Ollie.T's Aprilia RS250 rebuild and restore

[Ollie.T]

Blatant rip-off of Fast Eddies thread!


Bought a 1996 Aprilia RS250 mid last year with 13000km on the clock. Rode it for a couple of months then put it in storage while I was overseas for 6 months.

Now that I am finally back in NZ (and have a bit of time off work) I think its time that I pull it to bits, fix a few things up and then somehow put it back together with (hopefully) minimal parts left over!

This is pretty much the first time I have pulled a bike to bits - the most mechanically minded thing I have done before this is probably take off the front wheel, adjust the chain tension and occasionally change the oil! So yeah, its probably going to be a bit of a learning curve...

Like Fast Eddie said:

Comments, advice, ideas and motivation welcome...

[Ollie.T]

And here is the 'Prila all in one piece!
Bets on how long it will take to get it back looking like this?

[Fast Eddie]

wicked! haha I'll keep an eye on this and see what u get up to. we can pinch ideas off each other.

did u check out my wheels after polishing the lip a bit? it looks sharp haha..

getting my front forks anodized gold and going to try to blueprint the engine once I have all the pieces back in my shed..

enjoy! sweet bikes eh. does yours have an Aprilia Works Division plate riveted to the frame? left hand side by the head stock. was just curious.. mine claims to be number 408 built.

[Fast Eddie]

haha funny, is that a gn250 behind it? guess what my shed looks like.. aprilia and a gn250 as well haha!

bromance in the making

[Ollie.T]

Yep that's the mighty GN! My missus is learning to ride on it - and this one actually works!

I was thinking about anodizing forks, they have to be taken apart and stanchions replaced anyway, but I quite like the plain black... Seen the rims, I'm not really a fan of the two tone look, if I was to do anything I would strip them back and get powdercoated (red perhaps?)

[Fast Eddie]

meh, powder coat or paint. I was going to do red with black rims or red with polished rims but the black with polished lip is gonna be a go for now.

my fireblade has bright yellow rims so i get my fix with that haha!

my forks are anodized purple already.. but they have seen better days. Gold is going to look mint I recon.

look forward to pics of yours as you progress - have you stripped it down yet?

[Ollie.T]

Man, the power valves are really a pain in the ass to remove... Think i need a impact driver and a blowtorch to heat the bolts in order to remove them. So thats not gonna happen this weekend

With inspecting pistons and stuff, reckon I can just get away with removing the cylinder heads? or take off more to be on the safe side?
Its kinda scaring me how easy it is to take things off! Im writing notes and labelling things the best I can, and so far things are seeming pretty logical but we will see in a few weeks when I try to reassemble the bike!

Here is the racing division plate - E445

[Fast Eddie]

Man, the power valves are really a pain in the ass to remove... Think i need a impact driver and a blowtorch to heat the bolts in order to remove them. So thats not gonna happen this weekend

With inspecting pistons and stuff, reckon I can just get away with removing the cylinder heads? or take off more to be on the safe side?
Its kinda scaring me how easy it is to take things off! Im writing notes and labelling things the best I can, and so far things are seeming pretty logical but we will see in a few weeks when I try to reassemble the bike!

Here is the racing division plate - E445

yip same plate, mines a few bikes earlier than yours I assume. H408

yea power valves are a pain, I have an impact driver and blow torch.. lol but! the little allen bolt that holds the actuating arm/shaft in place was even worse. a real nightmare I had to drill to get an engineering shop to drill them out.

I just took the whole cylinders off and took engine out of frame etc as I'm rebuilding it anyway, but you can prob just take the heads off and look down. won't be able to see the sides of the pistons or the rings tho.

yea take heaps of photos and notes etc. I have the manual scanned to pc on pdf if u want

[Fast Eddie]

just saw your front stand, mint! where did ya score that from.. I need a couple for my bikes they look handy as.

[ducatilover]

Another one? Cool! Will be watching this

[Ollie.T]

House of Custom, via Trademe. Front stand was $145.

http://www.trademe.co.nz/motors/moto...-462976967.htm

They forgot to send bolts with it! though when I gave them an email, they sorted it out pretty quick!
Made life a lot easier! Though it wouldn't really fit while i had the front mudguard thing on - not too much of an issue as I was taking the whole front end off, but perhaps it might get annoying later on if I'm just using it for smaller things.

[Ollie.T]

More pics!

We got any piston fortune tellers? Im hoping that these pistons are gonna have a long and happy life! (and retire of old age in approx 6000km rather than explode into many bits destroying the engine)

There is quite a bit of carbon buildup on the upper cylinder, what do people think?

The guy before me said that the owner before him seized it when the oil pump broke - so the engine was rebuilt at approx 8000km (though he had no proof of work done). Like I said before its done 16000km now, 14-16000km is ok for a pair of pistons right?

[Fast Eddie]

Another one? Cool! Will be watching this

traitor!

[Fast Eddie]

sweet cheers for the link, gotta get me some of those. perfect for taking the forks out etc.

yea carbon build up is kind of normal for a 2 stroke I think. But dunno its my first one too and my pistons looked a hell of a lot worse. did u see the pics? hehe.

but cylinders and crowns look good bro.. who knows how much longer they last but if u open it up every couple thousand kms and have a look u should avoid a catastrophic failure.

check the oil pump is working hook up the feed line to a container with millileter measurement marks or something and time how long it takes to drain x amount of oil when running.

pdf manual has the method. pm me if u ever need the manual aye if u dont have it. its half in italian but also have rgv manuals that are handy.

[ducatilover]

You seem to be missing valves, cams and 6 cylinders mate.