Grenaded GasGas 2 Stroke

I was thinking about the piston to crank contact issue more than the head exploding

@edot504_ you are not alone on this one. 22 hours on it

Corporate had no compassion and told me I should have changed the piston after 10 hours (as per Manual) for a 250 #%&@ My son is not Justin Barcia!!!

We know it won’t happen but GG should replace it all. That head is a casting/manufacturing flaw. Wow

I am afraid to put my son back on  this. A 23' was supposed to be bulletproof. If I could unload it I would and get YZ 250 two stroke

$5000 to fix

That horrible, I had my 2020 tc250 blow apart with around 19 hours if I recall and husky paid for everything, parts/labor even bought me a brand new fmf pipe as it had piston chunks inside it. 

Some WEIRD (maybe extreme is a more fitting word) failures going on with the recent Austrians

$5000?!! Seems like a lot, but when you include brand new parts and labor… 😏

The issue is piston pin beating failure in every one I have seen…

Probably better off parting it out although I suspect it is closer to $2k in parts or maybe less. Should need head, cylinder, piston, and crank right? $5k sounds like the price of a crate engine. There is a cylinder and piston kit on MX locker for $1015 right now. Crank is $550 on RMATV. There is a rebuilt crank on MX locker for $375. Maybe yours can be rebuilt for less. $60-70 for the head and insert, $800 for new cases if you need them. You might need a better dealer.

Heck it’s like a brand new bike. I think I would rebuild it and sell it. If you rebuilt to sell, you could try to do it as reasonably as possible. What a shame since these are such cool looking bikes.

@wrc777 yeah it was basically replacing the whole engine.  It also ate the cases, reeds and reed valve, and power valve. Worst nightmare ever! Luckily it grenaded right before gate dropped!

Please Define what corporate means to you. Dealer or factory warranty claim department?

Did you take it back to the dealer you bought it from for them to go to bat for you on a warranty claim?

I had a KTM 250sx develop a crack on the side of the cylinder, I caught it before things went bad. KTM sent me a new cylinder Exhaust flange gasket kit and a check for $80. 

A new bike is probably around $8k maybe less right now. I would part it out or sell it as a mechanics special before I spent $5k to rebuild the engine. 

$5k? 

As I said previously, you can piece together one of these motors together for a lot less than $5k, probably less than half of that, even with cases or case fix. There are so many members willing to help with sourcing parts and so many lessons to tuning. I get it, everyone wants everything now/yesterday ... $5k might get you a new motor on a silver platter thru instacart ... I guess that's how we role in 2024. 

Haven't read through the whole thread yet , but my guess would be a rod failure, or bottom end bearing failure. I have seen damaged heads before from this scenario.....but never seen one blow the head apart like that. Wow!  I have seen rods blow through the bottom end , just never seen a top end explode like that. 😧😧 Crazy , and sorry to hear man. At least you didn't get hurt. 

Holy crap!! ( On these pics ). 

@lumpy790 Warrenty department wouldn't budge. My dealer was great! Warrenty department said my catastrophic failure was from not following the manual instructions and replacing piston at 10 hours. BIKE is fixed now, I am just scared that it can happen again.

No surprise. GasGas corporate can suck my ass. I purchased my txt300 new and it was lacking half the graphics when I picked it up from the dealer. They told me to contact gasgas and they'll get it sorted because you know "supply chain issues". Rat bastards led me on with a string of emails and eventually ghosted my responses.

Wow that’s good news. I wonder how many of these GGs we don’t hear about? So what’s your plan now? Go with KTM/Husky or YZs?

I could and would always use the help and suggestions. Fortunately the way this got paid for was by built up contingency and a God send in high places. But still messes with my confidence in the brand!

The KTM/ Husky’s may be okay, since we’ve only seen the GGs grenade like this.

Of course you can’t go wrong with the YZ - reliable and less maintenance, but maybe not as good contingency. 

Thank you for clarifying this you definitely went the correct route 

I have never owned an Austrian bike, but I have owned/raced/wrenched my share of 2t's. I am leaning with those that suggested bad casting or an air leak as more likely culprits, but one other less-likely theory is a failed water jacket that got thru to the combustion chamber (possibly by a more minor bad casting that split, failed O-ring head seal, etc...). Enough hydraulic pressure could do that.