Six862m6

Hi folks, I was wondering if someone might be able to direct me as to how the extra wiring for the removable headlight on an 85 TRX250 was originally bundled up/placed? In the middle of restoring my dad's old bike and it has looked like the first picture I've attached for the last 20 years at least.... Now that I have all of the original plastic back for it, I'd like to put that wire back how it should go (I believe it goes in the cubby under the headlight itself with the two main fuses, yes?). Any info or pics would be great, thank you!

Hey Fish, good morning sir. Hey maybe you missed it in my last reply to you but do you by any chance remember the vendor/place where you picked up your Cree light bars? Thanks!

Thank you sir. I was able to get the front plastic carrier/rack on yesterday as well (mostly). Starting to look like a quad again! I do have the tail light assemblies, they're over on the bench right now. I've ordered LED replacement bulbs for them, once I get the bulbs I will reinstall the housings. And I'll look over the rubber rack straps but I'm pretty sure they way they are is the only way they'll go on and work to latch the door in place.

Thanks for the info, I'll look into the Crees for sure. Do you happen to remember the vendor that you got them from? Yea, the old bird is coming along. I put the rear plastic back on it yesterday evening as well as the new (to it) powder coated rear rack/bar assembly. This is the first time in probably 30 years that this thing has had the plastic cubby door and the carrier door that covers it! Thankfully I was still able to buy the plastic bushings for the door new. I just bought a new set of tires for it (not that the ones it has are all that bad, especially the rears but I am going to have the wheels powder coated and I want a set of Swamp Witches on the back anyway, so hey, time to do it). I may work on putting the front plastic and carrier on today or tomorrow. Still not sure what I'm going to do with that ! tank though....

Hey Fish, that's an awesome looking rig there sir! Hey, what light bar is that and is it good for night time trail riding? I'm looking for a good LED Light Bar that will fit nicely on the front carrier of that 85 TRX250 that I am restoring. Any suggestions?

I would agree with this IF it weren't for the plastic tank fitting right. No modifications, fits like it should. Like I said, it's really weird. I was/am almost at a spot where I'm wondering if the 86/87 tank mounting holes WERE slightly different (and this one had been replaced on that bike at some point.... I know a lot of them had rust/hole issues) and they would fit the 85's if YOU TRIED REAL HARD..... 🤣 Head Scratcher.....

Thanks for the replies Wilson. As you caught, the 200 doesn't have a fuel gauge which mine does. It's turning out to be a real head scratcher really.

Yep, positive. Like I replied to Fish, I saw pics of the 85 being parted out that I bought the tank and other parts, namely the front plastic with correct decals for the year (these changed). Also, as I believe Wilson caught, the 200 is definitely a similar looking tank but doesn't have the fuel gauge which mine does. Honestly I wouldn't mind the plastic except for two things; it uses it's own different looking fuel cap and, mainly, it doesn't have provisioning for said fuel gauge.

So the guy I bought the tank from was parting out an '85 TRX250 for sure as I saw pictures of the bike before parting and bought other parts from it as well (namely the correct front plastic piece with correct decals), so I have no doubt there. I can take a better pic of the bike without the tank on it but I already looked it over and it doesn't look like anything is bent out of place. The aftermarket plastic tank for it had no fitment issues at all. As for a better pic of why it's not fitting, it's really just that one pic of the mounting holes not lining up..... that's it. Everything else fits perfect, from the way it grabs the rubber grommets on the front to how it lays on the frame. As for being a 350 or 200 tank, I would agree they're similar but none of them have a fuel gauge (which mine does as seen in my first pic). It's just weird....

Hi Fishfiles, I appreciate the reply. Typically I'm good with modifications as well but I'm trying to restore this particular bike to "as new" or as close as I can come to it for my dad. You can see in the one picture what I started with..... It's had a rough life.... at one time this thing ended up in the pond on my dad's property floating only by the big rear tires! (he forgot to set the parking brake when it was on a slight incline and he turned his back on it for too long.... ha!) that being said the engine is super healthy and it runs/drives good (now that I did some other fixes, see my comments on the wreck it was in coming up). The only real modification that I'm keeping is the CHEAP, high amp/capacity (compared to stock anyway) garden tractor battery mounted in front of the engine! This thing was a life saver before due to the 85s having a known cold start issue..... this one would never start before without some starting fluid aid even though the inside of the carb and jets were spotless! That's fixed now as well.... I picked up, cleaned and installed an 86 (QA09 I believe) carb which had the cold start issue corrected. Starts right up now! Thankfully I was able to pick up an almost mint front plastic section (even has the original correct decals)...... finding that in really good shape was hard. He threw all of this stuff (and everything else you see missing) away over the years.... at this point I have pretty much everything ready to put back, including original mounting hardware. I even got all new (to me) racks/carries and had it all powder coated black (The originals seen on the bike in the pick were pretty well bent up EVERYWHERE). Going to put new tires on it as well and when I do, I'm going to have the wheels powder coated as well. I know what you mean about the 85 being it's own animal.... One thing that already bit me is that the wheels are different from 86-87's. Not just how they look, the bolt pattern! It's still 4 lugs of course, but one is actually smaller than the other (I don't know that actual sizes/specs right off hand). I bought a pair of fronts from an 86 to replaced the bent front wheel on the bike and they wouldn't fit! Another thing that I've been fighting is that when this bike was only about 3 years old or so, my dad let one of his friends go riding back in the woods with it and they hit something so hard with the right front wheel that it actually bent the frame where the "J" arm attaches (as well as the J arm itself, front shock, wheel, and snapping the tie rod). Now this piece is actually replaceable on the 86-87 bikes as it is bolted on to the frame with 4 large bolts. Not so on the 85's! It's freaking welded to the frame! So I sacrificed the old, bent J arm and went to town with a heating torch and sledge hammer (See picture below of torch in action). It's not perfect but I got it straightened out enough that the new arm moves properly now that it is connected to the replacement shock. Before there was basically no suspension travel on that corner. Now, on to the tanks. I did see that the 85 tank originally had a different part number as well. HOWEVER, they look to have superseded it with the same tank/part number as the 86 and 87 (check the diagrams below). That tells me that while there was a change, it had to be something small and not major like a mounting hole change, otherwise the new tanks wouldn't fit the old bike. Thoughts?

Hi folks, this is my first post here on the forums. I was directed here by one of the members over on HondaATVForums.net. This post will basically be a copy paste of that post. I would have put this in your "Utility Tech" section but of the three choices, none of them seemed right. I happen to be restoring my dad's 85 TRX250 that he bought new that year and ran into a snag with the gas tank I picked up for it (he had at some point replaced the original metal tank with a plastic, I'm sure due to rust/leakage issues). So I purchased a good used OEM tank off of another 85 being parted out. It fits great.... almost. The only problem is the bolt holes in the back are off just enough that it is completely impossible to install the mounting screws. Rubber grommets in front fit good and snug, tank goes all the way forward on to them, tank feels good and secure while laying on the frame, and the screw holes are aligned vertically, but off just slightly horizontally. I've attached some pictures showing the tank, the mounting on the front and what I'm talking about with the rear screw mounts. Please note that once I insert the OEM metal sleeve/collar combos into the rubber grommets, you can no longer even see the mounting hole in the frame. Has anyone else ran into this before? I'm pretty confident this isn't a case of "press it forward harder and force it" as the tank is as far forward as the rubber grommet holders on it will allow.