[alex.s]

Originally Posted by brendandubs

I bought my first bike last night, a 2005 ninja 250 from a guy on craigslist. My buddy, an experienced rider, took the bike for a test spin, inspected it, and didn't notice anything majorly wrong. It was obvious that the bike had been dropped at least once, minor dent on the side and handlebar damage, but my buddy advised that snagging it for $2k was a solid deal. I now am wondering if I bought a junk bike.

The seller was trying to jumpstart the bike when we showed up to buy it (claimed to be selling it for his brother who stopped riding it 2 months ago), which should have been a warning sign. But we rode it around for 15 minutes after getting some juice in the battery, and the bike seemed fine. I then took it on the highway for a solid 40-50 minute spin to get it back to my place in SF. Someone honked at me in SF to let me know the tail light was out (scary, but easily fixable).

When I took it for another spin this morning, I'd have to wait a significant amount of time after starting the bike in neutral before I could switch to first gear. If I changed gears too soon, the engine would just stop. The next hiccup came at stop lights. Speeding up from a complete stop, it'd take the bike 4 seconds to accelerate above 5 mph. I'd go from stop sign to 5 mph, wait 4 seconds, and then I'd feel the bike give me some power.

I park the bike and an hour later I notice that there is a small puddle below the kickstand and exhaust. I googled and it looks like a lot of other people have reported similar issues and it can be fixed.

I tried taking it for another spin this afternoon and made it 2 blocks before it sputtered out. I couldn't get it to go above 5 mph and it would slow down then speed up like it was about to die. I pull over to the side of the road, hit the kill switch, and then try starting the bike again and couldn't get it to first gear without the engine dying. Tried this for half an hour to no avail. I street parked the bike and walked 3 miles back to my apartment. I am hoping I can fix the bike, but my gut is telling me I should have done better due diligence.

Does this sound like something that I can fix on my own? Or should I get it towed and have a professional check it out tomorrow?

find a more knowledgeable bike mechanic to bring with you next time. you can find much better deals than that, but now that you've bought it it's kinda too late.
did you change the gas? if its 2 month old gas it will do what you are talking about. old gas partly evaporates leaving a gummy residue that clogs up the carbs. if you didn't put the gas thats in it in, empty the gas, put a new tank in with seafoam and see if it helps. it will probably take some time to work its self through. if it doesn't start clearing up after running a bit (make sure you try to rev it to get the new gas through the different jets) then you might need to take the carbs apart and clean them. i think shops typically charge like $100 for that