Hawk 250 Street Riding

[JerryHawk250]

Took the Hawk out for a Saturday morning ride through the twisty roads of South Louisiana swamp to stretch her legs. This is how I get my stress relief from working all week. Took an hour ride and did a quick edit to condensed it down to 20 minutes of the fun stuff. Didn't want any body falling asleep watching. lol. I haven't figured out how I'm going to mount the camera to my street helmet yet so I just clamped it to the Handle bar. I didn't have an external mic so you don't have to listen to me talk. LOL This video is just for the riding pleasure.
It was a cool morning so the camera case started to fog up. I'll just call it special effects.

Enjoy the ride!!

The bike has approx. 5,500 miles at this point running the 17/40 tooth sprockets for the streets. Engine Mods are ported and decked head 1 mm. 10:1 compression, Keihin PWK30 carburetor, Decat Ebay CRF230 exhaust, direct ignition coil, NGK DPR8EIX-9 Iridium IX Spark Plug and dual oil coolers.

[Megadan]

I did the same thing this morning. Left an hour early to go to work and rode the long way around to get there. Great way to start the day.

[ChipToothy]

What top end do you get out of that bike? It looks and sounds much faster than the Storm.

[JerryHawk250]

Originally Posted by ChipToothy

What top end do you get out of that bike? It looks and sounds much faster than the Storm.

74 to 76 mph easily. Most of the riding I did that day I was running between 60 and 65 at about 3/4 throttle.

[Megadan]

Originally Posted by ChipToothy

What top end do you get out of that bike? It looks and sounds much faster than the Storm.

That would be the porting and higher compression at work. Mine sounds very similar.

[JerryHawk250]

I do need to repack the muffler. It's starting to get a little loud.

[Megadan]

Originally Posted by JerryHawk250

I do need to repack the muffler. It's starting to get a little loud.

Ditto! Mine didn't last very long lol. Debating doing a fine stainless steel wool around the core with some ceramic cloth behind it. Just to see if I can get it to last longer.

[ChipToothy]

Originally Posted by JerryHawk250

74 to 76 mph easily. Most of the riding I did that day I was running between 60 and 65 at about 3/4 throttle.

64mph at 8499 rpm is the fastest mine will roll under it's own power. 67 downhill once on the freeway ha. The deck and port work is the only thing I can see different. I need to sell this slow Storm and get the Hawk.

[ChipToothy]

Originally Posted by Megadan

Ditto! Mine didn't last very long lol. Debating doing a fine stainless steel wool around the core with some ceramic cloth behind it. Just to see if I can get it to last longer.

Where I live is about 2 blocks from where they host the 3rd largest motorcycle rally in the country. This is a proud Harley town everyday and I can't imagine a dirt bike ever getting near as loud as they roll their coal all day and night here. Big motors and raw pipes ahhhhh so loud. When my muffler starts to fade I'm just going to let it, might actually get a blink of respect out of it

[JerryHawk250]

Originally Posted by ChipToothy

64mph at 8499 rpm is the fastest mine will roll under it's own power. 67 downhill once on the freeway ha. The deck and port work is the only thing I can see different. I need to sell this slow Storm and get the Hawk.

You can do the same porting and decking to the storm. Same heads.

[Megadan]

Originally Posted by JerryHawk250

You can do the same porting and decking to the storm. Same heads.

With the gearing he has it will just get to 64mph a bit faster lol.

[ChipToothy]

Originally Posted by Megadan

With the gearing he has it will just get to 64mph a bit faster lol.

I have the 46T, 43T and 40T. 46T has the most torque and top end. The other 2 will only just barely break 60 mph.

[Megadan]

Originally Posted by ChipToothy

I have the 46T, 43T and 40T. 46T has the most torque and top end. The other 2 will only just barely break 60 mph.

There are a lot of factors at play, but I would say something is holding you back if you can only break 60 with a shorter gear ratio. I found the best compromise of top speed, acceleration, and highway RPM to be a 17/43 with a stock 110/100-18 diameter tire. With a 120/80-18 rear tire, which is about 1 inch shorter in diameter, that shifted the effective gearing on the 43 sprocket back to the equivalent of a 45 with a stock tire diameter. This change actually lost me about 3mph top speed. This was all on my now stolen Hawk with no head porting and just your basic bolt ons and a Mikuni clone.

My current Hawk with the ported head and smaller diameter rear tire (4.6x18 Shinko 700) with what is essentially 17/45 gearing is effectively a 17/47 setup, and it hit 66mph with less than 200 miles on the engine and effectively ran out of gear/rpm.

[JerryHawk250]

I failed to mention that I'm still running stock knobby tires. On some of those curves I could here a little tire squeal. Living on the edge!
Had a couple of slow pokes that elevated my stress levels on my favorite parts of the ride. But that all went away after I got around them. It was probably a good thing I didn't have a mic on me. lol

[Megadan]

You are a brave man with those knobbies lol. Good example of what makes a DOT knobby tire what it is though, because a softer non DOT knobby would have probably lost a few shoulder lugs.