I purchased this 1986 XL250R several years ago. I've went on a few rides then parked it again.
I brought it our of the mothballs about a year ago and started getting it back in shape.
First thing I noticed was the clutch cable wasn't repeasing properly. I tried different forms of lubrication, but nothing worked.
So I had to replace the clutch cable. The fork covers had disintegrated, so I found aftermarket fork covers. Since I had to remove the forks to replace the covers, I disassembled the forks, replaced seals, cleaned them and replaced the fork oil. Since the front shocks got some attention, I pulled the rear shock, links and swingarm. The rear shock isn't serviceable, but everything looked good so I greased the links as I put it back together.
Then I replaced the handgrips for good measures.
A couple weekends ago I rode it up into Tenn. on a "small bore" group ride. Put about 200 miles on it then.
The engine bogs under hard acceleration, so I have carb kits ordered to rebuild both of the carbs.
Photos from the bike(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/57eb9f2f09b5f3c61720e9c211639727.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/8ca763cbb559e9df40598f8bf16f282e.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/37c4d30ac2eb1732aa478cd6fdf125bd.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/c607a01df2c30b7b66c5b143b7275ed9.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/8bb03bf3180cc7b83f501157cc2a9ace.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/054970cd6fe647294fc958e2fcb64a55.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/e6cf5de6de21dac571d0de6ce00df28b.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/2fc076958286cad225dd56c12e9f2e60.jpg)(https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20260323/9ef41c806aa529c8e26a0299cf9666c0.jpg)