolt in there to see if it matched, but now I'm at work.

Art, my thoughts are that engineers are smart, and I'm not saying it in the self-deprecating "I'm just a consumer" way you often hear. Why get a modern machine if you're going to strip off everything invented after 1990? I can see making some adjustments, but I think that ripping off anything I don't recognize is foolish. Just my 2 cents and only because you asked for them.

[MEDIC-0372]

Well I just replaced my rear brake pads...easy job.

[Gregulator]

The skidplate mounting bolts are indeed an M6. They're the same as the single bolt holding the side (not tank) plastic on. I'm pleased with my homemade plate - the metal I had to use is far too thin to take a good hit from landing on something, but it is keeping the motor clean and free from flying objects.

I just checked the valve clearances for the first time, at a little over 1000 miles. They were in spec!
Intake: 0.07 mm (range 0.05-0.10mm)
Exhaust: 0.12mm (range 0.10-0.15mm).

The 0.10mm slid through the exhaust very easily, but I could only get the 0.13mm about halfway in, hence my approximation. When looking at the spark plug I initially thought it might have been running a bit lean, but I'm now thinking that it's just because the spark plug has so few miles on it. The bike starts easily, warms up quickly and runs beautifully.



And here's a picture of the bike in action, since this thread is pretty slow! That's my wife, not me, but I can't keep off of this thing. My bicycle and my streetbike are both getting far less use because of it, poor things .

[Shawnuf]

I didn't have much money to buy a nice bike, and I happened to find this 86 XT250 for not too much money. I've always liked that style bike. I've cleaned it up some and replaced the chain and sprockets, rear tire, and hand grips thus far. I removed some giant Georgia Bulldog stickers from the tank and repainted it. I made a new muffler end cap for it. I guess I'll freshen up the engine next when I get some time and money. I'll try to upload some more pics if it progresses further.

[Rode2Nowhere]

Anyone here know when they started installing electric start on the XT? Not necessarily on the 250, I mean any model.