Yamaha RD250C 1976 Rolling resto and daily rider

[adventure steele]

Hey everyone

After running my Yamaha RD250LC last year and a F800GS the Gs ended up collecting a bit of dust superb bike an flawless but just didn't make me grin like the Elsie does. Being honest 97% of my adventure riding is on small back roads or on the road.

I've been hunting like crazy to get a Yamaha RD250C 1977 settled on a great project bike through the owners club.

Utterly over the moon an it's gonna be a real long term keeper like all my others haha owned my 350lc since I was 16 with dad. That then bred into a few

Amazingly after the disaster that was last week with another bike.

I ended up picking up and collecting my new baby on my 30th birthday no less! An a year to the day we all got made redundant from the litho print company huge life change since I've been around print since I was a kid an dad an entire life time. Currently decided to take some time out for another year again an pick some part time work up a few days a week back on computers then eventually get back into wildlife photography an spend time with family (my cousin is terminally ill but doing really good) an spend time with other family members dad an I didn't get to see much doing 70+ hour weeks.

Which will leave me stacks of time for riding and going on adventures on the bikes with dad well that's the plan an make more memories with dad!

Enough rambling an onto the bike uk matching numbers 22k ish miles most importantly blue! Now my dads 250DX was blue an his older bro's 250C was blue I grew up on stories about these bikes so super excited to own one myself. Hopefully have some piccies coming of my uncles 250c. My mum actually met my dad through his 250 as she was watching him from a window a week or so before they met on the night he picked it the picture below. Even got pictures of my dads younger bro who doesn't ride whos the one that's ill sat on both of the 250's so will be ace to pop down to his on it alot as well

Initial plan is a rolling resto get her looking mint over time like I have with my Norton's but use regularly an by that I mean quite a bit haha did 2,000 miles in one week on my 250lc so like to get out an about. Main thing though is shes gonna be ridden alot!

Things I wanna sort so far are
Clean clean an more clean for a few days
Levers an missing bits cylinder rubber etc - already ordered on the way to pick the bike up haha so they should be here any day.
Tyres Avon's are my choice of protection Front tyres got a split from being stood so those are main priority
Tank - repair to the underside so gonna have a hunt about for a replacement. Respray once I figure out who to use.
Forks- Gotta decide what stanchions to get, new seals, dust covers, measure the springs up.
Electronic ignition - saw the huge improvement this made on the Norton's as it's gonna be ridden alot that's right up there with stuff to get done.
Re Chroming gonna start with the rear rack unless I can find a replacement that's ready to go. Pick who to use.

If anyone spots anything that's not standard etc appreciate the heads up Wanna get her as right as I can

This bike means a hell of alot to me so super excited to get started an to be a aircooled owner. Best of all I've set next door off on getting a bike again an let his lil Daughter have a sit on pull the throttle etc grins all round
Deffo a biker of the future an hopefully they will be doing a project as well.

Here's dad on his RD250DX in 77'



So day 1 of the resto / lets get ready to ruuuummbleee! haha

Wheels are a bit grubby so decided to get cracking cleaning those.





Started coming up pretty good by hand but took an ages so Nipped out for some re reinforcements !





Made quite a difference although still slow work!



Gotta decide what to do with the hub finish wise


Rear wheel is tomorrow an Mondays job!
Next thing to order is some new dust seal covers an a l/h Stanchion


Got the bits on order for the Front Disk!!


Another before picture on the caliper another task for this week


Before picture on the exhaust


Rear shocks


Got a bit engrossed in cleaning the wheels only to look round an see dad had half removed the rear grab rail lol so dived in an helped him get it off my baby


Roll on hours an hours of dremel work trying to get the nightmare stuff off after paint stripper wouldn't touch it.
Quite a bit of an improvement Lot more to do on it though !!

[adventure steele]

Next task to clean up this week is the engine



Pretty shattered an shes starting to come up!


Tired at the end of a long day but shes really starting to look good!!


Progress today an flipping freezing!! Did I say it was Freezing haha!

First thing I dad was clean the front brake metal hose up was covered in rust an had a quick go at some of the bolts on the front wheel came up really nice



Next front wheel again the joy!! Started working my way round the spokes cleaning the ends up bit by bit.


Next I had a go at getting the yellowing off the front hub shes really starting to come up good I think.


Dad came out an did a bit on the rear wheel for me



She's really coming up great bit by bit


Some before and afters slowly getting there with her







Slight bit of a noise but actually located that today one of the bulb holders within the indicator has come loose so that will be an easy fix was making a right racket:) always the simple stuff.

Small oil leak I just want to check out thats visible underneath the rear sprocket may be chain lube that's pooled spotted it when viewing the bike or its a pushrod seal or neutral switch had grief with both of those on a LC hopefully it's not a gearbox seal. Gonna whip the side casing off tomorrow an check that out so I can get the bits on the next order. Engine was fully rebuilt in 08 crank etc with all the receipts.




Should the clutch lever cable adjuster be Olive green or silver on the 250C lads? Got the correct green pinch bolt and adjuster for the brake lever.

got a bit of info back regarding tyres Road Riders are a no go with the original wheels so current choices are, Avon Street runners, ME77 Metzlers, Pirelli Sport Demon's waiting to hear back on Bridgestone's and Conti's options
Can't decide what to put on current original wheel sizes are as follows.
Rear
Rims are Takasago 1.85 x 18 6G 103 Japan
fitted with 3.50-18 Metzler
Front
Takasago 1.60x18 6F 206 Japan
fitted with a 3.00 18 Metzler tyre

Well I forgot to order some grips and a new throttle tube on my parts order the other day that arrived this morning so went in my Parts Cache for the Elsies. Total result!

Gonna run the pattern levers for a while got such a bad habit of catching levers haha! Few nice green bolts.... Ahhhhh Green!!

Looking forward to getting stuck in tomorrow and gonna order some tyres so I can get out toward the end of the week itching to go for a ride now especially with this nice weather forecast.

[adventure steele]

Today was one of those days where everything that can go wrong did go wrong haha!

Pattern Parts strike again had issues on my Elsie before so always bought genuine where I could, clutch lever assy was perfect so that's all fitted clutch pull feels alot better now.

Next up was the brake lever shoulder looked totally wrong bolt hole not lining up properly with the perch so stuck the old one back on and ordered a Genuine C one from our very own RDJames through ebay so soon as that baby arrives I'll get that fitted.

Just emailed Yambits so shall see what they say looks like it's a part they have bought in just really irritating.

Moved onto trying the anti vibration rubber that was missing luckily this bit fits lol.

Tomorrows job I'm gonna whip the l/h engine side casing off an just double check the oil I've seen then I'm gonna get back to polishing the wheels an order some tyres in at my local place and put a order in for some more parts once I work out whats still available.

Quite a bit of an improvement looks wise so gonna get the rest ordered an get the cylinders all sprayed up might have a painting day on Thursday and spray a few of the satin bits.

Should the bottom of the master cylinder be gloss or satin on the 250C?

[adventure steele]

Well I'm really glad number 1 I'm observant an number 2 a lil lucky haha.
That ive not run or gone out on it yet.



Just drawing up a list the bikes that original though not much to get

[adventure steele]

Got stuck in after finding the oil pipe joint issue checking a few other things out.

Missing the split pins under the anti vibration mounts on the bars, ones perished so sorted some new ones of those.

Checked behind the generator cover
Was pretty grubby with old stuff off the chain no signs of oil so that's good gave it a bit of a clean up.

Noticed the gear lever had been set to low an had put a groove in the l/h silencer so moved that a few notches.

Tried to get my tyres ordered but realised my tyre guy is on a half day gutter!

Fork seals are good although the dust covers are in the bin so fitting some new dust covers tomorrow. The pitting on the fork leg is well outta the travel area so just gonna turn that round so it's outta sight an then sort them later in the year.

So far so good gonna give it a compression test later cold just to see if the cylinders are reading the same then do it warm once I fix the oil feed.

Who's everyone using for head gaskets now genuine are discontinued? Might give it a de coke.

Anyway back to polishing spokes!!

[adventure steele]

Yeah I think you are right mate unfortunately no longer friction fit will Sus something out.

Bit more progress went round the bike polishing bolts.

An did a bit of work on the rear footrests quite far gone so didn't think they would come up


Other side



Finally did a quick compression test on a cold engine after finding the oil elbow loose just wanted to check nice and even between both the cylinders.

Few bits coming that I ordered earlier in the week should be here tomorrow so should make some more rapid progress tomorrow!

[adventure steele]

Lots progress the new lever from Yambits was even worse! Haha.

Decided today was a painting day ! The engine was driving me nuts cosmetically so got stuck in on that beauty did the cylinders and side casings best I could with a bit of wind also learnt a trick on the edges of the badge on one side so need to repeat that for the r/h side.

Tomorrows job is the front caliper and the brake m/c paint wise, then gonna fit the new dust covers on the forks. All in all feel like she's really coming along now!

Not perfect but the engine paint will see me through to the winter as I wanna get out on her soon as!

Green bolts inbound for the engine side casings

IMG_20190418_191502-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr

IMG_20190418_183246855-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr




IMG_20190418_183236767-02 by norton.rider, on Flickr

IMG_20190418_164620103-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr

IMG_20190418_181515602-02 by norton.rider, on Flickr

[adventure steele]

Not Forking around today bit more painting an got the forks off for new dust seals.

IMG_20190419_112507561-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr

[adventure steele]

Well today was one of those super long days!

Stripped the forks of the bike an dad spent pretty much all day getting some scrapes an scratches out of the fork lowers. Decided to check the front caliper put before paint which turned into splitting the caliper halves as the piston had seen far better days so gonna order a piston kit on Tuesday.

Next task was to split the disk from the carrier.. huge nightmare with some of the bolts got them all off though without breaking any, gonna order some of those as well.

While the bike was canted back with the forks off it started leaking gearbox oil outta the crankcase breather. Well up on the dipstick so gonna drop it an put the right stuff in. Wondering as well if it's got the right dipstick in

Painted the carrier up was really far gone but she seemed to come back ok.



Also took the rear brake pedal off an painted it just gotta sort the setup out on it again any tips greatly appreciated for the position of the plate an spline behind the brake pedal/frame.
Probably all make sense tomorrow when I'm not as tired

All in all a super productive day not many pictures bar the brake carrier but I'll add some tomorrow when I get stuck in again.



IMG_20190419_130923475-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr


IMG_20190419_193834313-01-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr

[adventure steele]

Got really stuck in today bit of a late start after braving the food shopping madness!

Finished the brake carrier an tried it on the disk, then spent a while polishing all the rust from the locking tabs and bolt's they came up great


IMG_20190420_170755801-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr

Next up got all the deep gouges outta the fork legs lots an lots of polishing to manage it Gonna put the correct finish back onto them tomorrow looking really good though. Dust seals are a huge improvement!

IMG_20190420_183820729-02 by norton.rider, on Flickr

Painted the front MC up an fitted the genuine brake lever I got woop went on with no issues.

IMG_20190420_183700916-01 by norton.rider, on Flickr

IMG_20190420_183720904-02 by norton.rider, on Flickr

All in all 8 days in really feel like I've made allot of progress.

Got a set of Metzler ME77's on order so looking forward to getting those fitted on!

Dad did took over on the front wheel polishing while I was doing all the little tasks an he had a mess with the seized in half of the front caliper.

Tomorrow I'm gonna finish the front wheel polishing, finish the fork lowers, an then do the oil union repair on the carb. Finally thinking I'm gonna drop the oil then start checking all the oil pump an carb settings. Not far off the first ride now once the tyres are replaced.

IMG_20190420_185701355-02 by norton.rider, on Flickr