I'm looking to get a dirty bike, and can pick up a new '12 WR450 for a good price. I was thinking of doing an SM conversion for a fun around-town bike and track days. How hard is it to get get an off road bike tagged in NC, or what suggestions aside from looking at a KTM or Husky can you offer?
I would love to move back to SC, but I'm stuck in NC for now. Fingers crossed, hopefully, I can GTFO here this fall.
Extremely difficult in NC. Buy a bike that has aready been street titled in another state. The NC license plate agancy will just retitle it in NC and you will be good to go.
You might still give it a try, depending upon how much you like DMV-related challenges. I successfully titled and registered a CR500 in NC back in '98. Did all the street legal stuff, which is a pretty short list in NC requiring only a headlight, taillight, brake light with switch on rear brake or both (front only won't cut it), left mirror, horn and either working front and rear blinkers or none at all. You do not need a speedo, odometer, hour meter, right mirror, but you might need a high/low beam on your headlight, I can't remember. This was before the days of kits. Baja Designs was just doing XR stuff back then I think. After I figured out how to get a CR to generate enough power to run a set of lights (that was a hassle) and how to get the bulbs to stop vibrating and subsequently shattering long enough to get through a safety inspection, I went to the DMV and applied for a title using the MSO paperwork or whatever it's called on dirt bikes and serial number as the VIN, and entered "Honda 498" on the paperwork so as not to trip a bunch of sirens when the code "CR500R" popped up, then I waited. (I'd insured it the same way, as a Honda 498 at an agreed-upon value). A few weeks later a friggin title for a 1998 Honda 498 showed up in the mail with the serial number listed as the VIN. I stuffed the title in my pocket, rode it up to the dealership to have it inspected, then rode it over to the DMV to get a tag. The nice lady took my $86 or whatever it was with a smile and I walked out of there with a registration card and a tag for a friggin frackin CR500R sitting on knobbies. I got pulled over on the way home from the tag agency for doing a 1st thru 5th gear celebratory wheelie off a stoplight where an unmarked Monroe cop was sitting behind me. He was unmarked and I was stupid for not checking behind me first but it's not like I would have been able to recognize whether or not it was a cop in the mirror anyway, it vibrated so badly. I pulled right over instead of doing what I'd do the next 6 or 7 times this happened (which is to find the closest yard, woods, railroad tracks, grassy hill, set of stairs, escape route I could find and braap braaaaap my way to freedom). He walked up, incredulous as to what he was seeing. A brand new, sparkly clean white and neon red CR500 with a license plate on it. He checked all my paperwork twice, then informed me that he raced flattrackers in his younger days, a street-legal CR500 was the coolest thing he'd ever seen, and to never again do a 5 gear wheelie in his jurisdiction. I got off with nothing more than a verbal warning and a "cool bike" from the cop. Stupid luck. Anyway, I'm way off on a tangent now, down memory lane. Good luck with the street legalization of your YZ250F if you choose to give it a go. Or you could just do what everybody else does and stick a plate from another bike on it.
Alot of it will have to do wiht your local DMV inspector - if they are cool, then you might not have too muchof a problem, if thye arent cool - forget about it . My cool one wouldnt approve my DR-Z400E with S stuff due to the serial number being the incorrect number of digits when compaired to a VIN -
Cool story ThrottleJock, thanks for sharing. I'm not trying to get the YZ tagged. It was more of a pipe dream "IF" I had bought a new WR. Still would like to try sometime down the road.
I am in the process of trying to get a 93' WR250 (2 stroke. teal seat. Pink shock spring. you know you likey) registered for street use. My local DMV guy is cool, but still follows the rule book pretty closely. So far, the bike has hi/low headlight. Universal kit from Parts Unl. & a tailight. The problem now is that in order to get it to pass it has to have a modified frame. I had a simple plan of making a subframe & seat from another bike work. Then my plan was to put the original back on after the paperwork was done. The problem here is that the inspector doesn't agree with a simple cut & bend of a sub frame enough of a modification to pass and get it titled. The easiest way is to buy another dirt bike from another state with a title. Then go from there.
@Seth I remember that bike, that was in my TL1000s days. @op I got the same thing done with a 98 Husky WX360E. I did it around the same time as Seth, but I imagine it would be much more difficult now that thousands more have tried to slip one by since we did it.
Brad I'd forgotten about that TL. 5th gear nitrous wheelies, you were completely normal back then too as I recall. That was the first sport bike I ever rode. Thanks for ruining my life, jackass. Remember that day we decided to go urban assaulting on the plated open class mx'er's? That was a great idea. Too bad they didn't have go pro's back then, we coulda been YouTube superstars.
