'87 Honda NSR250 'ELF Special'

Re: NSR250 revival

Dale said:
Moa, spoke to Mario last night... he has a MC18 crank available for sale...

nsr250spares.com/

Use the contact tab on the site to get hold of him.
He will give you expert advise as well.
Very knowledgeable.
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Awesome! thanks Dale. I've just sent him an email.

Dale said:
Did you get a MC16 or MC18 airbox? Are they the same? (I don't know anything about MC16's).
Check to see if it fits under your MC16 tank. If yo have a MC18 airbox, and it doesn't look like its going to fit, I do have a MC18 tank lying around...
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I found an MC16 airbox and kickstarter locally. I bought them before I knew I had an MC18 motor. Looking at the NSR parts manual, it looks like the 16 and 18 airboxes are more or less identical. So it should fit my bike, as well as work well with the mc18 motor. The kick starters are the same too.
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Moa said:
Hi Mikey, I'm up in Auckland. Do you have any two-stroke or NSR expertise?
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No NSR expertise. I've rebuilt a few 4 strokes and a lawnmower 2 stroke but aren't what you would call an expert.
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Fair enough Mikey, I'm no expert myself. Nice of you to want to help out though.

Just a quick update. I have a lot on at the moment so progress is a little slow. Mario from nsr250spares is re-building a crank for me :D, he just has to get all the parts in first. By the way, thanks for that connection Dale.

I'm just in the process of cleaning up the frame and swingarm. Pics of those probably later this week if I can get them finished.
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Right, the NSR is now completely taken apart. Over the weekend I've cleaned up the frame and swingarm. I didn't realise that they were painted at first. I thought they were just bare aluminium.

So I got out the paint stripper and started stripping.
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The paint stripper didn't take all the paint off, and the aluminium was a bit rough in places, so I've been slowly wet sanding the components with progressively finer sandpaper.

I looks good with just a 1200 grit sanded finish. I decided to lightly polish one face just to see what it would look like. Now I'm not sure whether to go with a polished or satin finish. What do you guys think?

Polished:
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Unpolished:
DSCN1188.jpg
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Satin would be easier to live with, as far as maintenance goes.

This build is sure moving fast! (Or is it that mine are on the go-slow)

Crazy


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Re: NSR250 revival

stroker crazy said:
Satin would be easier to live with, as far as maintenance goes.
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Oh, but that mirror finish is so very sexy :) Easy for me to say - my frame is satin black and my chrome is polished with WD-40 and a rag.

Whatever you decide, this is a very neat project! I wish NSR250's were more common in the States...
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Also, is that an e30 chassis BMW in the background? Love those cars...
 
Re: NSR250 revival

stroker crazy said:
This build is sure moving fast! (Or is it that mine are on the go-slow)
Click to expand...

Here's me thinking that I'm not making enough progress. I've noticed progress on your RaZoR build has been a little slow lately. I'm looking forward to seeing that one come together for sure.
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Worst cb650 ever said:
Oh, but that mirror finish is so very sexy :) Easy for me to say - my frame is satin black and my chrome is polished with WD-40 and a rag.

Whatever you decide, this is a very neat project! I wish NSR250's were more common in the States...
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Yeah, the polished finish is nice, I was more concerned that it wouldn't really suit the bike rather than maintenance issues. These bikes and also rgv's and tzr's are actually somewhat common down here. I think they were brought in because they're the fasted learner legal bikes around (250cc limit for learners here), although these fast 2-strokes are soon to be banned under the new learner biker laws.

Worst cb650 ever said:
Also, is that an e30 chassis BMW in the background? Love those cars...
Click to expand...

It's an E30 indeed. I just picked it up recently. I've been car-less for a while, and bikes are a pain when you need to carry stuff, or when it's cold and rainy. It's in pretty good condition, last owner had it since 1995.
 
Re: NSR250 revival

I think that the polished swing arm peeking out from under the bodywork would look killer.

A 60 hp "learner" bike would be insane. I learned on a '70s CB450 that leaked more gas than it burned, and that was a handful!

I had an e21 320i, a couple of 325s, and an e28 535i - all wonderful cars. The e30s could be a pain on maintenance as they were normally pretty neglected when I got to them...

BlHF7.jpg
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Satin and clean it with WD40 and a scothbrite scourer.
 
Re: NSR250 revival

I've always had a soft spot for old bimmers. The E30 is an affordable entry into classic BMW's, I was lucky enough to score a good one.

I'll have to think about the polished/satin question. I think I prefer the satin finish, but there's a certain satisfaction that comes from polishing metal :). I'll do a bit of photoshopping first, and also come up with a few ideas for paint schemes.
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Looking cool! Every NSR frame Ive come across is anodized! Maybe the MC16s were painted?! Dunno, unless one of its previous owners did that? Heres an example of a polished frame NSR... :) Think its an MC18 with an RS fairing...

Honda%20NSR%20250%20MC18.jpg
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Moa - the RaZoR is stalled waiting for the chambers.

The engineer doing the design and fabrication is an artist - but painfully slow
He has what is basically the rolling chassis with the crankcase and barrels; until I get it back I can't start on the bodywork.

Definitely frustrating, but most projects have these times!

Crazy
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Dale said:
Looking cool! Every NSR frame Ive come across is anodized! Maybe the MC16s were painted?! Dunno, unless one of its previous owners did that?
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I don't think my frame has been re-painted, as it still had the original stickers on it. They must have just made them like that.

The polished look is quite nice, now I'm thinking polished swingarm and satin frame? Not a mirror finish though, that would be too much. Just a nice slightly grainy shine. Here's another example, an rs250 with what looks like a frame just like my mc16: Looks, pretty sweet!
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stroker crazy said:
Moa - the RaZoR is stalled waiting for the chambers.

The engineer doing the design and fabrication is an artist - but painfully slow
He has what is basically the rolling chassis with the crankcase and barrels; until I get it back I can't start on the bodywork.

Definitely frustrating, but most projects have these times!

Crazy
Click to expand...

Fair enough, good things take time. I must admit I haven't read through the whole thread, but from what I see it should be amazing when finished, and a rocket! :D
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Time for another update. Today I did a bit of rust removal.

The inside of the tank had rusted up a bit from sitting empty for so long. I've seen a lot worse though.
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Firstly, I removed all the dirt and scaly rust by swishing around some steel BB's and a bit of water.
DSCN1201.jpg


Then I used a chemical process to try remove as much rust as possible. I used a phosphoric acid based rust remover mixed with about 4 parts water. There was about 1.5 litres of acid/water in there, so I let it soak for about and hour on each side of the tank. It came out great, there's just a few small rust spots left, but that's not going to be an issue.
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I also stripped the paint and rust off one of the expansion chambers. They're going to be repainted black.
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As for the end cans, I'll be ditching these...
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...and getting some of these:
tyga.jpg
 
Re: NSR250 revival

The tank looks great!

So do the expansion chambers, what you thinking about coating it with?

I coated my track bikes with a high heat (up to 800degC) powdercoating. Quite a nice finish. Done about 8 hours of hard riding, and powdercoating is holding up...

Those Tyga cans are great, running the aluminum ones like thase on my MC21 track bike, and the carbon ones om my MC28. Nice quality. You'll be happy.

Pipes.jpg
 
Re: NSR250 revival

That powdercoated finish looks nice. However, as this build is being done on a student budget, I'm going to go for the cheap option of repainting them myself with a high temp paint. This guy (http://edetuckracing.blogspot.co.nz/2012/04/two-months-since-my-last-post.html) used fireplace paint with good results, so I'll probably do that too. The less I spend on cosmetic improvements, the more I'll have to spend on critical components, such as re-building the engine. And also more for aftermarket goodies :D. I don't want to cut corners though, this is going to be a quality build!
 
Re: NSR250 revival

Haven't actually got much done lately, I've been so busy. However, I noticed my thread slowly slipping down the list so I feel like I should post an update.

Firstly, I pulled out the bodywork and gave it a look over. Not too bad, but needs some repairs done. I'll also need to strip the old paint off because it's chipping away. If anyone has some advice on plastic fairing repair, or stripping paint from plastic I'd love to hear it.
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I've also come up with a few paint scheme ideas. Just two designs at the moment and a few colour variations. There will be more, I take a long time to settle on colours/designs, they can make or break a bike! Thought I might as well share these now, and get your feedback. That's not my bike by the way.
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orange_grey_blue2.jpg

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This one's got a black frame:
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I modeled this design on the elf NSR500 racer.
elf2.jpg

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Re: NSR250 revival

Some cool ideas there! Like the ELF scheme, but I think your design is very cool - looks like it could have been factory. Nice.
How about a subtle number board shape on the rear?

The original plastics are valuable, as opposed to a fibreglass replacements, and the plastics are becoming rare, so its nice that you've got them.

Great update.
 
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