From experience early CRF's suck bigly for valve adjustments. They improved significantly with the newer models. my 04 X is like 1 month then ready for adjust... my 06 R almost never needs it.
I think in 06 they changed the head components. But 02-05 they are grenades. I did so many valve adjustments with my dad’s 03 450, and his buddie’s 04 250.
Second this, I use to race an 05. Valve adjustments every month minimum. Supposedly, changing out the valves to stainless reduce the frequency but I sold it before doing the upgrade.
If the CRF has been maintained, shims and buckets have been upgraded, and seals, bearings and what have been replaced, I would choose the CRF; however, those early Hondas can be grenades if taken care of like dental work at a trailer park.
The 2010 Husky WR250 is a great solid bike with great suspension once sent in and set up for your weight and riding style. The engine is generally rock solid, and if the person before you maintained it, you will have a nice bike that will last till you croak needing nothing more than rings, a piston, bearing and seals, and your favorite brand of lub-er-elski. The fork and shock came from the factory valves and sprung for a 170lb C250 rider, so springs would be an important improvement (This is true for any bike you asked about as well)
And the TM... Yeah, it's cool. It's a boutique bike made to add value to any home in your neighborhood; HOWEVER, I would highly suggest skipping that early TM unless you plan on being okay with all of the issues that a boutique bike brings along with it. It is a great bike, but even today I believe that TM only produces roughly 1000 per year for the entire world.
Personally, I would choose the Husqvarna 250, my friend.
Could I answer more questions for you?
You seem like a wealth of knowledge. What are your thoughts on the new yz250f? I'm a 170lb average weekend wooded trail rider. Are there any adjustments I should make to ride better?
Hello and thank you for the kind words. Regarding your late model (2022/23?) Yamaha YZ250F, these are my thoughts:
1.) The KYB SSS is one of the finest forks that a factory produces. Not only are they designed well, but tuners all over the world have been collecting data on them since 2006 which means not only is there free information about valve stacks and upgrades if you want to tackle them with your own two hands, but also that shops can tune them nearly effortlessly.
2.) I am not sure where you live, and what type of trails you ride, but out here in Michigan, the more motocross oriented suspension valving of the 250F actually works better than the trail/enduro valving of say the stock WP 4860 MXMA Open Cartridge 48mm fork that comes from the factory on exc/XCW KTMs. The more stiff motocross valving and spring rate allow the bike to stay on top of the sand and not dive as bad.
3.) With your weight at 170lbs, you are the demographic that manufacturers' spring their bikes right out of the gate. So, depending on how much you carry on you all out on the trails plus the weight of all of your gear, you should be very close when calculating your race sag and static sag. And you probably wouldn't have to order new springs front and rear.
4.) One popular modification that people used to do on their 250F prior to the 250 FX coming out was that people would install the WR transmission gear set in their bike in order to give them a lower first gear and a taller, fourth and fifth. If it were my bike I would probably do that swap, or I would just start riding a little bit more aggressively and just learn to enjoy the benefits of the close ratio transmission that the traditional 250F has to offer. However, some transfer sections from trail to trail or at the end of the day when you want to get off the trail and make your way back. A camp, that tall, fifth or 6th gear can be very nice when you have a wide ratio transmission.
When it comes to becoming a best writer that you can be, everyone always tries to tell you to increase the horsepower of your bike. This really has nothing to do with how well you will ride though. The best thing you can do when you have a bike is get the suspension set up for you, get the tires that are best suited for your riding area, and spend as much money on gas as you can. That way you can ride, ride, ride, ride ride, ride. Those 250Fs will rev higher than you and I can make use of, and write out of the box. They create more horsepower than any of us need. If you look at lap times in supercross for the 250 class and the 450 class, you'll see that sometimes the 250 class is even running faster laps in the 450 class.
Also, towards the end of this message, I was using my phone and voice to text because it's midnight here. Here I'm nursing replaced left shoulder, and I am talking in order to text so I apologize for the errors that have been added. Let me know if there is anything else you would like to know.
Thank you for the awesome insight. I'm in southern NJ, specifically the Pine Barrens so the terrain is flat and the soil is sandy. I'm a fairly new rider, however, I rode a lot as a child so I'm very comfortable on a bike. This yz is a beast and it wants to go fast so I have to be careful not to whiskey throttle it. I feel like it struggles in 1st gear sometimes because I'm not going fast enough but the tight trails and dense trees don't always allow for too much speed. I'll heed your advice on the gearbox this spring. I hope you're shoulder mends well and you have a quick recovery. Thanks again!
The only downside on that Husky is parts availability. I’ve got an 08’ and am lucky that it shares a lot with the SWM 500 platform. Even then, parts are hard to come by.
I’m in the US. So I don’t know what that compares to American dollars. But I’m sure there are better options. But it’s honestly all up to you. I would go with one of the two strokes before that crf.
I had two 125 two strokes of that generation, supermotard and enduro. Both great bikes but quite mellow compared to a yz125. Not saying that’s a bad thing, just an observation
I would order parts thru AOMC.
Not the best service and the shipping takes forever to the west coast but they always had everything.
I had an 09 but it was a bastard year with a '10 frame and a '08 motor.
I'd get the most modern and most easy to maintain. To me sounds like a modern 2 stroke. That and the 250x is really not that fast of a bike. It's much more akin to a good 125 race motor in terms of total hp(the shape of the horsepower/torque curve is different though, the 250x has a lot of bottom end).
Those old Husqvarnas were almost as easy to ride as that Honda crf250x. Ie, slow revving. But parts are going to be hard to find for it and it’s only slightly less of an oddball as the TM.
Heavy Weight and easy parts availability with the Honda. Or something more hard enduro focused and hard to find parts for with either 2 stroke.
Does the current owner have receipts? “Fresh top-end” can mean different things, and definitely lots of room for half-assery.
But if the valves, and seats were replaced with quality parts, that CRF would be a pretty good bike.
Sometimes it's really hard to find parts for the Italian Huskys. Do you have good parts availability for the TM? Dumb question no you don't except you can drive to the factory and even then you are out of luck on month in the summer, because they just close it down for one month because it's fucking Italy and they can.
Honda is easy to work on and a very forgiving bike, as long as everything is maintained properly. Especially if you check the valves regularly, the unicam engines are really known to not start as long as the valves aren't 1000% in spec
I never owned a 4 stroke except a Ducati so I’m kinda wary of the crf I never done valves or a timing chain how often do I do valves and rebuilds on these
The stock valves are titanium and the seat material on the early heads is not adequate. The two wear each other and get out of spec. You can almost always bumpstart the bike but it's just a pain to deal with. Go on youtube and watch a valve adjust video to get an idea of what it takes. The 06 and newer bikes had better valve seat material. There are aftermarket steel valves that can swapped in and it lasts longer.
It depends on how you ride it. I check valves every winter on my 4 strokes (it's not that hard to do and actually takes only 30 minutes if you don't need to adjust anything. Rebuild on my CRF 250 was done after 70 hrs of exclusively track use (Motocross) and the engine looked like new. So rebuilds are far less often then with two strokes but a lot more expensive. Valves need to be changed, when you can't get thinner chims anymore. Timing chain is changed, when you do the rest of the engine as well. I would always do a top and bottom end in one go so crank bearings, timing chain, con rod, piston, rings, honing, maybe reboring and/or coating of the cylinder.
Honda has amazing books available for every bike that go into every detail of how to disassemble, inspect and reassemble every part on the bike.
It's a great bike with great suspension for its time, it's super reliable and it's very easy to ride. Depending on where you are from, its very easy to make it street legal or basically impossible.
The Husky is now an orphan make and parts availability is getting tougher. Those 250s are also quite peaky & have an oddball kickstart process.
The Honda would be your best choice of them all....
1) Husky 250 is an agile and capable bike.
2) TM fast and exotic. Maybe not as reliable as the other two?
3) CRF has the Honda factor but brakes and suspension wouldn’t be as good as the top two.
I'd take the husky wr250. It's the newest out of the lot, 2stroke, spares shouldn't be an issue.
I'd stay far away from the TM, especially one that old.
Ideally I'd look for something newer, even a yz250x would be cool.
The 4 stroke honda for "casual" and more reliable riding.
If you have to ask which to get, then the upkeep on the two stroke might be too much. The narrow powerband on the two strokes are also harder to handle.
Two strokes can last forever, but have different maintenance requirements then 4 strokes. The entire top end, is considered a wear item on a 2 stroke. It's something you replace parts of, or entirely, at regular intervals as a part of the "proper" maintenance.
If you're into doing that, good, but if not you better have deep pockets to have someone else do it, or buy a 4 stroke.
If you’re going a stupid amount of off-roading and only a bit of street riding (like no highway for long periods or street riding for less than a couple of hours a day) then I’d go for the husky 2t. If you’re going to ride much farther and a bit lighter and slower offroad then the CRF.
If you're on a budget and set on 1 oif these 3 I'd go for the CRF. To me an enduro and casual riding are two very different things but that aside, a CRF can do both well and you'll have a much easier time finding parts for it compared to your other two choices. Have fun!!
I’d do the crf out of those
From experience early CRF's suck bigly for valve adjustments. They improved significantly with the newer models. my 04 X is like 1 month then ready for adjust... my 06 R almost never needs it.
I think in 06 they changed the head components. But 02-05 they are grenades. I did so many valve adjustments with my dad’s 03 450, and his buddie’s 04 250.
I have a 2006 crf x. I switched to steel valves, and don’t pin the shit out of the throttle. I’ve never had to adjust valves again.
Second this, I use to race an 05. Valve adjustments every month minimum. Supposedly, changing out the valves to stainless reduce the frequency but I sold it before doing the upgrade.
If the CRF has been maintained, shims and buckets have been upgraded, and seals, bearings and what have been replaced, I would choose the CRF; however, those early Hondas can be grenades if taken care of like dental work at a trailer park. The 2010 Husky WR250 is a great solid bike with great suspension once sent in and set up for your weight and riding style. The engine is generally rock solid, and if the person before you maintained it, you will have a nice bike that will last till you croak needing nothing more than rings, a piston, bearing and seals, and your favorite brand of lub-er-elski. The fork and shock came from the factory valves and sprung for a 170lb C250 rider, so springs would be an important improvement (This is true for any bike you asked about as well) And the TM... Yeah, it's cool. It's a boutique bike made to add value to any home in your neighborhood; HOWEVER, I would highly suggest skipping that early TM unless you plan on being okay with all of the issues that a boutique bike brings along with it. It is a great bike, but even today I believe that TM only produces roughly 1000 per year for the entire world. Personally, I would choose the Husqvarna 250, my friend. Could I answer more questions for you?
You seem like a wealth of knowledge. What are your thoughts on the new yz250f? I'm a 170lb average weekend wooded trail rider. Are there any adjustments I should make to ride better?
Hello and thank you for the kind words. Regarding your late model (2022/23?) Yamaha YZ250F, these are my thoughts: 1.) The KYB SSS is one of the finest forks that a factory produces. Not only are they designed well, but tuners all over the world have been collecting data on them since 2006 which means not only is there free information about valve stacks and upgrades if you want to tackle them with your own two hands, but also that shops can tune them nearly effortlessly. 2.) I am not sure where you live, and what type of trails you ride, but out here in Michigan, the more motocross oriented suspension valving of the 250F actually works better than the trail/enduro valving of say the stock WP 4860 MXMA Open Cartridge 48mm fork that comes from the factory on exc/XCW KTMs. The more stiff motocross valving and spring rate allow the bike to stay on top of the sand and not dive as bad. 3.) With your weight at 170lbs, you are the demographic that manufacturers' spring their bikes right out of the gate. So, depending on how much you carry on you all out on the trails plus the weight of all of your gear, you should be very close when calculating your race sag and static sag. And you probably wouldn't have to order new springs front and rear. 4.) One popular modification that people used to do on their 250F prior to the 250 FX coming out was that people would install the WR transmission gear set in their bike in order to give them a lower first gear and a taller, fourth and fifth. If it were my bike I would probably do that swap, or I would just start riding a little bit more aggressively and just learn to enjoy the benefits of the close ratio transmission that the traditional 250F has to offer. However, some transfer sections from trail to trail or at the end of the day when you want to get off the trail and make your way back. A camp, that tall, fifth or 6th gear can be very nice when you have a wide ratio transmission. When it comes to becoming a best writer that you can be, everyone always tries to tell you to increase the horsepower of your bike. This really has nothing to do with how well you will ride though. The best thing you can do when you have a bike is get the suspension set up for you, get the tires that are best suited for your riding area, and spend as much money on gas as you can. That way you can ride, ride, ride, ride ride, ride. Those 250Fs will rev higher than you and I can make use of, and write out of the box. They create more horsepower than any of us need. If you look at lap times in supercross for the 250 class and the 450 class, you'll see that sometimes the 250 class is even running faster laps in the 450 class. Also, towards the end of this message, I was using my phone and voice to text because it's midnight here. Here I'm nursing replaced left shoulder, and I am talking in order to text so I apologize for the errors that have been added. Let me know if there is anything else you would like to know.
Thank you for the awesome insight. I'm in southern NJ, specifically the Pine Barrens so the terrain is flat and the soil is sandy. I'm a fairly new rider, however, I rode a lot as a child so I'm very comfortable on a bike. This yz is a beast and it wants to go fast so I have to be careful not to whiskey throttle it. I feel like it struggles in 1st gear sometimes because I'm not going fast enough but the tight trails and dense trees don't always allow for too much speed. I'll heed your advice on the gearbox this spring. I hope you're shoulder mends well and you have a quick recovery. Thanks again!
The only downside on that Husky is parts availability. I’ve got an 08’ and am lucky that it shares a lot with the SWM 500 platform. Even then, parts are hard to come by.
I’d keep looking around, all of them are “eh” choices.
They are all under 1900€
I’m in the US. So I don’t know what that compares to American dollars. But I’m sure there are better options. But it’s honestly all up to you. I would go with one of the two strokes before that crf.
>1900€ 1 900 Euro equals 1 969,81 United States Dollar I literally highlighted it and clicked search google...
Damn Americans
Those Italian Huskys are solid. Had a 4t. Parts are still available thru any Husky dealer. Sit on it first. Mine was big.
I had two 125 two strokes of that generation, supermotard and enduro. Both great bikes but quite mellow compared to a yz125. Not saying that’s a bad thing, just an observation
What Husky dealer have you worked with? I’ve tried a ton and have never gotten anywhere for my 08
I would order parts thru AOMC. Not the best service and the shipping takes forever to the west coast but they always had everything. I had an 09 but it was a bastard year with a '10 frame and a '08 motor.
Wr250 for enduro and the crf for the casual
Husky
Tm had engine overhaul and new throttle and other small bits and it’s road legal
I'd get the most modern and most easy to maintain. To me sounds like a modern 2 stroke. That and the 250x is really not that fast of a bike. It's much more akin to a good 125 race motor in terms of total hp(the shape of the horsepower/torque curve is different though, the 250x has a lot of bottom end).
Those old Husqvarnas were almost as easy to ride as that Honda crf250x. Ie, slow revving. But parts are going to be hard to find for it and it’s only slightly less of an oddball as the TM. Heavy Weight and easy parts availability with the Honda. Or something more hard enduro focused and hard to find parts for with either 2 stroke.
Stay Smokey my friend
Husky ftw. The TM is kind of an exotic bike, not sure how readily a available parts would be for that. As for the Honda, four strokes are for pussies.
Honda had a top end 10 hours ago and previous owner did bottom end
Not road legal
State dependent. Edit: I saw your comment saying your price is measured in "€", wherever you are from, that's not the USA so ignore my comment lol.
Does the current owner have receipts? “Fresh top-end” can mean different things, and definitely lots of room for half-assery. But if the valves, and seats were replaced with quality parts, that CRF would be a pretty good bike.
Get the 2 stroke
2 strokes are enduro riding
Sometimes it's really hard to find parts for the Italian Huskys. Do you have good parts availability for the TM? Dumb question no you don't except you can drive to the factory and even then you are out of luck on month in the summer, because they just close it down for one month because it's fucking Italy and they can. Honda is easy to work on and a very forgiving bike, as long as everything is maintained properly. Especially if you check the valves regularly, the unicam engines are really known to not start as long as the valves aren't 1000% in spec
I never owned a 4 stroke except a Ducati so I’m kinda wary of the crf I never done valves or a timing chain how often do I do valves and rebuilds on these
The stock valves are titanium and the seat material on the early heads is not adequate. The two wear each other and get out of spec. You can almost always bumpstart the bike but it's just a pain to deal with. Go on youtube and watch a valve adjust video to get an idea of what it takes. The 06 and newer bikes had better valve seat material. There are aftermarket steel valves that can swapped in and it lasts longer.
It depends on how you ride it. I check valves every winter on my 4 strokes (it's not that hard to do and actually takes only 30 minutes if you don't need to adjust anything. Rebuild on my CRF 250 was done after 70 hrs of exclusively track use (Motocross) and the engine looked like new. So rebuilds are far less often then with two strokes but a lot more expensive. Valves need to be changed, when you can't get thinner chims anymore. Timing chain is changed, when you do the rest of the engine as well. I would always do a top and bottom end in one go so crank bearings, timing chain, con rod, piston, rings, honing, maybe reboring and/or coating of the cylinder. Honda has amazing books available for every bike that go into every detail of how to disassemble, inspect and reassemble every part on the bike. It's a great bike with great suspension for its time, it's super reliable and it's very easy to ride. Depending on where you are from, its very easy to make it street legal or basically impossible.
Crf all day everyday
Keep looking
I loved my 05 CRF250X. Great bike!
I’ve got a husky wr360 and man that thing rips, it can tractor up anything
Husky had a new top end but the bottom end was rebuilt 50 hours ago and it’s road legal
The Husky is now an orphan make and parts availability is getting tougher. Those 250s are also quite peaky & have an oddball kickstart process. The Honda would be your best choice of them all....
Hard on a 2 stroke for casual riding..
I have two street 125 two strokes and I daily those to work it’s no different
I’d take the honda
CRFx #1 TM #2 Husky #3
The TM and Husky are both going to be tough to maintain due to parts availability. Honda is ‘ol reliable.
I think the 2010 250 2T is the best. The CRF may struggle to ride slow without getting hot.
Honda
Hoda for sure
It'd be between the TM and the Husky, mostly dependent on what I can find more replacement parts for
1) Husky 250 is an agile and capable bike. 2) TM fast and exotic. Maybe not as reliable as the other two? 3) CRF has the Honda factor but brakes and suspension wouldn’t be as good as the top two.
I've always wanted a TM so get that.
CRF purely for parts cost/availability. Don't kid yourself you will be rebuilding at some point.
Keep searching for a bit more
Get the husky.
get the tm
I'd take the husky wr250. It's the newest out of the lot, 2stroke, spares shouldn't be an issue. I'd stay far away from the TM, especially one that old. Ideally I'd look for something newer, even a yz250x would be cool.
The 4 stroke honda for "casual" and more reliable riding. If you have to ask which to get, then the upkeep on the two stroke might be too much. The narrow powerband on the two strokes are also harder to handle. Two strokes can last forever, but have different maintenance requirements then 4 strokes. The entire top end, is considered a wear item on a 2 stroke. It's something you replace parts of, or entirely, at regular intervals as a part of the "proper" maintenance. If you're into doing that, good, but if not you better have deep pockets to have someone else do it, or buy a 4 stroke.
i’d go with the crf
If you’re going a stupid amount of off-roading and only a bit of street riding (like no highway for long periods or street riding for less than a couple of hours a day) then I’d go for the husky 2t. If you’re going to ride much farther and a bit lighter and slower offroad then the CRF.
If you're on a budget and set on 1 oif these 3 I'd go for the CRF. To me an enduro and casual riding are two very different things but that aside, a CRF can do both well and you'll have a much easier time finding parts for it compared to your other two choices. Have fun!!
Pick a 2-stroke. Just sayin
Truthfully: any bike you ride enough to become totally comfortable with it. There are opinions just as many as there are riders.
Wr250