CRF250L'12-20 - Flatland Racing Skid Plate

Happy with the plate! The rear holes are elongated for a little bit of play from side to side. Quick and simple job. :)

Worth the money. Easy to install and provides good protection. Oil changes are a little messy despite the oil drain hole but that is to be expected. Side ears will bend during a hard impact but protect your engine. Just bend them back if that happens. I slid into a deep rut in my case and hit a rock at probably 15mph. Bend the left ear against the engine case but did no damage to the engine. Slight dent in the skid plate and just bend it back when I got back home.

As others have said, installation is VERY finicky. At first it seemed like there was no way to get it all to line up, and I ended up rounding one of the rear bolt heads. Got a replacement bolt at Ace Hardware (they had the exact bolts, glad it wasn't proprietary like ALL Honda bolts :)) and removed the entire thing and started again. I put weather stripping along the frame tubes per my friend's recommendation to reduce buzzing which made installation a little tougher, but I was still able to get it all lined up. This is how I finally got it to line up right: loosely install the rear hooks and have them point forward on the plate before putting on bike. Hold the plate up to the bike and rotate the hooks to go over the frame tubes, it should be pretty far back near the frame welds. It'll be pretty loose on the bike, now just keep adjusting the whole plate forward and side to side until the front bolts line up with the frame bolt holes. I had to apply quite a bit of upwards pressure under the plate to get the front bolt holes to line up well enough. If you feel like you're cross threading the front bolts, YOU ARE... stop and try again. They will go in by hand when they're lined up properly. Snug the front bolts up all the way, then go back and tighten the rear bolts. Don't forget your loctite on all bolts. :) Now that it's on correctly, it looks awesome and feels like it could deflect a grenade.

This is a great skid plate, well made and extremely tough, you won’t fine one better. I have bashed this skid plate on rocks for a couple years and it’s still in great shape. In my opinion it’s the best aluminum skid plate there is. Here is the install video: https://youtu.be/Fg8ZoZXB2aw

Only one screw for the two original Honda mounting points would go in. Skid plate is really nicely made otherwise. But the other complaints about the mounting issues seem to be the norm, not a fluke.

Like others said, the plate is a bit finicky to mount. Its just a matter of getting all of the bolts started before tightening them down. This plate took a solid hit from a railroad track on my bike and the aluminum didnt gouge or dent. My friend with a stock skidplate on his yamaha xt350 wasnt so lucky.

The bolt holes might have been warped from when they were welded or their jig is off but after buying 2 new bolts and a tap I got it on with a little bit of a fight. Other than that it looks great and very strong. It was worth the fight to get it on from the good looks.

Ok . Update to my above review. Seem one of the bolts got damaged/bent in shipping and made fitting the skid plate near impossible. Fitment is all good now with a new bolt. Quite a heavy duty skid plate. Very nice welding job on it. Supper happy on how it protects the water pump is well!. Disregard my first review.

Customer Update: \"After taking everything off again and inspecting everything it seems one of the bolts was slightly bent and the top corner of the bash plate a bit bent. I\'m thinking t happened in shipping. I bought a new bolt and in a vice slightly taped the bash pate back(wasn’t much). Fits perfect now! Are you able to delete that review I posted? I feel it now was unjust. Anyway, all fits well. And happy with product. Thanks for contacting me. Cheers, Stephen\" CRF\'s Only Comment: Stephen agreed to have us update his review rather than delete it. We prefer updates as we do not delete reviews rather positive or negative. Fitment sucks. Poorly designed product. Do not buy. Will have to drill out the holes to get it to fit. Shame on you flatland racing. Would send it back and ask for refund but stripped bolts trying to get it on. Seems to be a very common problem with this item for other crf250L owners. Not Happy !

Install takes about five minutes- isn't much to it. I'm still learning how to ride dirt so I can't say anything on how it takes hits but it feels and looks strong.