95C1500's 2015 Hawk 250 Thread
 

I bought a 2015 Hawk 250 for $850. 3100 miles (that's when the odometer stopped working). I still need to transfer the title but after that, it'll be mine.

now that I have the bike, there are a few things that need to be addressed.
1) Dead battery. I dropped it off at O'reillys to get it charged. I'll pick it up in the morning and see if it works. If not, I'll be buying a new battery.
2) the mirror was broken off, He tossed in the one off his parts bike. I need to put that on tomorrow.
3) The color. It looks decent in pictures (I like the color but the execution is poor. There are spots where you can still see the original color (blue). I will respray it at some point (maybe a dark grey or something)
4) Oil change, fork oil change, lube the chain, etc... basic maintenance. Speaking of maintenance, how often are the spark plugs changed on these bikes?
5) left grip just slides off. Need to glue it or replace with a different set.
6) bike was dropped, clutch lever end broken off. Do they make short levers that work on these bikes?
7) bike squeaks when suspension cycles. I hate anything I ride or drive to squeak. Any know areas that squeak or even solutions to the problem? I used fluid film on my truck leaf packs and it worked great. For 3 months it was squeak free. Sprayed some more and it was gone after a trip around the neighborhood.
8) The bike needs to be cleaned. Bad. It's dusty/dirty. I don;t plan to do much offroading with it so I want it to look nice.
9) That damn shift lever. So short. So uncomfortable. I need a longer one asap
19) I'd like to do sprockets and a chain. But I want to get a good feel for the way it performs stock before I change them.
11) carb tuning. I think I've decided to keep the stock carb and just replace the jets
12) Hand Guards. Always liked the look. Not to mention the added protection.
13) needs a kickstand spring. Right now it's held on by... you guessed it. A bungee cord
14) One of them fancy digital clusters. The speedometer doesn't work (needle broken off and it just spins in circles as I rode it)
15) float in the gas tank needs to be replaced since the gauge doesn't work

It's not perfect, it needs some work and modifications, but I feel like I got a pretty good deal and I expect a lot of great, cheap fun over the years.


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So since my last post, I picked up my battery from O'reillys. Fully charged and ready to go. I got home, dropped it in the bike and it fired right up. Went for a ride around the neighborhood. When I got back, I turned the ignition off and washed the bike. About an hour later I went to go for another ride and I heard it turn over for a fraction of a second and then... nothing. So just my luck, dead battery. I didn't have time to mess with it so I unhooked the battery and stuck it back in the garage. LAst night I picked up a "powersports battery" at O'reillys for the grand total of $103 (Yikes!). Come to find out, it did not fit. No biggie, that's what returns are for. I really wanted to take it for another ride so I looked at the stock battery again and there was no water in the cells. You'd think auto parts workers could check the simple stuff rather than just toss it on a charger. So I added water, went out and bought a battery tender trickle charger and let it sit overnight. Go out this morning, toss it in and it fires right up. Wait an hour, go out to leave for school and it fires right up again (except when I forgot about the killswitch lol). So I park it in the garage, leave it connected and I'll try it again tonight.If it starts fine, I'll leave the battery tender on it when I'm not riding and use the no-name chinese battery until it has nothing left. I hope it lasts, not looking forward to $109 for a new (the right one) battery.

Anyways, here's some pics of it cleaned up, the rattle can paint job, the busted cluster, etc...
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It might have had some water in it, but the charger O'reillies hooked it up to probably boiled it off

Might be time to take measurements and order a battery online, save a bunch of cash in the process too, a "Chrome" branded AGM batteries go for under $30, and the smaller Lithium batteries that fit most of these China Bikes are just over $70 shipped to your door

Yeah there's one battery tender brand that's $75 shipped. If this battery is toast, I'll end up ordering that one

How do I go about getting one of those fancy digiti clusters? I know there's an email address but is there a website you can order them from?

Order it directly from Matt, (mjstef) He is the importer. I will PM you his phone number. It;s like $100 with all the wiring and directions. It was by far the best cosmetic thing I have done to my hawk.

Is shipping included in that $100?

That price is shipped with a 6month warranty from what I remember reading, but mjstef will have all the details ;)

Awesome! I'll get in touch with him soon.

The battery sat hooked up to the bike all day long and it fired right up tonight. I also got my $103.49 back from O'reillys :D Very happy about that. I'll go put on the ring terminal connectors for the battery tender junior so I can charge it easily.

Took it around the neighborhood and really got on it and sure enough, beyond half throttle it bogs down. Time for some carb tuning.

Oh and I need to get rid of that signal beep. That was annoying lol

I decided that even though I have a lab report due tomorrow morning, I'd rather be out in the garage working on the bike. I pulled the side plastics, seat, air box lid and filter, dried out the air box, reassembled that, clipped the turn signal beeper wire, went around the bike and tightened any loose nuts or bolts (passenger foot peg and manifold). Reassembled it. Made a list of the next things I'll be doing to it which includes an oil change, valve adjustment, greasing tjhe axles and the swing arm bolt, spark plug, new jets for the carb and lubriate the chain. Then a hawk cluster and a new paint job. Thinking a dark blue or a dark grey color.
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I got a gel-cell battery from these guys for my TMEC200. You have to measure your stocker in order to get the right size (the bikes they list are all for brand name bikes, even though they sell Chinese scooters and quads).

http://www.t-motorsports.com/batteries/?sort=priceasc

I think this is the one that fit in my TMEC, and the price seems about right. Lasted over 2 and a half years, and the only reason it stopped was because when I stopped riding the bike, I never disconnected the terminal, and about 6 months later, one of the screws and the terminal was corroded and I could not get it off. The terminal ended up literally ripping off due to the corrosion.

http://www.t-motorsports.com/gel-ytx...cycle-scooter/

Could have been this one?! Either way, the price was under $35 shipped from what I remember (not doing too well with that, LOL). Much less than $100...

http://www.t-motorsports.com/ytx12-b...moped-battery/

Awesome! Thank you for that! Good to know there are cheaper options out there

Okay guys, I am absolutely furious right now. I ordered fun parts for the hawk the other day and yesterday I got a call from the PO who told me he forgot to mention that the plastic dipstick broke off and fell inside the motor. He said he took it to a mechanic who supposedly removed it. He told me he also changed the oil a couple days ago. It seems to me like it would've looked like this (or worse) then if it had really fallen and not been removed, so I didn't think much of it. Well I went to change the oil today, and lo and behold... this is what I find...
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So... how fucked am I? It's plastic, I know it's not good for it at all but how much damage did it do/could it have done to the motor? I can flush the motor and fill it back up and ride off into the sunset right? How would I go about that?

I'm not blaming the PO, I'm blaming the bullshit shop for not doing the work.

Man I hate that. Sometimes I really can't believe the things people do...

Most are more knowledgeable here than me, but I believe there is a centrifugal oil filter that is accessed by removing the right engine cover. Maybe this video will help:

https://youtu.be/lyhfqa3QP5k?t=868

[QUOTE=95C1500;234123]


Is that even fresh oil?

>:( The person that sold you the bike is a POS !!! I am not a mechanic and not sure if this will work ??? Run alittle diesel fuel mixed with Rotella 15w-40 to clean the engine out a few times . Don't ride the bike , just to flush the engine out . Get the engine hot , drain , clean the filter , and do it again. This should flush the engine from the plastic that is in the engine .I hope this helps !!!
IF NOT GO TO THE PERSON THAT SOLD YOU BIKE AND KICK HIM IN THE SACK!!!:clap:

Seriously. I was going to give that shop hell but with them being in Cali, there's not much I can do. Thanks for the video. I will do this tomorrow
[QUOTE=BlackBike;234131]PO said he changed it a few days before I bought it so.... who knows. It doesn't look like it to me but the guy I bought it from has been very straight forward with me about everyting.
The person who sold me this bike is a nice guy. It's the shop that "did the work" that needs a nice kick in the sack lol. I'll open it up tomorrow and see what it looks like

The good news is that the centrifugal oil slinger will capture what the strainer missed. It's a good opportunity to clean the centrifugal unit out, since that's a job that people rarely do. It's probably a good plan to pull the valve cover off and see if there's any debris up there; I doubt there is.


It was nice of the PO to call and warn you.


BTW, once you've got it cleaned out, don't bother replacing the dipstick. Just use the sight glass.

That's good to know. I was wondering if there was a stronger replacement out there.
Well I've got the bike torn apart (kind of) and I found the f*@$er. Still instant for the most part. I'll update with pics later

*intact for the most part

Alright, so my garage is dimply lit, so I decided to try my chances at getting it through the door of the shop... it fit! by half an in lol!
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So I took the cover off, and there it was.
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I can't seem to get the centrifugal oil filter cover off. Videos show people just pulling them off, this one will not budge.

Haha, there she blows. Bet y a feel good finding that:tup:

I fee great finding that much of it in one peice lol! With the centrifugal oil filter, do I just pop the cover off, wipe it out and put it back on or do I take that nut out and clean it deeper?

Where would I get gaskets for this motor? Ebay my only option?

Picked up some gaskets for this thing locally. But damn were they expensive.
Hope I can get it back together and the valves adjusted today

only one of the gaskets was correct. I've been fighting with them to get off their asses and call whoever they said they'd call to find one since I got home yesterday. The guy swears he'll have one tomorrow.

In other news... parts!
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So I put in a new spark plug (found out it already had an NGK plug but oh well), adjusted the valves (I'm not too confident with the job I did, so I may redo them tomorrow just to be sure) and pulled all of the plastics in preparation for a new cluster and some paint.
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As for paint, what color do you think I should paint it?Midnight blue (or something similar) or Charcoal Grey (or something similar)? Also, chrome or black for the wheels and forks?
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Wow. That's one of the reasons I don't want to buy a used bike!

Yeah I'm regretting it. But I'll still come out ahead of a new one with all of these upgrades (price wise) when I put it back together

After reading this thread I headed to the garage, removed the dipstick/oil plug from my Hawk and hacksawed off the dipstick portion as a precaution.

As for color, I vote for the charcoal black, but they both look good.

Keep fighting the good fight. If nothing else you'll know your bike quite intricately by the time you get it set up and running how you want.

-Dan

haha good! I never heard of something like this happening. I guess someone is always the first

That's the one I'm leaning towards too. Finding some dark grey spray paint at walmart (giftcard...why not right?) is proving to be difficult

I know it much better than I should after owning it for a week lol

What you have there is a new cooler running spark plug.The firing tip doesn't project out as far as the old hot plug.It should work better for your aircooled Hawk.Here's some info that may help.

https://www.ngksparkplugs.com/about-...rk-plug-basics

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Okay, so the dealership never found a gasket so they made me one. They did a bad job too lol. So I got it buttoned back up, filled it with oil, put the battery in and tested all of the electrical stuff (everything worked), installed the gas tank and the seat and went to start it...boom, nothing. None of the electrical works. So I finally get it kickstarted, take it around the block a couple times. Seems to be running well. Love the MSF shift lever sooooooo much! A couple hours later, multimeter showed 12.6 volts in the battery (Awesome!) without it being on the battery tender all day. So I checked the fuse. Bingo! Now I need ot figure out what blew it. Fix one thing, discover a new problem, amiright? In addition to this, I can;t seem to get the kickstart lever back on. I can get it on the splined shaft, I can get ti tightened all the way down but everytime I use it, it pulls itself off the shaft. No idea what I'm doing wrong there.

Also, plastics are off to be painted. Tossed the headlight back on, kind of like the way it looks. Has a street fighter look to it lol
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I like the headlight as well.


The kicker shaft has a groove machined into it, and the kicker should slide on far enough that the bolt rests in the machined groove. As long as the bolt doesn't fall out, the kicker will never slide off.

Ah okay. Good to know. I'll get it out on there tonight

It should be noted the bolt needs to be removed to slide it in place...sounds like that is what may be the problem here. Remove bolt. slide it on..replace bolt so it sits in said groove.

Looking good, can't wait to see the painted parts on it.

Yes the bolt was removed when I tried to put it on. I could feel it tighten down but when I swung it out to kick start it, it slid to the end of the shaft and al it's fell off. I'll keep playing with it
Thanks! Should be this weekend

My digital cluster came in the mail today. I got the email while I was stuck in class. I have a calculus 2 exam on friday and I swore I would wait to install it until this weekend. I got home around 10 pm and I finished the install around 11:15 lol! Very easy, very worth it. Thank you mjstef! Great product.
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The bike in the "shop bay" lol

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Old v. New

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Couldn't find anything else to use to get the front wheel off the ground, so lifting with my back ended up with the bike on top of my weight bench of all things. Worked great lol

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I have a youtube channel (TexasMoto) and I'll have a video up of a quick night ride with the new cluster soon. I will post the link when I get it uploaded

I've spent about 8 hours int he shop today working on the bike.

First off, my jets came in. I adjusted the mixture screw, replaced the stock 98 with a 110, and tossed it back together. Unfortunately, I couldn't test it because of part 2...

Plastics are getting painted. Metallic Charcoal is what it's called. I'm tired, so I'll spray some clear tomorrow and let them dry for a couple days just to be 100% sure that they're good to go
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Tossed the plastics back on
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Test rode it. It still won't start or run right. Now it'll idle with half choke (it wouldn't before) but that's the only difference. Time for more research