Just joined and wanted a place to follow my bike. I had previous to me a 2001 TTR-225 and to be honest I loved it minus its lack of suspension. Wasnt fast but stone dead reliable in the woods. So I figured why not get the bigger better version of the 225.
I purchased a 1999 TTR-250 with a title a couple weeks back.
Immediate needs were tires, chain, brakes and the bike had a slight mid-rpm miss.
Well the other day I fixed the chain and brakes. Was going to forgo tires until I sorted it on its first trail ride but it died.
15A main fuse was absolutely melted. Swapped that, turned it back on and blew the fuse. The Chinese CDI box was gurgling so I swapped the fuse again, unplugged the cdi and turned it on and so far so good. I went through the factory service manual and tested all the ignition components and it all seems to be within Yamaha spec so I am hoping the cause was the original CDI died, PO was too cheap and got a cheap one and that also sucked.
I was hoping to gain some knowledge here since these bikes are super not supported.
So after diagnosing I went and got a CDI Replacement. That CDI also exploded and I seriously couldn't figure it out. So I replaced all of the electrical charging system (stator regulator, voltage regulator and CDI) with a used set off of a 2003 TTR. Bike ran perfect. I have a terrible feeling it was my bikes issue on the replacement CDI because the hack of a previous owner definitely cheaped out replacing everything the first time.
Got the bike to the trail, Chinese carb decided it didnt want to run right so I took the seals out of the China carb and put it into the OEM carb and it ran phenomenal for the 30+ miles of trails I did.
I rode the TTR225 for 3 years probably hundreds of miles. I've now ridden this TTR250 30ish miles. This bike is everything I was hoping it was/would do. It makes way more power, the suspension (although not as good as a WR250F) is a lot better. The hardest part of being in Upstate NY, the trails here are very muddy so I truly struggled with a bald rear tire. I bought an installed a TUSK Intermediate/Hard compound tire.
Hoping to put a ton more miles on the bike this summer.