New Bike...

[NotMatt]

Uh-oh, there went the Jeep savings fund. :redneck:

It's an '00 TTR-225, street legal. Nothing special, just a bike to put around town and to work and back and take out on the single track trails around here and have some fun. Took it out the first night and went on the Beehive trail and the first three miles of the Devil's Gulch trail with a couple of friends, then we went riding again on Sunday and clocked about 80 total miles between Wenatchee and Leavenworth in all the canyons. Shouts out to snowboarder and mthompson. :redneck:

First order of business is going to be putting a bit smaller rear sprocket on that biatch... it's geared real low right now, which is great off road, but it's a real struggle to do 60mph with it geared that low.

BTW, I test rode a '95 KTM 400 the same day I bought this... but man, I'm a short guy and that thing was tall tall tall, and was left hand side kick start only, just too much bike for my short inexperienced self. I figure with the way gas prices are going these days, as long as I take care of this thing and keep it in good shape, I'll be able to sell it for at least what I bought it for down the road when I'm ready for a bigger bike.

 

[Flexy Backhand]

:awesomework: congrats!

I need to fix my damn chain so i can start riding again

 

[JThompson]

I know the Beehive/Devils Gulch area. Not only have I grown up riding horses up there (especially Table Mountain and Haney Meadows) but I like to do a little snow wheeling up around there as well. Are you just running horse trails, or are these actual bike trails?

What trails did you run between Leavenworth and Wetsnatchee? My grandfather lives up Nahahum Canyon, not far from Sugarloaf/French Corall area...

 

[Cascade_Crawler]

Hell yeah, i really miss bike riding

 

[mthompson223]

Did you get a replacement o-ring for your case fill plug? I've got one or 50 around here at my shop. We need to go up to Mission Ridge and try to cook our brains by climbing up on the radio towers.

I'm glad you didn't get the KTM with the left-hand kick starter. LH kick starters are for commies.

 

[NotMatt]

Did you get a replacement o-ring for your case fill plug? I've got one or 50 around here at my shop. We need to go up to Mission Ridge and try to cook our brains by climbing up on the radio towers.

I'm glad you didn't get the KTM with the left-hand kick starter. LH kick starters are for commies.

No I didn't get the O-ring yet. I need to dig through my drawers, I'll bet I've got one that will work somewhere.

I'm glad I didn't get the KTM too.

 

[NotMatt]

I know the Beehive/Devils Gulch area. Not only have I grown up riding horses up there (especially Table Mountain and Haney Meadows) but I like to do a little snow wheeling up around there as well. Are you just running horse trails, or are these actual bike trails?

What trails did you run between Leavenworth and Wetsnatchee? My grandfather lives up Nahahum Canyon, not far from Sugarloaf/French Corall area...

Bike trails... unless I'm incorrect about the names of the trail(s) we were on... the actual Devil's Gulch trail is a bike trail.

The trails up the nahahum, derby, eagle creek, swakane area are just single track stuff with numbers that I'm forgetting now. We actually were on forest service roads for a lot of time, since we weren't sure where some of the trails went and if they were ok to ride on or not.

 

[jeffs88toy]

lets go riding I got a new drz 400s three weeks a go:awesomework:

 

[snowboarder2359]

It was alot of fun riding up there. Dual sports are the ****! :beer: :beer: :beer:

 

[boxboy]

Nice bike!

and I have had my eye on the KTM...

 

[NotMatt]

Update... apparently the TT-R 225 is a joke to the aftermarket, but that doesn't bother me much as I'm not looking to spend a bunch of big money on this bike. However, I was a bit frustrated to know that just about NOBODY makes aftermarket sprockets for these.

This bike had a 14 tooth front sprocket originally and a 58 tooth rear sprocket, which makes the gearing super super low, and makes it a struggle to do 60 without feeling like the motor is going to explode. At some point, someone swapped a 15 tooth sprocket on the front, which geared it up a bit, but it was still too low to do 60mph comfortably...

So, I started looking at aftermarket sprockets. Apparently a company called "PBI" makes a 50 toother, which sounded like a great compromise between road gearing and offroad... but unfortunately their website is completely useless, they can't be reached on the phone, and nobody carries their products... so can that idea.

Next up, I found out that the XT 225 uses the same rear sprocket pattern, but the bolt holes are smaller on the XT sprockets. So, I ordered up a 45 tooth (stock XT) rear sprocket, and a 13 tooth front sprocket (XT's had 14 tooth stock). I drilled out the holes on the sprocket, threw it all together tonight and took it for a test ride and it's perfect! The 13 tooth front and 45 rear is a good compromise between the XT 225's tall gearing for the road and the stock TT-R 225 gearing which is almost "off-highway" only.

Next up, I've got a nice selection of jets for the Mikuni carb on this bike. The PO has already opened up the air box, and I will be modifying the exhaust a bit with some aftermarket parts and a new spark arrestor, then I'm going to swap out the jets and richen it up a bit and see if I can squeeze a little extra OOMPH out of it. Nothing major, just a little more power to get my fatass moving down the road. :awesomework:

 

[mthompson223]

Play with the needle height while you're in there. I dunno what kind of carb is on your bike, but you more than likely don't have a needle with multiple clip positions. You can buy jet needle shims from the local Honda shop in varying thicknesses to emulate an adjustable needle. The jet needle shims were the biggest improvement on my bike because I had a CV-type carb that responds well to such modifications.