• Husqvarna Motorcycles Made In Sweden - About 1988 and older

  • Hi everyone,

    As you all know, Coffee (Dean) passed away a couple of years ago. I am Dean's ex-wife's husband and happen to have spent my career in tech. Over the years, I occasionally helped Dean with various tech issues.

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    Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been working to migrate the site to a free cloud compute instance so that Woodschick and Dirtdame no longer have to fund it. At the same time, I’ve updated the site to a current version of XenForo (the discussion software it runs on). The previous version was outdated and no longer supported.

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    Coffee didn’t document the work he did on the site, so I’ve been digging through the old setup to understand how everything was running. There may still be things I’ve missed. One known issue is that email functionality is not yet working on the new site, but I hope to resolve this over time.

    Thanks for your patience and support!

1975ish 400 versus 450

FirstEliminator

FirstEliminator

Husqvarna
AA Class
Hey guys,

My name is Mark and this is my first time posting on this site. I have been out of bikes for a few years however, some of you guys might recognize my name from other forums. I even met Joe Chod at the Snow Run(?) Enduro a few years ago. I used to ride an 87 430cr in the enduros before buying a 2007 Husaberg FE550e.

Anyway, I currently have most of a 1975 400wr hanging from the rafters in my shop. The bike needs a lot. I have been pondering about what it would take to get it going and are starting to realize that I might be better off buying another 400 that is running, but not the level of restored condition.

I have never ridden any vintage bike and are not sure what the engine charactoristics might be. The 1987 430 is just pretty darned wonderful in the woods with all the low-end torque. I've heard that an 87 400 is snappier and revs faster. Is the 1975 400 or 450 similar to that type ? Is the 450 much faster than the 400? I am not quite sure what type of power I am after. 400 plus cc's should be fast either way.

Anyone have any comentary on comparison with the two engines?

Another question, on the 400wr, does it have a lighting coil where you can put a headlight and tail light on it? It would be pretty cool to show up to an Enduro with a 1975 bike.

thanks,
Mark
North Adams, Massachusetts
 
I haven't had much response on the comparison of the 400 to 450. I have a '75 400wr that is in pieces, or I can buy a '74 450wr that is all together and supposedly runs, but needs work. Either way the money is probably going to be about the same.
Which bike would you rather have or ride? Any reasons why you'd choose one bike over the other?
 
I can only comment on some stuff in the earlier post.

As to a 1987 400 versus a comparable vintage 430, they both have the same crankshaft so how much quicker could one rev? (about 10 pounds) Those water cooled 400/430 have much larger transfer ports than previous air cooled 430. Havn't seen the insides of what was available in 1975 it is pre reed valve isn't it? Does it have full circle crank wheels so you have close to a filled crank?

As to entering enduros with vintage husqvarna bikes, When you are a member of the promoting club and know the guy at the teck/sound inspection entering often becomes possible with a loud bike and a screwdriver transfer plate. (Maybe you are a dealer plate guy which I think is unfair but it was the rules when I did enter) Actually I don't think I did it since the sound tests. I hear and believe it to be true that the rut depth is something to consider. If you are going to get your footpegs stuck in the rut before anyone else that creates a problem. I guess If you enter the enduro the club you belong to promotes you will be able to figure out how to deal with that.

I would buy the second bike. Before I ever got involved off road I had a friend with a 450 desert master is that similar to these or an earlier creation?

fran
 
FirstEliminator said:
I haven't had much response on the comparison of the 400 to 450. I have a '75 400wr that is in pieces, or I can buy a '74 450wr that is all together and supposedly runs, but needs work. Either way the money is probably going to be about the same.
Which bike would you rather have or ride? Any reasons why you'd choose one bike over the other?
Click to expand...
As I remember from the day the 400WR was more for competion in enduro and the 450WR was more suited for desert. I may have those backwards but it was hard to beat a bigbore bike back then as now as well. If I was going to play I would most likely pick the 450WR.
 
I have a wr 450.If your riding a lot of nasty up and down hill trails the 450 is a better motor.It all grount!! Not much in shear acceration,but you will appreciate the the motor's "just keep moving forward" power
 
I have a '71 400, MI frame/CR...& I am restoring a '72 450 MJ Frame/WR Although at this time I cant comment on the 450, I can on the 400. The 400 is a tractor, great low end pulling power, while the 4 speed top end hits about 65 mph pretty fast....and stays there. I would like to have one more cog to upshift.. I look forward to getting my 450 together, but other stuff came up, but from all my research it seems the 450 WR pulls with even more bottom end than the 450 CR. That is exactly what I want. As for the 450 WR and a Desert Master?...well the Desert master is heavier, parts are scarcer, and that translates to more $$$... I like the looks of a DM, but wouldnt want the headaches. just my 2c
 
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