We have been riding Yamaha WR250Rs since back in 2014 when we decided to seriously invest into an off-road capable dual sport. It’s not the best bike to start on because it’s heavy and has a high center of mass, but neither was the SV650 which was the first bike I took on the Newfoundland T’Railway. We purchased a used 2009 WR250R that was lowered (using a lowering link instead of a spacer) and had a nice big windscreen that I broke during the first couple of rides when I went over the handlebars. Half a dozen bent foot pegs later, we were ready to travel.
I used to think there are some parts you get that last forever like the skid plate, rotor and caliper guards or the frame. Over the many years we have battered and beaten the WRRs, we have had to re-weld, rebuild or replace most of the parts including the engine. Doing so allowed us to learn what works well and what doesn’t.
There were moments of boredom and free time that led to creative disasters, like the time we bought cheap luggage on Amazon and had it tailored to the bikes only to have it catch on fire and burn our gear. Or the time we tried to solve vibration issues by using lead and all kinds of materials in the bars which broke apart and wedged itself into the bars preventing us from being able to install our hand guards. Or when we used pieces of knobby tires for vibration damping in the foot pegs only to have them reduce our grip on the pegs resulting in spontaneous crashes.
List of Upgrades
Handguards – Cyrca probend, because cheap hand guards are a pain to install and without the bend it may cause your wrist to break as you fly over the bars.
Rotor Guards – bent the front rotor while riding through rocks in the Californian Sierras and the rear rotor while while hopping around fallen trees in Ontario.
Tugger strap – Less useful than rolling the front wheel, but more useful than pulling on the wrong part of the bike and breaking something. I use it for more leverage in case there are more hands on deck than solid parts to grab onto.
Front fairing – Lynx Britannia has an adjustable windscreen which I find to be quite helpful when riding both on and off-road with decent front lights that don’t draw too much power. Some folks complain about wind buffering but I can work with it. I also installed a relay, aux lighting switch and charging ports into it. The fairing helps me manage all my electrical accessories on the bike, but I need to be careful and watch the volt meter diligently or else I will be pushing the bike instead of riding it.
Heated grips – a luxury accessory that we only turn on when it’s snowing or when we are wearing MX gloves on a particularly cold day. We use Oxford’s grips as for us they seem to offer the best value for the money.
SAE adapter – great for charging the battery after those long cold Californian winters or to power my heated gear.
IMS 4.7 Gal tank – This tank has 3 functions. 1) Unlike the stock plastics, it can take a hit without falling apart. 2) It protects my radiator. 3) It provides me enough range to reduce any anxiety about running out of fuel. After several years of hitting it hard all over, it started leaking a little at one of the bungs, but never enough for me to be concerned. I just hope no one lights a match near it in its weak state. Despite extensive cosmetic damage, it worked flawlessly on both bikes. Previously I would have to replace my plastic side fairings on a monthly basis and that was after using plenty of duct tape to hold it together. Although nominally 4.7 Gal, I have on occasion pulled into a gas station and put 5 Gal into it without overfilling.
Camel Tank 1.5 Gal – Together the two tanks provide us with roughly 350-400 mile range depending on how we ride. They have seen some serious abuse over the last 5 years. I have broken its mounting brackets multiple times and needed to re-weld it to the subframe. Sometimes I really wish I could ditch the exhaust and have two, one on each side.
AXP bash plate – When I go over particularly large rocks or try climbing boulders where both wheels cannot touch the ground, I like to rely on being able to slide up or down on my favorite skid plate. There are some caveats to owning one. After a while the threads strip on the engine frame mount to which the skid plate attaches. I used to use Flatlands skid plate for the longest time. I have bashed one of them to the point where it was bent beyond repair by any reasonable expert with a hammer and spare time. The other downside to the Flatlands skid plate was that it only had four points of attachment and the bolt heads would stick out causing problems when they get damaged. The AXP has five and the bolt heads are flush. Despite AXP’s skid plate being plastic, it holds up pretty well and I have already tested their warranty when the weld developed a small crack. AXP honored the warranty and sent me a brand new replacement.
Cree LED auxiliary lights – Found a nice set on eBay that I mounted on a couple of RAM 1” balls for easy installation/removal. They are small, relatively light weight and produce enough light to blind a chipmunk a quarter of a mile away.
Doubletake mirrors – I tried both adventure and enduro models and decided to go with the enduro as there was less vibration and less weight. At freeway speeds, I cannot tell the make or model of the vehicle behind me, but I can tell if it’s a semi, SUV or a regular sedan. The most useful part is that I can tell if a rider has fallen behind so that I can turn around quickly and get that perfect photo of them being miserable and picking up their bike. They can take abuse and are easily moved from one bike to another.
Aftermarket seat – I would like to think that when it comes to stock seats at Yamaha, they engineered it to feel so uncomfortable that it will get most people standing more on the pegs and somehow lead to better riding form. We have a Sergeant seat and a SeatConcepts low seat. They are comfortable enough for full day ride if you keep shuffling them butt cheeks around from one side to the other.
Wider and more durable pegs – We have been using the IMS SuperStock pegs and a set from an old WR450F, but there are other better alternatives out there. Some of the cheaper aftermarket options look sturdy but don’t hold up to any sort of abuse and bend just as easily as the stock pegs.
Shifter / rear brake / exhaust – We prefer to keep them stock because we found they can take quite a bit of abuse and are well designed. We tried every FMF exhaust / header combo and found the “increase” in power to be more placebo and almost negligible relative to the weight savings. However the weight savings comes at a cost in durability. Not to say the stock exhaust didn’t cause us any problems. It has a knack of snapping at the weld close to where the passenger pegs mount which requires immediate attention as the hot air traveling in that section will melt anything in the area including the side plastics and luggage. This happened to us twice. The shifter and rear brake have rounded tips that for some reason many aftermarket manufactures ignore as not looking aggressive enough. Sharp corners catch onto the surface instead of slide causing more damage than necessary. Also, the stock shifter bends easily. It may seem like a disadvantage but it’s preferable to a beefy shifter that puts a hole through the crankcase cover.
Aluminum radiator guard – I kept one but with the IMS tank they are not very easy to install and probably overkill. Marina insisted on ditching hers and the jury is still out on who will change their radiator first.
Magura hydraulic clutch – This is a great upgrade that’s plug and play and makes riding off-road much more fun and effortless when needing to actuate the clutch. Requires occasional TLC because if too much dirt gets into the bottom portion of the assembly, it can damage the piston seals. Highly recommended!
Scotts damper – We have been using Scotts dampers for while now and it really helps us conserve energy for most types of riding.
Professionally tuned suspension – As we got more skilled and our riding speed increased, we started noticing a lack of trust in the bike handling whoops and rocks. The bike comes stock with decent suspension that may only need to be adjusted for preload when you are a beginner and riding slowly off-road. Its adjustability allows you to get it serviced and tuned to your particular riding preferences which worked very well for us and gave us more confidence in being able to push further.
Tires – Much like oil this is a subject where everyone has their personal preference. We currently run Dunlop D606s and vary the tire pressure depending on the terrain we are riding and how much we want to shake and slide.
Thumper Racing 280cc Big Bore – During one of the engine rebuilds we decided to install a big bore cylinder. We had it on the dyno professionally tuned and got a custom map. I can feel more power out of it but it also runs hotter and consumes more coolant. In retrospect I would have preferred to just use the stock cylinder. When the bike runs hotter it sometimes burns a little bit of oil.
Fuel air mapping – We use Dynojet power commander FC. Have tried cheaper alternatives but they are more difficult to customize resulting in a mixture that was too lean or too rich. This would cause the bike to sneeze, cough and fart, sometimes all at once as it intermittently lost and regained power. This was the single most substantial change in regards to power delivery. After dyno tuning, the throttle response was very smooth and predictable, difficult to explain in words, but confidence inspiring.
Air filter sock – we use these to help us reduce the amount of maintenance we need to do on the air filters.
Navigation – I use an iPad mini on an X-Grip mount, and Marina uses an iPhone XS Max. Despite the lack of screen brightness compared to flagship phones, the larger tablet screen makes it easier to see more trails in the area we are riding so that we can take alternative routes without having to stop and regroup as often. It’s easier to plan our routes during lunch stops and be able to share the same screen when planning. We no longer use dedicated GPS devices, instead these complement and offer backups to the phones that stay safely in our pockets.
Tail light and turn signals – Although sometimes it seems the use of turn signals only confuses the locals, I just can’t shake the habit. We use DRC edge tail lights and cheap but bright LED turn signals from ebay. There is an upgrade board available for the DRC edge tail light that is brighter and we have that on one of the bikes.
Luggage
We have previously used a variety of different luggage solutions such as Givi hard cases, Ortlieb side bags, Giantloop Great Basin, Tusk Highland, Green Chile Uprising and others. This time we decided to go with Mosko Reckless 80 v3. So far we are not disappointed even though we had to replace some parts due to the damage the bags endured on our trips. To us they honestly feel sturdier, better engineered and overall better suited for the kind of riding we do. They are on the complex side of the installation/mounting spectrum and one needs to really pay attention to the videos instead of winging the installation process, mounting them the wrong way and wondering why problems develop. Trying to fill up the side bags to the top can be painful, but we have developed a technique where we use our butts to put some weight on our belongings, compress anything squishy and help load it into the side bags. This is usually followed by some wiggling of straps and a little bit of huffing and puffing. The top 22L Stinger tailbag doubles as a backpack which we have used to get groceries while on the trip. The small 4L aux pockets fit our tools, air compressor and other misc parts. One of the 4L pockets fits our entire 3 person tent (floor, main body and rain fly, poles packed separately), which I’m still amazed at.
Tank bags is something very personal and each of us has chosen a different path in life in that regard. Marina decided to go with Mosko Hood tank bag due to it being waterproof, well compartmentalized and easy to open/close with one clip. My opinion is that the placement of the clip should be on the side and not at the front of the bag near the crotch as it makes it awkward to get at and requires one to slide back in their seat only to jam their back into the Reckless 80. Otherwise the bag works ok with the gas cap and hose. I went with Giant Loop Diablo, and no, it wasn’t because the name sounded cool. I chose it because it was designed to fit over a gas cap with a hose sticking out from it like the one that connects the Camel tank to the IMS tank. I have been using it for a few years now and it rarely dislodges the hose. However the tank bag is on the small side, isn’t waterproof, the zippers require two hand operation and are a pain to use when they get dirty.
For backpacks, we prefer smaller volume to reduce the weight on our backs. I use a Klim Nac Pac and Marina uses a small MEC cycling pack.
