Originally Posted by New_Folder

Hi all...
To introduce myself (should I have put this somewhere else? I feel more at home in the KLX250 mega-thread); I spent a significant amount of my time last year lurking on these forums, including reading the first hundred or so posts in this thread, but never found the time to join in (was reaching the end of school, rather busy). I bought a second hand '04 KLX250 as my first bike around two years ago and have had a pretty good run with it (~4000km on the clock when I got it, no issues that were not my own fault). It isn't the shiniest bike around, but I love it ;). It broke my arm dead in the middle of my final exams (ran straight into a hole in the scrub, but that's another story)...

So. A month or two ago, I was off on a ride with a mate. Got rather bogged and burnt out the clutch (my originally-not-amazing-off-road tyres didn't have a lot of tread left, which didn't help matters). Really shouldn't have kept on going as far as we did (I swear it was worse than it looked XD). The clay-like mud was so sticky and heavy that it took the two of us and someone who walked in with a manual winch around three hours to move the bike less than 10 metres, off the track and behind some tall grass (the other bloke was on a 450 enduro bike). There was no way any of our vehicles would get in to pull it out for quite some time, so we had to lie it down and hide it as well as possible. That night it rained rather heavily, and the whole area was flooded to about 200mm deep. As luck would have it, the very next day another friend was able to borrow a 4wd quad from someone I don't directly know, so we went in and retrieved the poor old KLX...
The eventual result is that you can barely hear the normal engine noise over the corroded bearings. Not an ideal condition. A local mechanic quoted around $2500 to replace all the bearings in the engine, but I have ended up attempting it myself ;). I have never done any work this complex on a bike before and haven't had a huge amount of mechanical experience, though the workshop manual certainly helps :)... So far it seems that every second bolt has siezed. The axle wont come out of the back wheel (had to pull both the wheel and axle off together) and the pivot bolt for the swingarm (through the frame and engine) took a bit of... encouragement. And a hell of a lot of hammering while someone else turned it backwards and forwards. I have finally gotten to the point of splitting the two halves of the crank case apart.
And it's all taken a lot longer because of a whole load of other commitments. I've had to do it all at a friend's place, as I don't own all the necessary tools. But I've learnt a lot and become a lot more familiar with the internals of the bike, so there is definitely a bright side :)
Anyway, I can't get the two halves of the crank case any more than about 10mm apart. I have removed everything that the manual demands, except the magneto flywheel. I can't see how to get it off, and was hoping it could stay on for the time being (the manual says the crank shaft must be pressed out of the left engine half, so as far as I can see it shouldn't be obstructing anything at this point). The sprockets that drive the camshaft chain are too large to fit through the large crank shaft bearing and don't look like they come off the crank shaft...? This appears to be stopping the crank case from separating further. So I'm thinking the whole bearing should come out of the right crank case half... right? As I said, I have very little experience and am basically guessing. Whatever should be moving, isn't. So I suppose I'm asking for advice, if anyone can understand my rambling? Please? If I can't sort it out myself I'll just get the mechanic to do this bit for me... lol. But I really would like to finish the job myself. Should I just keep tapping on the bearing (with a bit of pipe to spread the force around the bearing or something) until it comes out? I've had a bit of a dig around for info online, but without much luck. Might be a fairly specific case, I suppose. Or maybe not. Dunno... Hope I haven't missed anything obvious, apologies if I'm wasting your time.

Sorry for the long post, if you're reading this I'll assume you got through all of the above :P Thanks for any help you can give, as well as for everything I've picked up lurking in the past. Eh eh eh. I was always going to create an account and join in but was afraid I'd end up spending even more time on here (especially while I was still at school). Finally I can justify it XD

I was told when I bought the bike that some carby mods and stuff had been done, but I can't remember what. I have also always wondered when reading about swapping snorkels how bad it is that mine has never had one? Should I fit one? I am currently taking a gap year between school and uni, in which I had hoped to do as much riding as possible :(. I definitely need to upgrade the rear suspension somehow (seems to bottom out constantly in certain circumstances - no idea if adjustment could help), though haven't had any trouble with the front, and am considering upgrading the exhaust. But I will research these once I have the engine running again... The dry season is setting in and the beautiful weather is calling me to ride!

Cheers, and sorry again for the long-winded post. Very excited to finally become a part of adv!
Pete ;)

Oh and um... Next time I'll make use of the proper smileys, for now simple text will do :P

Originally Posted by New_Folder (Post 418438)

Hi guys, thanks for the input :)

I did have a friend here suggest the same (entirely new engine). Ebay? There isn't such a huge bike market up here (Katherine, NT), I'd probably have to ship one up from down South. Any suggestions on where to start looking? I believe there might be a wrecker in Darwin, I'll see if I can check them out next time I head up. Doubt they'll have anything though. Especially anything that works.
How specific does the engine model have to be? I seem to remember something about Suzuki's sharing some designs around the year it was made, how broadly can I search?

The mechanic told me he could declare it a write-off if it was insured for flood damage, but alas only fire and theft. The next option was to torch it :P

I think you're right, WestOzKLX, about needing to remove the flywheel to get the crank out. Now to find a... 'flywheel puller'? Haha thanks for bearing with me...

Pete