Motorcycle Repair: Carb advise, fmf pipe, reed valves

Question
Randy,
  This isn't a Japanese street bike question, this is a 2002 Honda CR250R two stroke competition dirt bike question, the other tech in this site is currently "maxed out" on questions, so was wondering if you could help me out. I have no carb knowledge what so ever, I can replace the top end on a bike, I've done suspension work, but I need to tweek or tune the carb on my son's race bike for peak performance, low end as well as top end. We've raced this bike for a year now and I've never taken the carb off of it, any hop up advise? Ie.. reed valves, etc..? Thanks. Norman

Answer
High Norman, I have a lot of experience with Honda CRs I have owned several CR500s and one 93CR250. Thing is Norman the CR is just so darn good right out of the box, at least on engine performance that is, suspension and handling..different story. Sure you could throw some Reeds at it and a FMF pipe and a K&N filter and an SA Pro Silencer and a Roost Boost and on and on, Never realizing that all your really doing is moving the power around in it's band. The trick is to tune the bike for low end grunt, you want your son to get hole shots right? You want the bike to explode out of berms with minimal clutch feathering and you want the grunt to clear doubles and triples on the short tracks. You didnt mention if it is stock so I am going to assume it is completly stock. I would upgrade to a performance filter and rejet the carb for synthetic oil say like Dumond tech full synthetic, this will increase the bikes crispness of the bottom and decrease the bog when he misses a downshift. Other than that I would suggest leaving the stock exhaust in place until it's smashed then go for the FMF or DG or whatever is the hot setup these days, I gotta tell you though motos really aren't won on the pipe, there won on consistancy so keep your changes subtle and work on that hole shot.