Bike of the Month: February 2021

My name Is AJ Stouwie. Currently 44yrs old and I’ve been riding for about 30yrs now. I started off like a lot of riders my age did with an ATC 110 then a 1986 Suzuki LT250 quad and my first dirt bike was an ’85 CR250 that me and my Dad fixed up. My first four-stroke was an ’03 CRF450 that I bought new followed by an 2009, ’16 and now my ’17 CRF450 with other bikes mixed in here and there that I fixed up and rode and ended up selling over the years.

I loved the look of the new ’17 style and I saw one for sale on OfferUp and purchased it back in 2018 with supposedly 10hrs on it, took it home and found an hour meter hidden underneath the tank with 40hrs on it and decided although it wasn’t a lot of hours I wanted to redo the top end and have peace of mind. So I decided to just build my version of a dream bike/works edition bike and have fun doing it.

Engine Mods: High Comp piston, fuel injector mods, remapped and running VP110 with a full titanium Yoshimura exhaust system

Suspension mods: Enzo re-valve and heavier springs front and rear

The bike has all kinds of components from Motostuff, CMT Compositi, Faster USA wheels, DID Rims, Dunlop tires, Mika Metals sprockets chain and bars, ARC levers, X-Trig clamps, Works Connection braces and covers, ICW radiators, Hammerhead shifter and brake pedal, Moto Hose radiator hoses, Titanium bolts, FLO foot pegs, Cycra engine/frame guard, the bike has an anodized frame and swing arm as well as nearly every aluminum part anodized black. The frame coating has held up really great no wear issues as I run either P3 frame grip tape or Split Designs frame tape. I also try to power wash the bike after each ride.

The bike definitely has way more power than I’ll ever need but being a bigger guy the high comp piston is nice to have and for tracks with some nice dirt I’ll switch it to my aggressive map that Robbie Feder hooked up for me (Josh Hansen’s mechanic) and she absolutely BARKS! No complaints on the suspension either it’s just a super rad bike that you can lug around OR it can get with the program QUICK! 

My favorite part of the build was just seeing the frame blacked out for the first time. Pictures don’t do it justice unless you actually see it up close and touch it and look way inside and check out the radiators that are all blacked out and you just feel like a kid again staring at a factory bike in the pits back in the day at A1.

There were no problems during the build, everything came together great. I didn’t have any time constraints but the project once I had all the parts took about 2 weeks for the frame off build and anodizing and putting everything back together.

I’m stoked with the way it turned out! Can’t be happier with how the frame turned out rather than powder coating it. If I could change anything I would do engine coatings and do the fork lower coatings but at the time it wasn’t necessary. I’m currently working on another project my 2019.5 FC450 Rockstar Edition is slowly getting the same treatment. 

Id like to thank Robbie Feder for his hard work doing the engine mods and doing the frame off work. Also so many companies:  Scott &Erin Motostuff Yoshimura Works Connection ARC Mika Metals FasterUsa FLO Motorsports Dunlop ICW radiator Moto Hose Redlabel graphics P3 CMT compositi , Travis at Motoseat VP XTrig , Cycra ,Acerbis and Westeffex graphics

@rolltheluckydice