So I am now in the middle of a 01 Honda 400ex restore/complete rebuild and pics will be up in the honda thread soon.

But, I am enjoying it so much I am already looking for another build when I'm done, and I may have stumbled upon it the other day.

Here's the story my friend always rode his brothers completely tricked out YFZ450 (2005-YFZ450 SE-K&N lid and air filter-Houser +2+1 arms-unknown steel +2 swingarm-braided extended brake lines all around-yoshi slip on-DG nerfs-DG bumper-pro taper bars-pro taper grips-and i have been told it was lowered all around-etc-etc)

But he was riding it at another one of my friends houses and it blew up, they are all too lazy to give a damn about the bike anymore so it is sitting rotting in my buddys back yard, aparently the kids brother now wants a grand for the bike. And I stumbled upon something saying the 05's always blew up because of oil problems.

So, Could this be an easy fix? Could this be a steal considering I will completely restore/fix up the bike? Is it a fair price considering they think it's blown up? What could have went bad in the engine?

Here is a pic, not really pretty, but I see potential.

 

This makes my heart hurt. : (

I'd talk him down to $800 and take it. It's hard to tell what went wrong when told "It blew up". So much could be wrong, so much could be fine. Hard to tell without tearing into it.

The problem you are referring to on the inadequate oiling can be fixed with the "oil mod" and a rebuild would be the perfect time to do that.

 

Ya. It's a shame ro see it rot away. Hopefully i can talk him down and save this bike. I almost feel responsible to save the ole girl.

 

It's been sitting for nearly 3 years now.

 

Try to talk him into selling it to you for less, I'd feel obligated to buy that thing if I were you!

 

Sitting for 3 years and no telling what may be blown in the engine? Talk to his wife. I'd bet she'd be happy to get it out of the yard for a lot less.

 

Haha, I'm 16 and my friends brother is 18. Also, it's not staying at his house, it's staying at another friends house and his parents don't care.

 

Pop off the left eng cover plug (mag side) and throw a 17 (14?) mm socket/rachet on it and see if it will do a 360 rotation. If so that's a good thing. Well, better than it locked up. If locked, your most likely going to be treated to a valve that smashed the piston, which in turn, will take out the crankshaft. Also a chance that the head is bad from broken valve that bounced around and damaged combustion chamber and valve seat.
Fingers crossed for you ! BTW, U "should" be able to swap out the bad stuff with parts from the YZ450F motocrosser. Most of it anyway...

 

The oiling could have been the downfall, but it could have failed from a bunch of other reasons as well. For what it is worth, I put the rod through the bottom of the piston on my '05. Decided to replace every seal in the engine while I had it apart, plus all 5 valves, new jug and crank, etc. and the parts plus labor for the head work was about 2K. Essentially everything between the cams and trans is new except for the cases

 

That is one of my favorite color schemes. I am betting you could probably talk him down a bit more maybe to $700-800. Bring cash, a couple 100's, couple 50's and a lot of 20's that has always worked for me.