Fast Eddie's Aprilia RS250 rebuild & restore

[Fast Eddie]

when are you gonna finally have this fuckin thing rideable?

I haven't done anything on it for months really, sidecar had taken over finances until a week or two ago and that old uni thang - but last exam for uni is on wednesday, I have all the bits for the aprilia except front forks so will chuck it back together over the holidays - but if money is needed along the way then will flag in favour of the sidecar... she'll get there eventually

Rideable? I think that's asking a bit much

hehe.. lets just get the thing back together without leaving my watch or screwdriver in the crank case eh

[Fast Eddie]

this is for the fireblade again.. flagged ducatis vague idea of using tube to make a new exhaust mount. instead I grabbed a spare pillion peg hanger off tradies and chopped it up, gonna start polishing it now.. takes fuckn ages tho! there must be a faster way to polish..

.. pre chopping..


.. after chopping..


.. starting to try and polish to a mirror finish..



.. but dunno if I can be bothered polishing it, might just paint it haha! ducatilover I dunno how you do it but I recon u use a machine or have some trick. cause doing shit by hand literally takes 4-5 hours.. and its not even perfect then, you'd have to spend way too long on shit to actually get it to a mirror finish - why would any one want to sit there rubbing shit for hours!

[imdying]

Silver powdercoat it. Then it'll stay that way forever. Polishing things just leads to a life time of maintaining that finish or living with a shabby once polished ride. You've been warned...

But yeah, put a mop on your bench grinder. That'll make short work of it.

[ducatilover]

why would any one want to sit there rubbing shit for hours!

Does not compute? I like rubbing off for hours on end and I'm fuckin good at it.
My polished parts need the same amount of cleaning as everything else, but I think everything needs cleaning anyway.
Neat mount though.

[Fast Eddie]

haha, actually I understood your interest in polishing a little more after today..

hand polished up the mount.. muuuch smoother than it first was - prob hard to see in photos but when I started there was deep scratches all over it etc..

here is the finished product (for now.. will prob go back and do it again to make it better/touch it up)

before..


after..

[Fast Eddie]

and exhaust hanger fitted to bike along with the seat cowl I painted earlier on.. complete with custom fireblade logo painted under the cowl (by the lovely mrs) carbon fibre undertail tray and all associated bits out of carbon fibre.. and yes.. space for a couple of 2lb NOS bottles

[ducatilover]

That blade is hella sexy dude, great work, seriously clean looking beast.

[Fast Eddie]

That blade is hella sexy dude, great work, seriously clean looking beast.

cheers bro.. I love it.. had it since '08 and not sure if I will ever bother to sell it.. I've fucked around on a bit with some keener shed wizards. cylinder head is home port polished n shit, matched weights of moving parts, bought the biggest K&N air filter I could and made a new airbox to fit it. The full titanium akrapovic exhaust system with sweet headers, carb work.. dyno run start of this year put it at 129.33hp at the wheel peak at 9,600, 149.something at the crank. with 80 lb/ft torque starting pretty early and peaking at 7k compared to brand new 1997 out of the factory claims of 128.00 HP at the crank @ 10500 RPM (dunno how they work it out to wheel from crank), 67.3 ft.lbs @ 8750. love it haha also been doing little things, tidying up paint and parts, some polishing which you like little amounts of custom like the headlight cover, seat cowl, brakes, screen, rear sets n so on. Still a bit on the wishlist tho.. Suspension we had a go at.. I'm not sure if I just made it worse trying to respring it and fuck with the settings. It goes ok on the track though wasn't that slow compared to modern bikes that everyone else rides, most of them prob better riders than me so I'll give credit to the bike hehe.

anyway enough about that old blade, im sure its only me interested in it! back to the real bike - the 2 stroker. pics coming soon, I'll do a full montage from start to finish I recon.. putting it back together at mo - scratching my head over what to do with suspension though its all very tired and needs money thrown at it

Found this little snippet - maybe imdying or eel or someone can shed some light..
in relation to the ignition boxes.. I was planning on buying the hottest one avail for these motors to start the power search but..

"23d70... Aprilia ignition box. It was derived from the 23d10, but they changed the ignition timing to be slightly retarded compared to the race-kit box, and modified the opening times of the power-valves. It has 4 degrees of pre-ignition, but with the 5 degree ignition advancer kit (FZR400 woodruff key) it would produce almost the same advance curve as the 23d10. NOTE: Having now run the box back to back with a 22D30 on the dyno
(Jan 05) no difference could be found. I wonder if the Aprilia "tweaks" are just urban myth?"

seems like the aprilia box may be pretty much as good as the best from suzuki/the race box? and i'm thinking you don't even need the ignition advancer?

was on rgv250.co.uk forums

[imdying]

Don't bother with all that old school rubbish, these days we have cheap programmable ignitions like the Zeeltronic or Ignitech. Woodruff keys and racing SAPCs are too full of compromise.

There are basically no differences between the RS250 and RGV250 engines. Slight change to the combustion chamber (and plug location for non SP RGVs, a slight change to the ign and PV curves (although really that's all bullshit given just how many different SAPCs there are for an RGV), and some variations in jetting.

Rebuild the engine. Get it running on the factory equipment. Fit your expansion chambers, rejet to suit those. Fit the Zeeltronic box. Tune the powervalve opening curve. Then tune the ignition curve to suit the pipes/compression/squish/fuel/usage that you're going to put it to.

In addition to that sort of shit, you can also plug a quick shifter straight in then for another hundy. None of the 'trick' SAPCs will do that ;-)

[Fast Eddie]

Don't bother with all that old school rubbish, these days we have cheap programmable ignitions like the Zeeltronic or Ignitech. Woodruff keys and racing SAPCs are too full of compromise.

There are basically no differences between the RS250 and RGV250 engines. Slight change to the combustion chamber (and plug location for non SP RGVs, a slight change to the ign and PV curves (although really that's all bullshit given just how many different SAPCs there are for an RGV), and some variations in jetting.

Rebuild the engine. Get it running on the factory equipment. Fit your expansion chambers, rejet to suit those. Fit the Zeeltronic box. Tune the powervalve opening curve. Then tune the ignition curve to suit the pipes/compression/squish/fuel/usage that you're going to put it to.

In addition to that sort of shit, you can also plug a quick shifter straight in then for another hundy. None of the 'trick' SAPCs will do that ;-)

very cool - and solid advice thanks man! shes almost all back together now, engines on its way back into frame all pre assembled.. hopefully I get it back in like this cause I took cylinders/carbs etc all off before I removed bottom end from frame. but anyway - all good, tricky with only 2 hands.

photo montage when its pretty much done - suspension rebuild is last financial hurdle..

[imdying]

Yeah I've decided to crack on with suspension, finally dropped on some lovely red 07/08 ZX6R forks. Have some (Tyga) triples already, so just need some Brembo loving and some new discs. Oh, and I guess a mudguard... although I might stick with the RGV one and modify it to suit.

Can't decide between an Ohlins or Nitron for the back. With my lack of talent it won't matter much, so long as it's got a spring more suited to my fat arse than a Jap teens....

[Kickaha]

- all good, tricky with only 2 hands.

How many hands do most people have in Dunedin?

[Madness]

The Blade looked better with Doris on it wearing the pink wig & bikini.

[Fast Eddie]

How many hands do most people have in Dunedin?

more than 2

[Fast Eddie]

Yeah I've decided to crack on with suspension, finally dropped on some lovely red 07/08 ZX6R forks. Have some (Tyga) triples already, so just need some Brembo loving and some new discs. Oh, and I guess a mudguard... although I might stick with the RGV one and modify it to suit.

Can't decide between an Ohlins or Nitron for the back. With my lack of talent it won't matter much, so long as it's got a spring more suited to my fat arse than a Jap teens....

sounds mint seen nitron shocks around a lot lately in the UK stuff, isle of man, lot of bikes and a sidecar I was watching had em fitted. I see them on TTW, not bad for a full race shock - prob still have to set it up anyway for weight.

how are those zx6r forks lookin? pics? the aprilia front forks confuse me.. why aren't they identical in the job they do.