[Carburhater]

Oh gosh, where to even start in all this...

Picked up a yellow 2006 250 last summer as alternate transportation vs my gas thirsty truck (1.5 hours commute every day). Rode it all fall, rode it all spring.

It MAY BE the world's most beat-on 250. It came to me as someone's starter bike, with both turn signals broke off and half a year of neglected storage. Then I learned to ride on it! One hard drop, busted the cowling and right peg bracket, bent handle bar... glad I was dressed for the slide, not the ride! Probably 20/30 mph when I went down.

That was 4,000 miles ago! It had 10k when I bought it, on around 16,000 right now.

I LOVE the 250. I love that it's EXACTLY the right amount of speed for me. I genuinely don't even want a bike with higher top speed, this keeps up on the highway just fine! But because Im using 100% of it all the dang time, Im wearing the poor thing out.

Anyway, I could go on about the abuse... but last week, sitting in construction, she finally overheated and the motor seized. This week, I picked up a donor bike from the local motorcycle graveyard that I was told had a good motor in it (it had been wrecked), and yesterday swapped it in.

Still cant get it to crank.

Gas is good (although I havent connected the tank yet, I just wanted to see if it would crank before finishing reassembly), carbs are clean, battery is fully charged, tried jumping from my truck battery, etc. Same result: some starter motor clickings, but no crank. And, sometimes a concerning whine? Swapped out the donor starter with the starter from the original motor that I knew worked, and again, same result.

Am I unlucky enough to have TWO seized motors on my hands now? Is it worth tearing them apart and rebuilding one?

It's well worth noting that the old motor had been sitting in this scrap yard outside for who knows how long. The one air intake port on the engine that WAS covered was full of nasty brown water, and one of the valves had some visible rust on it. I treated it with some CLR and cleaned it out really good, definitely reducing the rust, but I'm afraid there is more rust I can't see/treat. I wanted to put my engine's plugs in the older engine, but I don't have the bit for them, and plugs shouldn't effect cranking anyway, right?

Neither engine will allow the bike to roll in 1st gear, so I can't push start.

Is it worth rebuilding the motors? Or should I take my loss, sell it to someone who's got the time for it, and start saving for a 650? This little bike has serious sentimental value to me, but I also am weighing that against my very evident need for something bigger... I'm moving to Atlanta next week (from Maine) and will really rely on a bike for work for gas, but at the same time I've already put too much money into THIS bike...

Any insight and wisdom would be massively appreciated...