• 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.

    When he passed, I worked with his kids to gather the necessary credentials to keep this site running. Since then (and for however long they worked with Coffee), Woodschick and Dirtdame have been maintaining the site and covering the costs. Without their hard work and financial support, CafeHusky would have been lost.

    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 The previous version was outdated and no longer supported.

    Unfortunately, the new software version doesn’t support importing the old site’s styles, so for now, you’ll see the XenForo default style. This may change over time.

    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!

1978/79 Husqvarna 250 OR restoration/restomod

cruisetopdown

cruisetopdown

Husqvarna
AA Class
I decided to start a thread to document the build of my '78/'79 250 OR. I found this gem in original but rough condition. The previous owner snapped the end of the crank off trying to get the ignition system off for testing..."Lefty Loosey" does not apply in this case! The serial number of the frame is an MM and the engine is a 2065, which as some of you all have pointed out that it could be an early '79 model with Carrnutt shocks...the bike appears to be all original and not been tampered with. I have pulled it down to a pile of parts and have beaded every part that can be beaded and re-painted, and have been plating bolts and misc parts that should be plated... I have sand blasted the frame, treated it to a coat of metal etching primer and have sprayed it with the Duplicolor silver engine enamel that you guys have pointed me to and topped it off with 2 coats of PJ1 epoxy clear...it looks amazing! The original tank is metal/chrome with red body and white pinstripe with several dents of varying degrees. I have sand blasted the heavily pitted chrome off and will use the stud welder to pull and bodywork the dents, then use the chrome sticker inlay for the center section and will return it to the red with white pinstripe look. I have pulled the engine apart and sent the crankshaft to Stahl's for repair which he completed in just a couple of days time. I have stripped the cases with aircraft stripper, the applied the metal etching primer with a PJ1 engine paint top coat and am just about ready to pull it all back together, just need a few pieces and then I'm ready. I have decided to go with the 40MM front forks and found a set on ebay that are now being re-worked by Drew Smith of WER, he has done several of my race bikes back in the day...He does great work! I will be posting pics soon, so stay tuned and feel free to comment on anything you see that doesn't look right, etc.
Thanks for all the help you have provided, it's made the project a lot of fun.
Wade
 
Way to go CTD. Sounds like you are off to a great start. Pics. we want Pics. if you can post 'em. I'll be following along on your thread to see the progress. Sounds like you are able to tackle many aspects of this at once.....that makes it even more fun.
 
A couple of pics to get started...
Husqvarna250OR
Husqvarna250OR
Husqvarna250OR
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The frame is 1979 . I have a 1978 OR frame and it is the ML version but with a different cradle and the 30.5 rake angle
 
Update:
I am waiting for the suspension to come back from Works Enduro Rider (Drew Smith) and also waiting on the cylinder to come back from PowerSeal in PA.
Having the cylinder bored to get it back to new condition. I am still plating all the misc items and will have them completed this weekend. Also waiting for the swingarm bearings to show and will get them installed and swingarm mounted up. I have a few more pics on the progress.
w
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The 1978 ML OR frame I have has a more rectangular shape than the CR or WR frames that year. I thought at first that maybe the original owner had crashed out the cradle and had it replaced by the dealer ( Al Zitta from Cycle Dynamics) that was and still is an excellent fabricator. Then I saw a restoration on a 1978 OR here, saw the cradle, and realized it was done at the factory.
 
jimspac said:
The 1978 ML OR frame I have has a more rectangular shape than the CR or WR frames that year. I thought at first that maybe the original owner had crashed out the cradle and had it replaced by the dealer ( Al Zitta from Cycle Dynamics) that was and still is an excellent fabricator. Then I saw a restration on a 1978 OR here, saw the cradle, and realized it was done at the factory.
Click to expand...

Does your 78 OR frame have the extra tube on the bottom and Timken Bearings? My friends have a few ML framed Autos with the extra tube on the bottom and they were sold as 79's but I don't recall if they were 30.5º rake.
 
My 78 OR frame had the middle tube under the engine and Timken bearings but I removed the 3rd rail and harvested the bearing caps for my project with my 78 Auto frame. I am going to possibly restore the frame as I started cutting up a 1976 ML frame that I have no interest in building on as I want nothing to do with a 32° rake on a Husky anymore. The OR will get the steering stem from the 76 frame as well as a set of custom bearing caps to replace those I cut out. I do not have an engine formally lined up for it but if I have a leftover 82 250WR engine it might get that one with an SEM ignition for real lights and such
 
Update:
I have received the suspension back from Works Enduro Rider (Drew Smith) and everything looks great! Can't wait to get it back on the bike. I have replace the swingarm bearings and will be mounting it up soon, then install the rear shocks, etc. I have also received the top end back from Power Seal located in PA. along with the new piston wrist pin, etc.... Now if the weather would just cooperate, it's been quite cold here, enough to keep me inside the house. I will try to get things rolling again very soon.
w
 
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