• 2 Stroke Husqvarna Motorcycles Made In Italy - About 1989 to 2014
     WR = 2st Enduro & CR = 2st Cross

  • 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 The previous version was outdated and no longer supported.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!

125-200cc WB165 radiator swap

motocrossmr

motocrossmr

Husqvarna
AA Class
Just wanted to show a couple pics of the radiator swap I just performed. The main reason I wanted to do this was because of the lower radiator port on the right side was touching my exhaust. PAHusky had suggested wrapping extra rubber around the area where it touched. I did this when the Gnarly was installed and it made me feel better. When I installed the Fatty from Walt it was actually pushing on the hose a bit. I tweeked the mounts a bit which helped but I was still paranoid. I read some threads about swapping radiators so I started poking around Ebay. I wanted to perform the mod before this weekends race (OXBO = all rock). I came across a really nice set from a '04 CR125. They looked like they would mount up and the ports were both on the inside. I won the auction for 66 bucks. Not bad seeing the seller was including both radiators, hoses, clamps, guards, etc. I mounted them up yesterday and I am curious as to why Husky stopped using this setup? I was originally going to just replace one radiator but since I also had the hoses I figured no splicing would be needed if I replaced both. The hoses are tucked in so much nicer (top and bottom) and seem to be way more out of harms way. Plus the crappy plastic 'T' was eliminated. IMOH I cant figure out why this setup was ditched in favor of the current setup. If anyone can see a downside let me know! The only thing I realized, after switching it all out of course, is that my CV4 radiator cap didnt fit. I tried one I had sitting around from a YZ250 and it fit perfect so I ordered a CV4 for a jap bike.IMG_0333.JPGIMG_0334.JPG
 
Looks good and it sounds like you got a good deal. I had my stock radiators modified similarly. My bottom hose rests on the power valve portion of the head so I covered it with a length of garden hose. It looks like you might have more room though.
 
Yeah I was really surprised how everything fit together but I guess I shouldnt be. There is only a five year difference between the '04 and my '09. Silly question but which way does the coolant flow on these? I am assuming it flow out the top of the head and into the top of the radiators??
 
I completely agree. I have an 04 CR125 i am doing up right now and noticed the same thing. Husky went backwards in several areas. Zerks on the linkage... Gone. Little pull handles on the axles... Gone. Low slim larger tank... gone. Seems the subframe is better built to. As for the rads i see no reason to have moved the outlets outward making them more prone to damage. Even the older plastic is far more durable / flexible. Original graphics are still intact on a 04 that has had a hard life. No frame or motor mount cracking issues on the old bike ether. Weird.

the new bike is better, the frame geometry rules and the suspension is much upgraded... I just wish they had kept the good stuff from the older model.
 
Those CR125 radiators are the same rads on the 125 AND 250 2smokes from 2001 till 2004 at least maybe even to 2008.

Do you have to change your late model rad shrouds or do they bolt up.

BTW, I bought the motor off that 125...it shows no wear and it looks like a brand new Pro-x rod was just swapped in.

That bike was clean!
 
R_Little said:
Those CR125 radiators are the same rads on the 125 AND 250 2smokes from 2001 till 2004 at least maybe even to 2008.

Do you have to change your late model rad shrouds or do they bolt up.

BTW, I bought the motor off that 125...it shows no wear and it looks like a brand new Pro-x rod was just swapped in.

That bike was clean!
Click to expand...

All my parts bolt right up. Even the radiator guards. It seems like everything is identical besides port location and radiator cap. I figured that if the radiators were in this good a condition that the rest of the bike had to be low hour. Did you get a good deal on the motor? Maybe Husky was trying to save weight or money by switching to a different setup. Who knows. I love there bike regardless but would be nice to have some the the things Motosportz mentioned. R_Little, are you doing OXBO on Sunday? Im going to do my first ride on a trials tire for this one.
 
I had that same problem with my SX 200 FATTY Pipe hitting the rad.hose and what I did was took the pipe off and put a bat handle into the spiget and tweeked it out and now there is a small gap and I still run a heater hose over the rad hose and if I should fall on that side,it will probably be touching again,better not fall I guess.
 
motocrossmr said:
All my parts bolt right up. Even the radiator guards. It seems like everything is identical besides port location and radiator cap. I figured that if the radiators were in this good a condition that the rest of the bike had to be low hour. Did you get a good deal on the motor? Maybe Husky was trying to save weight or money by switching to a different setup. Who knows. I love there bike regardless but would be nice to have some the the things Motosportz mentioned. R_Little, are you doing OXBO on Sunday? Im going to do my first ride on a trials tire for this one.
Click to expand...

No OXBO for me...it's my daughters college graduation on Sat.

I am doing Rige Run next sunday though.

We should ride together some time.
 
Motosportz said:
I completely agree. I have an 04 CR125 i am doing up right now and noticed the same thing. Husky went backwards in several areas. Zerks on the linkage... Gone. Little pull handles on the axles... Gone. Low slim larger tank... gone. Seems the subframe is better built to. As for the rads i see no reason to have moved the outlets outward making them more prone to damage. Even the older plastic is far more durable / flexible. Original graphics are still intact on a 04 that has had a hard life. No frame or motor mount cracking issues on the old bike ether. Weird.

the new bike is better, the frame geometry rules and the suspension is much upgraded... I just wish they had kept the good stuff from the older model.
Click to expand...

That is exactly correct!

The old bikes were very durable and the motors seem faster with only a drop in man jet needed...what is up with that?

The new bike handles fantastic though!
 
so will this be an issue for all WB165 + FMF kit setups? i'll have my pipe soon so i don't have a clear picture yet. can we dent the inside of the pipe a bit to clear the hose more? or is a new rad the way to go?

thanks for the pics!
 
typeone said:
so will this be an issue for all WB165 + FMF kit setups? i'll have my pipe soon so i don't have a clear picture yet. can we dent the inside of the pipe a bit to clear the hose more? or is a new rad the way to go?

thanks for the pics!
Click to expand...

No the pipes will fit fine when new, they always do,. It is after you drop your bike on the pipe side that you start having issues.

K
 
typeone said:
so will this be an issue for all WB165 + FMF kit setups? i'll have my pipe soon so i don't have a clear picture yet. can we dent the inside of the pipe a bit to clear the hose more? or is a new rad the way to go?

thanks for the pics!
Click to expand...
I think there could be slight variations between each setup once its put together. I think the best option is to find at least the right side radiator but if not there are other options as some have posted here. DaveG321 tweeked his pipe a bit and has some clearance now. I had originally tweeked the mounting tabs to gain some additional clearance. If you do the latter make sure you safety wire a piece of heater hose or equivalent over the area where it comes close to the pipe. That way if the hose ends up pushed into the pipe after a crash or something it can hold up until its fixed. Another option is the new replacement radiators we all see on ebay. Some seem to be made quite well and made in the USA to boot. I was going to go that route until I found mine. I would definitely contact the seller first and make sure the spigots are where you want them. They usually just put a generic picture on the ad. Im sure they could make them however you wanted them. Some have also sent there current radiators out to be modified. There are lots of options. Like I said this isnt completely necessary but Im just a worry wart. Personally if money wasnt an issue I would replace the radiators and buy the proper hoses. The setup is way superior IMO. But for me money is an issue......hence the Ebay score!
R_Little said:
No OXBO for me...it's my daughters college graduation on Sat.

I am doing Rige Run next sunday though.

We should ride together some time.
Click to expand...
I recently joined the Ridge Riders so I will be at the Ridge Run helping out. I drive a dark grey 05 Tundra four door. Not sure if I will have the WB or TXC. We should definitely ride sometime. Any good places in Bergen County?
 
You can also have Myler's modify your stock radiators by swapping the bottom tanks between the two and getting the older style bottom hose.

If you run the stock radiators keep an eye on the spigots and hose connections after crashes/drops. I had a crash on the left side that tore the hose losing all of my coolant during an enduro. Thankfully it happened near the end and I finished without issue. I also had a fall on the right side during a hare scramble where the pipe collapsed the spigot enough to lose coolant. That one cost me a top end and a DNF.
 
As far as the older wr125,s,your,e write,my 02 WR125 was leaps and bounds faster and ran cleaner than my 09 WR125 .It would lug and then it would climb thru the powerband and rev til tomoro and then some but the handling was not even close to the 09.
 
slo rider said:
You can also have Myler's modify your stock radiators by swapping the bottom tanks between the two and getting the older style bottom hose.

If you run the stock radiators keep an eye on the spigots and hose connections after crashes/drops. I had a crash on the left side that tore the hose losing all of my coolant during an enduro. Thankfully it happened near the end and I finished without issue. I also had a fall on the right side during a hare scramble where the pipe collapsed the spigot enough to lose coolant. That one cost me a top end and a DNF.
Click to expand...
What year is your bike? I know Husky switched radiator manufactures for a couple years. The ones they switched to were allegedly poor quality. I want to say '06 - '08 but Im not sure.
 
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