Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

(Above) An awesome motor but sketchy hand ling had our testers a little leery of the Honda. (Below) You name it and the Kawasaki does it well. This bike will please a wide ran ge of rl ders with its broad powerband and pl ush su spensi on. pow er is stu ffed into the middle of th e powerban d but there's plenty left on top, too. This mo tor reminded us a lot of the KX250 a fe w y ea rs ago, w hen the Kawasaki was busting at the seams with m idrange power. Unfortunately for th e TM, the trade-off is no low end, SO what yo u have is a ligh t-swi tch type of powerband tha t, at tim es, can be overwhelming. It's either off or very much on. The TM is very, very po werful once it comes on the pipe . It hits hard and then pulls and pulls and pulls. If top speed is yo ur thin g, and the mos t impo rta nt thin g to yo u is beatin g your bu ddies in d rag races at yo ur loca l rid ing area, the TM is yo ur bike (bu t yo u still m ight want to avoid cha1lenging the CRs ). Everyone appla uded the RM's powerplant. Its personali ty is a lot like that of th e KX' s but w ith slightly less p o w er across the boa rd . The RM's motor, however, is a little fas ter-revving , pipier and "buzzier" than the KX's, but, as a whole, is pretty damn good. Again, like the KX, beginners righ t throu gh the pro s liked the RM's motor, sa ying it had enough power to ge t th e job done and was very user friendly . Fas ter rid ers agreed the RM could use a little more "hit" when plowing through a soft berm but were otherwise pleased with the RM's motor overall. 'The Suzuki's power is not the most or the broad est of the 2505, but it's one of the funnest and easiest to use," said a pro rid er . H e a lso went o n to say tha t he didn't like the "n oisy" motor and felt that the RM vibra ted more than th e other s. Another rider agreed, saying he felt that 'The motor felt loose and rattled." Like the CR, the RM ben efited greatly with leaner jetting. (See spec box.) The Yamaha's motor was liked by most of our testers, too , saying it had a ha rd hit and pulled well off the bottom and through midrange; however, some of our intermediate- and pro-level rid ers felt that the power seemed to "ru n out" on top. But no one could deny that it hit off the bottom a lot like the KX, and tha t's a good thing. 'The motor produces a wid e range of usable power, but in kind of a boring way," said one of our pro riders. An other pro rider said, "It isn' t su perfast - kind of average, really. Still, I liked it a lot but it signed off too earl y for me." The YZ250, like the KX250, required no jetting cha nges . While the KTM ha s a good, s trongrunning m o tor, it didn 't really "wow" any of our test ers. Most of them ag reed that the KTM does have eno ugh power to w in races because it has good botto m end, comes on nicely in the middle and moves along w ell on top . Nothing heroic, bu t it gets the job done. One p ro rid er said of th e KTM ' s power: " Kind of blah - mo re would be, nice." 'The motor never rea lly had a hit to it," said an intermediate. "It pulled all the wa y th ro ugh, but wasn' t reall y ex pl osiv e." M ore than one rid e r felt tha t th e KTM 's p owerband was actuall y to o smooth. One pro rider said, " It felt kind of lazy; it di dn't grab yo u or pull you didn't kn ow w here the torq ue was. But it's kind of weird beca use the motor does have powe r. It's hard to explain." On the o ther hand, one in termediate rider said, " I didn't think it was slow; it' s right up there with the Suzuki and Yamaha." Our KTM ran pretty cleanly right ou t of the crate, but we d id end up going to a needle that was slightly lean er from the closed throttle to half throttle. (See spec bo x.) SUSPENSION Aga in, the Kawasaki was the winner in this category, bu t it was a lot closer, The KX offers a superplus h ride that just ca n't be bea t. Th ere's no give-and- take when it comes to the KX's sus pension, as it handles both the sma ll bumps and hard hits without com plaint. However, some of the fast rid ers felt the KX's su spension wa s a little "too plush" in so me areas. 'The KX was more plush on accelerating bu mps and braking bum ps bu t d id sacrifice some control," said a pro rid er. It was also th e bike tha t needed the leas t amount of "clicker" adjustments at each track an d was the on ly bike, other 19

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