addition to the stable (which burnt down)

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Sun Aug 26, 2007 10:53 am

well, I had saved up some cash and was thinking of doing abig update to my genny, but isntead I ended up adding another bike to the stable.

Monday night I am taking delivery(the guy I am buying it from enthusiastically offered to ride it the 30 miles to my house for delivery as he gets one last ride out of it

) of a 87 ninja 250.

decent price, visably its worse for the wear, but mechanically seems great minus a stumble at 5k.

I'll get pics up when she arrives of the awful shape its in looks wise and then get to work cleaning her up

I have been wanting a toy to ride in crappier weather and get more used to leaning over father w/o worries about hurtin my FZR if I go down learning to really carve corners

to bad its a kawasucki though

sickle44 · Post by **sickle44** » Sun Aug 26, 2007 12:59 pm

Good score Doug,

I'm lookin' for something like that myself, preferably in the 400 range, hmmmmm isn't there an FZR 400??

Post by **FZRDude** » Sun Aug 26, 2007 1:47 pm

You think its hard finding stuff for the 1000?

sickle44 · Post by **sickle44** » Sun Aug 26, 2007 4:31 pm

that's exactly why I was being fascisous. Love the machine, but would never own one, unless it came with a parts machine or two. Think I'm better off with ... heh, whom am I kidding, if it's a 400, it's hard to find parts for whatever brand. They just didn't sell that many in Canada, not sure 'bout the states but they usually run similarily. Kickin' myself cause I had the opportunity to nab one a while back for 1500 with extras.

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Sun Aug 26, 2007 7:30 pm

I wish I could afford a FZR400......and a YZF600 engine........

I can't wait to start tinkering on it soon!

too bad I have no parts budget for it really, the brakes are horrid and need an upgrade bad.

seems I shoulda gotten a 88+, but its not like I had much of a choice, 88 brought on the model thats been the same till now, whereas 86-87 are a bit different, and no one seems to have documentation as to how different, so I hope when I order a haynes it tells me everything I need to know

noshoes · Post by **noshoes** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 1:09 am

I guy put a rotax 500cc motor in a ninja 250 and it was bad ass..back in the late 80's motorcycle mag..cant rember what 1

wslonger · Post by **wslonger** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 1:16 am

You'll enjoy the Ninja 250 may take awhile to get used to wringing it's neck to get her going. Watch getting too aggressive with stock suspension as it is very soft. Front likes to bottom and pogo rear bottoms and slides.

Included a link to a site for the Ninja250

http://www.ninja250.com/home.htm

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 8:50 am

noshoes wrote:I guy put a rotax 500cc motor in a ninja 250 and it was bad ass..back in the late 80's motorcycle mag..cant rember what 1

that would be sweet.....

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 8:51 am

wslonger wrote:You'll enjoy the Ninja 250 may take awhile to get used to wringing it's neck to get her going. Watch getting too aggressive with stock suspension as it is very soft. Front likes to bottom and pogo rear bottoms and slides.

Included a link to a site for the Ninja250

http://www.ninja250.com/home.htm

thanks, I read a bunch on there this weekned, its just too bad they have no info for my E model

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Mon Aug 27, 2007 9:28 pm

well no pics tonight, breaker tripped at the garage, no lights, can't get to it in the dark.....dont know well enough where it is in the basement

silver · Post by **silver** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 2:09 am

sickle44 wrote:that's exactly why I was being fascisous. Love the machine, but would never own one, unless it came with a parts machine or two.

Ya mean like this one ?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayI ... R40QQfviZ1

Heading out in about 10 minutes to bring her home.

Post by **Hooligan** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 12:13 pm

awesome friggin deal silver!!

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Tue Aug 28, 2007 1:24 pm

nice!

should have some pics up this afternoon hopefully of my acquisition

silver · Post by **silver** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 8:58 am

Hooligan wrote:awesome friggin deal silver!!

Picked it up yesterday morning after a 4+ hour drive each way. Took the wheels off and slid the frame into the back of my Ford Explorer. A pretty tight fit.

Anyway, it looks like it might be a Katrina survivor. Much of what I thought was polished aluminum in the photos was actually silver paint. When I pulled the axles I found water inside the rims. Also, the brake rotors were so worn that I had to split the calipers to get them to rotate off so I could remove the wheels. The frame and forks appear straight and that was mainly what I was after. The fork seals are leaking oil as well. Also I am concerned about the wiring harness. Going to get into that here in a few minutes. Are these harnesses easy to rebuild or replace ? Would the fork tubes be damaged by submersion in water for any length of time ?

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 11:45 am

sounds like we are in teh same boat,

stripped all the plastics off the 250 and found alot of issues, cobbled wiring, pod filters, huge gel battery ziptied into place.......

some bolts missing........

should be fun

silver · Post by **silver** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 12:24 pm

haunter wrote:sounds like we are in teh same boat,

stripped all the plastics off the 250 and found alot of issues, cobbled wiring, pod filters, huge gel battery ziptied into place.......

some bolts missing........

should be fun

LOL ! Yep ! I talked to the wife about it this morning and we're now committed (committable ?) to getting this thing together by next year. I asked her to start polishing the wheels in her spare time and we're going to look for a small compressor to run some hand tools. Just wish I knew how to weld aluminum so I could cut the tail section off that YZF1K frame have and weld it onto the FZR. So much to do and so little time !

silver · Post by **silver** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 12:26 pm

BTW, while it didn't turn out to be an absolute raving bargain, I do want to thank Tim for bringing this one to my attention. It will really help me by having another frame to work with so I can start working on moving the forks over from the YZF.

sickle44 · Post by **sickle44** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 12:45 pm

Hey Doug,

Hope you weren't expecting better, after all, the machine's almost 20 years old. I think on purchase of any machine that's more than 5 years old a guy can expect to loose $1000 in the first 6 months easy. Even 4 wheelers.

I suppose that's why I like restoring old stuff, there seems to be some satisfaction of righting all the previous wrongs done to the poor machine.

haunter · Post by **haunter** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 4:50 pm

sickle44 wrote:Hey Doug,

Hope you weren't expecting better, after all, the machine's almost 20 years old. I think on purchase of any machine that's more than 5 years old a guy can expect to loose $1000 in the first 6 months easy. Even 4 wheelers.

I suppose that's why I like restoring old stuff, there seems to be some satisfaction of righting all the previous wrongs done to the poor machine.

yeah.....I piad about 100 more than wanted too, figuring if I got it apart something would happen......

the pods annoy me the most, cuz.....airboxes for this year are unheard of, so tuning woes it is!

atleast it guarentees me some quality wrench time!

sickle44 · Post by **sickle44** » Wed Aug 29, 2007 9:36 pm

You could always pull out the matt and resin and make your own airbox. It's not really that diffcult to be quite honest. Although, you'd need to know what the first one was supposed to look like.