new CRF50... and its down already...

[wasted]

well, my brother bought his son a CRF50 a couple days ago to replace his PW50... which was a good tradeoff by the way... other than the fact that we went trail riding today and the thing locked up tighter than a drum about three miles down the trail...
now he has to ride his pw the rest of the weekend(which doesnt trail ride well at all) because the place he bought it from is closed until teusday, which kind of bummed him out...
seeings as its only a couple days old, I hope they just replace that CRF instead of saying their going to try to fix it...

 

[Vic]

They will likely want to fix it. Did anyone check the oil?

 

[wasted]

yep, thats the first thing we did...
if it didnt have oil in it, it wouldnt have been his fault anyway, the shop was supposed to have had it all prepped and running when he picked it up, so it still would have been them at fault...
he picked it up thursday afternoon, broke it in good thursday, let him ride it around after school on friday, and it locked up late saturday morning, so it had next to nothing for hours on it...
we havent touched anything else, we didnt even pull the plug out... hes just going to take it back the way it is, he's not real happy about it...

 

[Patman]

Actually you should check the oil level often on a fresh engine. Assuming a bike is 100% ready to go, even a XR50 is just asking for disaster. It's been my experience that many dealers us "prep" as added $$ for their pocket. I'm pretty sure most of the non-racing Hondas have a minimal warranty so they will fix it before ever thinking about a new bike.
BTW what does breaking it in good mean?

 

[tnrider]

i believe a new crf50 will have a 6-month warranty - AND you did check the oil before every ride!

 

[wasted]

we did check the oil before he rode it and after it locked up, but if there hadnt been oil in it when it locked up they couldnt have used the excuse that it was our fault because they were supposed to have had it ridable when he picked it up( which you would sure think would include putting oil in it), it was part of the deal...
but it had oil in it then and it has oil in it now...

breaking it in means we took him out in the field behind my brothers house and had him ride it around without reving the hell out of it a few times, letting it cool down between rides, and letting him ride it a little longer each time, checkng the plug and other things on it each time to make sure everything was going good with it, and everything was until sat.

he was racing it around pretty good friday afternoon and it ran great then, so I dont know what happened... it actually will turn over if you force the kicker down hard enough, so its not frozen solid... I dont know, like I said, we didnt even pull the plug out after it locked, he's just going to take it back and see what happens...

I told him to bitch hard enough and maybe they would throw the bigbore kit in it instead of putting it back stock for all the trouble its caused him... its a good thought, but I doubt thats going to happen either...

 

[Zerotact]

I've ridden the snot out of mine without any problems. Maybe a ring slipped

 

[jpconard]

Did you ride through too deep of water? My son did on 01 XR50 and it bent the rod, and scuffed the lower skirt on the piston when the piston seized. The piston eventually freed, and the motor started, but the rod was barely hitting on the lower part of the cylinder.

We took it apart, new rod $40, having dealer press off bearing and install new rod, and press on bearing and true crank around $100. Yours should be warantee. We re-used the piston as it wan't scarred on top and not too bad on the skirt. Bike still runs good, but son is looking for bigger one. These things are pretty tough.

They won't put any thing other than stock parts on it.

Watch the deeper water on XR/CRF 50s. Check oil before every ride (usually after it warms up a little).

 

[wasted]

yep, thats exactly what happened to this one... he rode it through some water, not very fast and not very deep, but with that screwed up airbox on that CRF it must have sucked water like a vacuum cleaner and sucked enough of it that it bent the rod, which hit the piston skirt, oblonged the bottom of the piston, and locked it...

their not going to warantee it because it was water damage and they dont warantee water damage, so if they repaired it he would be stuck with the repair bill...

where did you get your replacement rod from jpconard? I called a honda dealer here and he said they only sell replacement cranks assemblies, and they were like $260...

 

[Jaybird]

LOL...it's always in the details.

 

[firecracker22]

Ouch, that sucks.

You might talk to BBR motorsports ( www.bbrmotorsports.com ) about big bore kits since you're going to have it apart anyway . . .

 

[jpconard]

They are giving you a load of sh**. The rod is around $40. Go to bikebandit and pull up the microfilm for XR50. It will show the part # for the rod and for '01 it is $42.49.

If you replace the crank pin and bearing there are three different colors (I guess sizes). You can't tell what one you need. Somehow the dealer did when he took it apart and wrote it down for me.

If you are lucky all you need is the rod. We didn't replace piston, rings, crank pin or crank bearing or anything else has been running great over a year later.

It don't take much water or speed here either, my kid had K&N pod and it is just as bad as stock for letting in water. Maybe an outerwear? I just say no water unless under the axles.

I was charged $100 for putting the rod on the crank and balance (requires a press, we could get the bearing off but not the crank apart). I had the motor apart myself. If you are careful you can re-use the gaskets. The gears are a little tricky so you probably should have the manual.

One place did say they would do it for $70, and they said they would take the motor apart and put it back for another $70.

If you live around St. Louis Donellson quoted me those prices, but they are approx.

I was mad at kid as well, but these things happen and the $150 wasn't too bad.