2015 Yamaha WR250F Update

A Little Bit Of Everything—Including Abuse.

So our Long-Term 2015 Yamaha WR250F is clicking away the hours and we’ve been really impressed with this bike so far. Most would think that its racing brother, the FX would be the only choice when it comes to these two very similar yet quite different machines. But knowing what you are going to be doing with the bike and knowing the range and skill level the bike has to support might make the WR more appealing.

For sure as a box-stock bike the WR will leave you disappointed. You only get 1/3 throttle and with that a very limited power. Easily modified into an off-road regulation complaint bike for most states the key is the GYTR Competition kit (see link) and also the GYTR Power Tuner. With these two items you can pretty much take your WR and turn it into a full powered 250F and match the performance of the FX or YZ taking into consideration the very quiet and weighty muffler (which we still have on our WR).

Time: 50 hours

Mileage: 650 +/-

Maintenance:

-5 oil changes, one oil filter (We’ve been a little off schedule and late with most of them as recommended is every 7 hours.)

-Cleaned air filter as needed.

-Replaced the water pump cover. ($66.95)

-Added Competition ECU kit. ($107.05)

Our WR is running the competition ECU mapped with a slightly different timing and fuel setting based on where we wanted the bike to perform with the stock muffler. We feel the standard programming on the competition ECU still allowed the bike to stall a little easy and also lacked a little pick-up in the mid-range. We started with Yamaha’s suggested setting for the bike with the stock muffler and played with it from there. Tuning the ignition to give the bike some snap where it needed it and using the fuel to speed or slow the pick-up of RPM. All this has been done so far with the stock muffler because we like how quiet the bike is. We may try an aftermarket quiet system in the near future.

Part of the bike’s life was spent at the King Of The Motos extreme enduro helping set up the course. No easy task for any bike. In swapping the skid plate onto our FX to test fitment, the WR was ridden for a day without the precious plastic plate. And wouldn’t you know it (we didn’t) that a rock would reach up and tear a nice chunk or water pump cover off. The water must have left the bike so quickly that the rider didn’t notice it. And the bike never did anything funny or even act like it was overheating. We even had the bike out another day when it started detonating for some “strange” reason. This, we suspected, was because of the new map we’d just loaded into the ECU. When the detonation didn’t go away after a switch back to a known map, closer inspection revealed the hole in the cover and lack of any water. We suspect the bike was ridden up to four hours (not very aggressively) with no water in the cooling system.

We then changed the oil and yes it was black. Next we called our contact at Yamaha and asked what we should do. The answer was, “If it is running fine and there was nothing out of ordinary in the oil, then just run it.”  We checked the valves shortly thereafter and they were all in spec as well. Additionally the cams and everything else we could see looked perfect still. We got lucky, but we were also smart enough to start checking things when something out of the ordinary started happening instead of continuing to ride it and pay the price later.  We were assured that this bike should be good for 100 hours on the wear parts in the top end. So far we believe it.

Our use of the bike has taken it to motocross tracks with novice riders and they were happy riders on the vet tracks without too many jumps. But that is not where this WR shines. It is at home being trail ridden in the mountains and through the desert and has not let us down at all. In fact the FI is spot on no matter the temperature or altitude. The suspension is plush and comfortable. It has race-bike precision in the handling, spunky yet torquey and smooth performance from the motor and can go wither fast or slow without making the rider suffer one way or the other. The WR features like the skid plate and cooling fan have done their job (when they are on the bike or have water to cool) and even the headlight isn’t that bad for night riding.

We’re really happy with the 2015 WR250F and since racing it isn’t the first call of duty, the WR is the right choice for the testers that have been spending time on it. We may play with some exhaust options and it is getting time to service the suspension. But we’ll keep putting miles on the bike and see if Yamaha will let us tear it down when we go over 100-hours.