Kia Ora
I bought a 2007 Honda VTR 250 off TradeMe a few months ago and I've been fixing it up ever since. I thought I'd just share my stories and experience here rather than let it sink into the back of my mind. If all you care about is pictures they can be found here:
https://plus.google.com/photos/10608...MOcspPXhcn0pQE
My advice to you and anyone else doing novice repairs on a bike will be highlighted in bold
On with the story....
I spend a lot of time on Trade Me so it's no surprise I spotted a bargain; a broken-ass VTR 250. The seller was asking $1000 for it and it was listed as a 2006... Hmm... Looked like it needed some work done though but I was keen! Anyway went and looked at the bike, which had it's own story:
The young guy who had it last used it to learn on, fair enough. However he went to a friend's place one night and left the bike parked in the driveway with the key still in it - it was nowhere to be found the next day. The bike was later found in a shit state parked up at a wreckers yard by the police. Unfortunately the thieves had ripped out the ignition barrel to hot-wire it, taken it for a hoon and promptly low-sided it. There was damage to the RH side and all the warning signs were there; scuffs on the frame and exhaust, broken indicator, smashed speedometer, no headlight, bent handlebars, and a gnarly dent in the tank. Unfortunately the legal owner had no insurance coverage for the bike itself... Woops. The bike itself had only done 11'937KM at the time of the crash/theft.
After giving the bike a once over I decided to make the commitment and picked it up off the guy (after doing a Carjam report to make sure the story checked out, sure enough the bike wasn't reported stolen and had it's rego on hold). As I didn't have a spare battery I couldn't test if it actually ran or not but I wasn't bothered... Next time I buy a broken bike I'll make sure to bring a spare battery to test for spark/compression/electrics/etc.
Anyway I got the bike home and begun putting forward a plan of what the bike needed. I knew I needed the following; New handlebar, new levers, new mirrors, new headlight, new front indicators, new battery, new ignition barrel, new fuel cap (as the old one had been screw-drivered), and a new front tyre. I jumped on TradeMe and set up a 'favourite search' to look for VTR 250 parts then I jumped on Ebay to search for the other bits and bobs which raised a question; "How good are cheap chinese aftermarket parts? Also will they fit off the bat?"
I jumped on the Kiwibiker forums and asked around about things like indicators, the folk mentioned that the Chinese mentality is that all parts are universal... Basically that means that you could be lucky with a Chinese replacement part but don't expect it to be better than factory and most certainly don't expect it to fit without modification!! In any case I ordered a whole bunch of parts, now the thing with Chinese ebay sellers is that they send their fucking products via horse-driven cart and man-in-a-canoe-paddling-across-the-pacific mail... So expect to wait a month if not more, but that's the price you pay for... Well.. Paying a lower price.
I was sitting at home twiddling my thumbs waiting for my parts and waiting for my 8 month pregnant wife to squeeze out our first child so I got up and decided I'd do some other work to the bike. I jumped on TradeMe and ordered some plasti-dip spray paint, went to my local honda shop and got some pre-mixed coolant and fresh 10W-40 oil plus a new battery, then dropped my Mitre 10 and bought.... Epoxy. Don't lie, we've all fixed something we shouldn't with a bit of bog rather than having to add an additional 'fuck' to do the job right.
Your eyes look tired from all this text, let me give you a break;
Anyway... I plugged in the new battery and all the electrics seemed to work (horn, blinkers, headlight, brake lights, etc.) so I was happy at that. I removed the gas tank and took apart the rear fairing off the seat, then removed the front mudguard - I was gonna paint this bitch up. I got a hit from my 'favourite search' on TradeMe; a set of Renthal Streetfighter bars with custom end-weights, straight off a 2011 VTR 250. Buy them I did, and the colour of the bars dictated the colour of the rest of the bike as it seems. I then returned to eBay and ordered some levers to suit the bars and on I went with painting the bike.
Oh bugger there's a great big fuck-off dent in the tank, 'whatever shall I do?'. Ah right, the epoxy! Bogged and sanded it then primed her for painting. The one tool that saved me a shit-tonne of time from sanding back the paint on the tank? A dremel.... Buy a fucking dremel So the paint, now that's an interesting one... I used 'Plastidip' and it's got some pretty interesting properties. You can google it yourself but essentially individual results may vary, depends on what you use it for. My experience with Plastidip was... mixed, it's great that you can just spray it on with minimal preparation and that at the end of the day you can just peel it off, however I would not recommend using plastidip to paint your fuel tank. 'Why?' ...Because you get even the slightest drip of fuel on the tank and it'll eat right through the paint.
So tank and fairings painted and mounted back on the bike I slap on the aftermarket handlebars and everything lines up nicely (it was set up by the previous owner for his VTR) and as it turns out you use woman's hair spray to seal the grips in place on the bars. Oh! Brilliant, the aftermarket ignition barrel has arrived, bloody marvelous I saved so much mon... Fucksake it won't fit... Oh well, DREMEL TIME. After stripping back a few millimeters of metal the ignition barrel fits like a glove. I connect everything up to the battery and try to start it... Like a bloody moron.
As the Honda shop had failed to give me the dicky little square nuts that are used to bolt the terminal connectors on to the battery I decided to improvise with some wires I soldered up with alligator clips... Pro-tip; learn about resistance. No wonder the bike was turning over slowly! After realising that I'm a fuckwit I jury-rigged the terminals onto the battery. That's better! Ok so it turned over, great! I then went ahead and tried to connect the fuel line and vacuum pump up to the fuel petcock on the bike... Let's reiterate the final point of the last paragraph - 'like a bloody moron'...
Turns out the fuel line does not connect DIRECTLY to the fuel tank, that's the breather hose you fuckin' nut-case! Also turns out that vacuum hoses are smaller than fuel lines.. Go figure. After fucking around trying to get the too-short fuel line connected I then tried to run the bike... No go. Pulled out the spark plug and.......... NO SPARK!
Here's the deal; if you have an electrical fault with your bike then your first point of call is down to the local hardware store to buy a multimeter. Your next POC is YOUTUBE. I had no spark so I started out by testing the STATOR. After that I moved on to the Rectifier. After diagnosing those two I came to the conclusion (and with some further advice from KBers) that my CDI was at fault and if it wasn't that it was the Pulse Generator. Now I had no clue what each of these components did so I learned through the power of the internet how a motorbike gets it's spark.
I managed to dig up a replacement CDI on eBay (as all the parts shops quoted $400+ and the Honda shop was gonna order a new one from Japan) but I was wondering if it really was the CDI at fault. So I organised to get the bike looked over by a proper Honda technician at my local Honda shop.... $200 later I was none the wiser, the guy at the Honda shop thought that a proper diagnosis was gathered from replacing the CDI with another unit and seeing if it worked... And they couldn't find a CDI. Pro tip; trust your gut and never pay for a second opinion. In frustration I said 'fuckit' and ordered the CDI from Aussie.
Take a break....
In the meanwhile the headlight showed up and I set about getting that thing to fit. Fucksake, China! I love your prices but you bastards don't know measurements like we do! The bloody headlight wouldn't fit so I had to run down to Mitre 10 and pick up some galvanized brackets (with pre-drilled holes! Heehee!) so I could extend the headlight out enough for the bugger to fit... Which it did in the end. I also set about doing the oil change while I was at it.
A wee while later the CDI arrived! 'Moment of truth' I thought! I unscrewed the rear-cylinder spark plug and sat it on the frame, plugged in the new CDI and turned the ignition on. Press the starter aaaand... PRESTO! Spark! Feeling relieved and excited I set about putting the bike together temporarily so I could have a test ride. She was a bit smokey, and was running a bit rough but it had been sitting for a long time! I puttered up and down the road and noticed that the speedo wasn't working. I pulled back into my garage and pulled out the speedo cable, it turned okay so must have been a buggered instrument cluster.
I set about ordering a replacement speedo (one that looked like factory, surely it will fit this time!!) and while I waited for that I flushed the coolant. Pro tip; if you remove the drain bolt from near the water pump the coolant wont pour out until you take off the radiator cap! Simple physics, people! I also waltzed down to my local Honda shop and picked up some replacement fuel line so I could sort the issue of the too-short fuel hose.
I put the bike pack together as properly as I could, but with no instrument cluster, and used it a couple of times at night just to get the headlight angle right. Eventually the smokey back-end disappeared and the engine started running quite happy! A couple of weeks later the instrument cluster arrived and I went to bolt it on... Yep, same story. Even though it looked and functioned exactly the same way as the factory the dimensions were out and it wouldn't fit! Thankfully I had some brackets left over so I could extend out the cluster enough for it to fit and function.
I noticed the tacho didn't work, I put this down to the CDI being from an older model VTR and took the bike in to my local Honda shop for a WOF and a new front tyre. A few days later the bike was good to be picked up! I drove it straight down to the post shop to pick up some rego and it was all done! A fully road-worthy and road-legal motorbike back on the road! I'd done it!!
The next week I booked in to sit my full licence test and passed it with flying colours! I've decided that my journey with the VTR has come to an end, it's now time to sell it on to the next owner for them to enjoy!
Once the VTR sells I'll be upgrading to a VFR 800 - my dream bike
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Originally Posted by Reubix
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