[Hedbngr18]

So I just did a complete bottom and top end on my 85. My dad is the original owner and the cases have never been split until this year. I found 86 versions of both the clutch sleeve/bearings as well as the kick starter sleeve. I have yet to look at the sticker to see when it was manufactured, but I am willing to bet that it was late in the 85 run and they were running out of parts. Anyone else find anything similar? It confused the heck out of me, but I have reconciled and moved on.

 

[Mr Scary]

So I just did a complete bottom and top end on my 85. My dad is the original owner and the cases have never been split until this year. I found 86 versions of both the clutch sleeve/bearings as well as the kick starter sleeve. I have yet to look at the sticker to see when it was manufactured, but I am willing to bet that it was late in the 85 run and they were running out of parts. Anyone else find anything similar? It confused the heck out of me, but I have reconciled and moved on.

85 250r engines were totally black in color. 86 and up were a kinda grayish black color. If that helps in your reconciliation 😜

 

[Hedbngr18]

Yeah, I know the external differences. I own one of each year in reasonably original condition. This bike in question was manufactured in June 1985 and my dad bought it new in July of that same year. The cases have never been split and there has only been 2 top ends done since it was purchased. It even had the original clutch basket and clutch in it. He added a reed block spacer with Boyesen Super Stock reeds and upgraded to the Keihin PJ34 carb over the Mikuni back in 87. Otherwise, the only part I can recall him replacing was the throttle cable around 2002. Otherwise the bike is (now was) 100% factory. That's why I am a bit surprised at finding things like the 86 setup for the kickstarter spacer and clutch basket bearing/bushing (both of which had separate washers as spacers instead of all inclusive machined units). I wish it had the 86 pushrod actuator assembly, but that can be done for less than $100 if I really wanted to.

 

[Cold Slither]

Someone on another forum used to work for one of the Big 4 and said the during a model year factories typically used to start off doing 80s first (they made a ton of those), then 125s (fewer 125s than 80s), then half as many 250s as 125s, then made 500s (not many) then would start on the street bikes, ATVs and ATCs. After that, I think they would start again on things that sold out or saw really high demand. There were two different runs of '86 250R quads for example and the later has a different front master cylinder I think for one. If they were making something in June that's going to be the second run since they don't want to make people wait until June of '85 for an '85.

One thing I do know that was a detour for this order was the opening of the Honda plant in Marysville Ohio in 1979 where a 1980 CR250 was the first bike off the line in September of 1979 so the factory in Japan was probably doing something other than CR250s. As far as I know there was never any 250R production in the USA. I think Marysville did crank out a lot of TRX300 utility quads though. Those sold 100,000 units a year for a while!

 

[BeverlyGross]

Good