Has no one ever read the owner's manual of a high performance dirtbike engine except that of the CRF?

All the two strokes have recommended you re-ring after every race (among other things) for years, yet no one makes a big deal about that.

No one makes a big deal about the rebuild/re-ring requirements of the YZF engine.

It's actually the valvetrain that needs the most attention on these new breed of four stroke engines.

In reality, those "recommendations" are there to essentially "scare" lazy people into maintaining their race engines like a race engine instead of a tame trail bike. In reality, unless you're a top level expert that needs every ounce of performance to stay ahead of the competition, the "recommendations" are extreme.

I think we all have a friend or relative with a CR250 or a YZ250/4XXF that's 5 years old, that he hasn't touched his engine and it still runs great. While I don't recommend someone follow that maintainace schedule, it goes to show that you don't necessarily have to follow the recommendations "to the T" or suffer the consequences.

Surely we all know Honda has (and uses) their engineering capabilities to make whatever changes are necessary to make this engine suitable for use in a quad. Rest assured that we'll get a tamed down version that your redneck cousin "Cletus" from West Virginia can ride for 15 years without even checking the oil.

The good thing though is that the potential will be there for those of us who don't mind performing a little engine maintenance in return for exceptional performance.

 

I am not saying that it would be bad to put that motor in a quad. I personally would love to have one. By the way, my friend never rebuilt his before he sold it and it had way over 20 hours on it. I just thought the 20 hour rebuild schedule was high for a four stroke.

 

You can put a CRF450 motor in a 250r frame, a 400ex frame is harder though. And expect to spend a lot of money. Theres lots of stuff to deal with like the backwards kick start.

And BTW I really want the new honda bike to have a kickstart. The motorcycles have them, why cant we. I wouldnt mind loosing the extra 10-15lbs of a starter and battery.

 

The engine will be detuned, and will probably have a modified, if not all new transmission. They did the exact same thing when they came out with the 400ex. The 400ex engine came from the xr400. They had to detune it and beef up the tranny a bit to handle the 100 some odd lbs of extra weight that it will be hauling around.

I would imagine that they will also change the crank a bit or at least add some weight to the flywheel to keep it from stalling out when lugging the engine. And of course they have to make it electric start, but that part should be taken care of when they release the CRF450X. The Frame and suspension will probably be almost mirror image of the 400ex. Who knows what the body will look like, but I bet it's not a revolutionary change. (honda's always look like a honda [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]) And if I remember correctly (I may be wrong) the CRF450F engine is a wet sump, and I would guess that they will change that to a dry sump setup.

Basicly, what I'm getting at is that it's probably an all new engine modeled after the CRF450F/X engine.

and on a side note about top speeds, to comply (I can't remember the orginizations name) with standards, 70mph is the speed limit for any factory atv sold in the US.

 

I thought it was 75 mph.

 

I’m not sure if this has been mentioned yet- witch I believe it has not. reading all this stuff about stuffing dirt bike engine into this frame detuning that, also waiting for them to make this or that. you guys now that there is a 300 2-stroke and 450, yes 450, 4 stroke made by gas gas. those quads came hang with the bb's. a bit expensive but what would you rather doing rebuild a quad or wait for some other cheaper 450 to come out. those gas gas quads produce around like 45-55 RWHP, I think. its up their. check out those quads. look a little funny but they would probably kick your quad in the sand. or throw some on yours. J/K no really though there great quads.

 

Gas Gas's are way badass. But they also cost a ton. Over 7k. I would love the 300 though. They come standard with really nice wide Arms. Very good bikes, they own all other stock bikes. Yes even the big boys.

 

The GasGas 300 is around 42 to 43 hp at the back tires, the 450 is less.