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I thought there should be some dedication to bikes of a simpler time. Show us the antiques you're riding! Fortunately, many older bikes functioned off a very similar set of design ideologies, so if you have a tech question it might just get answered here. I bought my first bike, a 1972 Honda CB500/4, a little over a year ago for $400. It was in terrible, terrible condition and only I've only recently put it into something resembling road-worthy. I decided long ago that this was never going to be a show bike and began to appreciate its rattiness. Unfortunately I don't have any 'before' pictures. Note: The battery tie-down is not for sale.    Next thing to do is find another forward turn signal (for safeties sake!) and true a set of spoked rims I just finished rebuilding. 
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Oct 22, 2009 07:34
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I like to fix basketcase Japanese bikes. I've got two from two separate eras and now I'm looking for a cool 1980's bike. 1966 Yamaha YDS3 250 Two Stroke:  1977 Kawasaki KZ650: 
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Oct 22, 2009 12:09
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my 1955 bmw R50. as bought: (didn't run)  now:  currently undergoing a tranny rebuild because of one bearing with a broken outer race. dunno how that happened. everything else in the trans looked good for another 100k. of all the bikes i've worked on so far, some 70s and 80s japs, moto-guzzi, ktm, this is the easiest and most enjoyable to fix. there are no unnecessary parts on it and almost everything is easy to get to.
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Oct 22, 2009 12:35
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1975 Honda CB200. It's a dumpster save from the guy who taught me how to work on motorcycles. He used it to learn to ride offroad, and we use it to teach newbs how to ride. It's not in the best condition, it definitely needs some work, but it still starts up willingly on the first kick and is just so much fun to ride.  Here it is with the other bikes we owned at the time...for around town, I tended to take the 200 rather than the 929.  I used to have a lot of fun on it running up and down Redwood road in the bay area and chasing down squids on it. It's also useful as a knee down trainer!  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VABQbps8n5w It needs a new stator, (currently doesn't make enough power to charge the battery if the lights are on), new fork seals, new front brake pads, and to be cleaned and had the oil changed. Oh, and it doesn't have working turn signals, or a brake light. Whoops. This bike attracts the most attention out of any bike I've ever owned, we've had people stop traffic to ask us if we'll sell the bike. As my friend says: "An old bike is like an ugly girl...it looks attainable". 
Z3n fucked around with this message at 15:08 on Oct 22, 2009 |
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Oct 22, 2009 15:02
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 My old CL350, I miss owning it but not working on it. Heres a CB160 from the same honda guru who rebuilt my CL.  I want to pick up a Cafe/Tracker Project eventually.
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Oct 22, 2009 15:58
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There "should" only be a few things left to do on my '69 Honda CL350: coils, tires, cables, and some rubber pieces around the handlebars. My '73 BMW R60/5 teardown starts this weekend. I just picked up some damaged R75/5 cylinders for the engine rebuild. When it's back together, it should be a five-speed R80/5. Once it's finished, I'm hooking it up to a CJ sidecar.  
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Oct 22, 2009 16:19
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guhh I love old BMW's. Any of you go through the trouble of mounting and balancing your own tires? I'm debating giving it a try.
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Oct 22, 2009 16:43
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My 75 CB750 with a a hard tail welded on. I just recently bought a second motor as the first one had lots of miles and was no in very good shape. It is currently torn completely apart, the frame is at powder coat and the tanks are getting painted with candy colors and metal flake.  I had to take the forks apart to replace the fork seals and change the boots. Also I needed to get rid of the ears, because I'm going to run a old school dual headlight setup like this. 
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Oct 22, 2009 17:04
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Valt posted:old school dual headlight setup That's pretty neat.
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Oct 22, 2009 17:13
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rope kid posted:My '73 BMW R60/5 teardown starts this weekend. I just picked up some damaged R75/5 cylinders for the engine rebuild. When it's back together, it should be a five-speed R80/5. Once it's finished, I'm hooking it up to a CJ sidecar. RogueEngineer posted:guhh I love old BMW's. Any of you go through the trouble of mounting and balancing your own tires? I'm debating giving it a try. tubed tires are a hell of a lot easier. tubeless i just take to the shop.
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Oct 22, 2009 19:19
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Rev. Dr. Moses P. Lester posted:i must have missed this in your thread... was the engine blown? or are you just upgrading to 750 for shits and sidecars? There is a guy that runs around town here that has a bike almost exactly like yours. I believe he even has a sidecar on it from time to time. I have also seen a dog in the sidecar and I'm pretty sure it had doggles on. If that isn't the best thing in the world then I don't know what is.
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Oct 22, 2009 19:48
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Rev. Dr. Moses P. Lester posted:i must have missed this in your thread... was the engine blown? or are you just upgrading to 750 for shits and sidecars?
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Oct 22, 2009 19:54
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Rev. Dr. Moses P. Lester posted:
If you have a compressor, tubeless are easier. You don't have to fight the tube ( I tend to run the heavy duty tubes which a step below a bib mousse ) and the process goes much faster as a result. Getting the bead to catch can be a bitch sometimes, the rear tire on the K75 I had was a strumpet.Generally though, if you are having a lot of trouble with tires you're doing it wrong. I use a pair of 8" hand irons and a Irwin speed clamp....and the Walmart store brand "personal lubricant" as a lube. I don't know if Asstroglide would be any better and I sure wouldn't know which side to put the KY his and hers lube on, I'm guessing I'd put the his on the rim and the hers on the tire. It works for me, it's cheap and it doesn't react with rubber.
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Oct 23, 2009 02:40
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I'm glad that I have more modern bikes, but I do loves me some old bikes. This is my present pre 1980 bike- 1978 Kawasaki KZ1000 Z1R.   This bike is going to transform over the winter into a ELR cafe bike. At least that 's the color scheme I'm going with. I'm likely going to remove most of the bodywork and substitute cafe style parts. After seeing what Z1R parts fetch on ebay, I may sell the Z1R stuff, which would bring in close to the $500 I paid for it. Is it right to do that to a Z1R I could concievably restore? Maybe not, but I don't plan to do anything permanent to the frame and the next guy can restore it if he wishes. The best part of owning and older bike is watching the reaction of the checkbook chopper owner when you ride in to a gathering and all the riders walk right past his bike to have a look at yours. He's got more money in his handlebars than you have in your whole bike and who gets the attention?  A few more random old bikes from the Alaska bike blessing back in May    Local bike legend Squeaks and his $300 KZ1000, $3400 later. It may seem like a fair amount of money, but try to buy a nice literbike for $3700 and see what you get these days.
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Oct 23, 2009 02:58
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'73 Yamaha LT2 $730 Click here for the full 1944x1458 image.  Click here for the full 1639x1229 image. There's really no problem riding it as is, but it does need a chain, sprocket, tires, better suspension, a passenger peg fixed, and oversized piston + boring. '77 Suzuki GS400X $45 + $509.39 in parts so far = $554.39  Click here for the full 1536x1152 image. This bike's current state is frame, handlebars, wheels, rear suspension. Everything else is in boxes. There are many, many pretty parts waiting it. Time's available, just no money for other missing parts or doing things like powder coating the frame right now.
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Oct 23, 2009 04:30
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The paint on that Suzuki and the trailer are a perfect match.
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Oct 23, 2009 04:52
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Wasn't really mine, but I got to admire it/trip over it in my dads barn every time I went to work on my old Land Rovers. He just sold it 2 weeks ago, unfortunately I live too far away to have bought it. 1966 Moto Guzzi Regolorita ISDT 125, one of only 100 imported to the US. We estimate it had lass than 100 original miles on it when he sold it. The buyer said he was going to use it in vintage trials and races so it's about as close to buying a new 1966 motorcycle in 2009 as you can get.    Oddly enough, it originally came from Alaska, where I now live.
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Oct 23, 2009 08:02
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Embarrassed due to the sheer volume of AWESOME in the thread and the lack thereof in this picture, but here's another trials bike (TY250 - "B" or "C", IIRC). I use it for shits and giggles at our place, sometimes for my commute (taking life into own hands), and sometimes it even goes out for wobbler trials. I've since put a new exhaust on it, rebuilt the forks with 15w and some gaiters, replaced the clutch plates (it's still on or off) and wired up a horn (for road legality) to a 6v battery under the side panel. Don't really have the spare time to do a lot of trials or do a lot of work on it. If I get really bored and don't want to do anything with it, I suppose I might strip it down and have the frame repainted properly. The book says inspect/rebuild every 20 hours or one trial, and gently caress knows how many hours/years it's been on the current rings (let alone the rest), so that might be for the best. It is basically all original, save I think the front mudguard, so it might be worth doing. 
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Oct 23, 2009 13:48
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Similar to that yamaha, my girlfriend got this Ossa 350 Mick Andrews Replica for christmas last year. She wanted to come do trials with me while I was on my modern trials bike. We completely restored it but I'm an idiot and don't have the after picture. This is before:
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Oct 23, 2009 13:58
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Gnomad posted:The best part of owning an older bike is watching the reaction of the checkbook chopper owner when you ride in to a gathering and all the riders walk right past his bike to have a look at yours. He's got more money in his handlebars than you have in your whole bike and who gets the attention? There's so much truth to this it's not even funny. And then, you get to tell everyone you did the work yourself, earning you even more coolness points.
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Oct 23, 2009 14:09
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Here's the 1976 Honda XL100 that my dad bought ~15 years ago for a hundred bucks. My brother and I rebuilt the carburetor and some other stuff a while back and it goes pretty well, but it still needs the clutch rebuilt and the electrics once-overed... 
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Oct 23, 2009 15:47
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yummycheese posted:The paint on that Suzuki and the trailer are a perfect match. Isn't it scary? I'm thinking whenever the new tank and tail get painted I'll go with a darker, deeper shade of blue. Something like...  Gnomad posted:The best part of owning and older bike is watching the reaction of the checkbook chopper owner when you ride in to a gathering and all the riders walk right past his bike to have a look at yours. He's got more money in his handlebars than you have in your whole bike and who gets the attention? No kidding. Someone asked Nerobro if he was selling my LT2 while he was riding it. He said the owner was inside if the person wanted to wait to ask. They did not. Probably because I'd tell them hell no. kdc67 fucked around with this message at 18:53 on Oct 23, 2009 |
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Oct 23, 2009 18:50
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Hoo boy, really there are too many to easily list, and so many that I dont have pictures of, so I'll just start with street riding. I started riding on the street with a 1980 CB650. I know its not PRE-80, but its close, its date of manufacture was actually 1979, so there. I sold this bike to a goon. It got stolen from his garage, he found it, still had the key, and stole it back.   It was both purple and eventually black before I sold it.  I also owned a 72 CL450 Honda, another bike that I sold to a Goon. I had no title for it, and unfortunately this was at a time before online title services. I miss this bike.  Click here for the full 800x600 image. Then came some modern bikes (GSXR-600, DRZ-400SM, etc), and I found an RV90 on Craigslist for $300 or trade for a scooter. I just happened to have a Suzuki FA-50 scooter (that I scored from CL for $20!!!) to trade him. So I drove out to his house and became the proud owner of 3 boxes of RV90 parts that he assured me could be assembled into a complete RV90. I didnt care, I had wanted an RV90 for a long time, and they never came up at that price. About 10 months, and one additional parts bike purchased later, I had a complete RV90. Not the prettiest RV90, but it runs great, and it is seriously the most fun motorcycle I have ever ridden. I will never sell it.  Click here for the full 1600x1200 image.  Click here for the full 1024x768 image.  Click here for the full 1280x960 image. Then I bought a 1976 Honda XL250 for cheap off a friend of my brother in-law. I did the quasi-supermoto thing with it, and put street tires on it. I beat the everliving poo poo out of it for an entire summer, jumping it, wheelieing it, and generally beating it up, and it never quit. Always started on the first kick. I sold it at the end of summer for 2x what I bought it for.  Click here for the full 1600x1200 image. I also happened upon the crappiest Kawi KZ440 in existence for $20. I gave it a spitshine, cleaned the carbs, and turned it around for $100.  Click here for the full 1600x1200 image. Then came the RD-350. I heard through a friend of a friend that there was one sitting in a collapsed barn. I investigated, went to said barn, and $20 later, I had a RD350 with a good motor, bent forks, and very expensive (even now) aftermarket exhaust. I sat on this one for a while, since it needed a lot of work, plus I didnt have a real garage to work in. Then I moved into a condo, with a real garage, and found a running, titled (!) RD350 on Craigslist for $250. I called 10 minutes after the ad was posted, made him promise to save it for me, and basically sprinted out of work to buy that bike. Now I had two RD350's and a garage. Over the next few months, I turned two OK RD's into one nice one. Sold it last summer.  [url=https://wi.somethingawful.com/ab/ab127f4e04429a69b0be7ead0af23bf1c9660e74.jpg]Click here for the full 1600x1200 image.  Click here for the full 1024x768 image. I then found a 77 CB750 for $250, and turned a poo poo-brown CB into a green one. The CB was fun, and a cool bike, but I wanted to get into something more modern and powerful. I sold it just after the RD, to fund my 1200 Bandit.  Click here for the full 1280x848 image.  Click here for the full 1280x960 image. More when I get back from lunch!!
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Oct 23, 2009 19:41
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Continued from lunch time... When I was young, my dad had a 1975 Kawasaki F11-250, a bike that I always lusted after. It was in nice shape, ran great, and was street legal to boot. Well, in the spring of 07, I tracked down the guy who bought it from my dad, and bought it back!  Click here for the full 1600x1200 image. I again did the quasi-supermoto thing with it, and put street tires on it.  Click here for the full 1600x1200 image. Unfortunately, in the spring of 08, it seized up on me. One of the main bearings basically vaporized. So its been sitting, waiting for a new crank since then. They basically cant be found, so I'm holding out for someone to unload a good complete motor. Other bikes of note, are a Kromag pinto from the late 70's that I bought for $40, got running and rode around for a bit. It was in great shape, and ran perfect, but I live in a ridiculously hilly city, so it wasnt practical. I had my worst sales experience with this thing. I sold it to a guy who thought "It doesnt have a title" meant "Go ahead and ride it wherever, because the police dont care if you dont have a title or license plate". He hounded me for months about a title, despite me being totally upfront with him about it not having a title. What a horrible experience.  Click here for the full 800x600 image. I also owned a 77 Puch Maxi Sport that I dreged out of the back of my grandmas garage. Paid $200 for it, and went on another scooter kick. It had about 450 original miles on it, and was cosmetically perfect. Again, it wasnt practical where I live, so I wound up selling it with about 550 miles.  Click here for the full 1024x768 image. This isnt a motorcycle, but it has a pre-1980 snowmobile motor in it! This was known affectionately as "The Beast".  Click here for the full 1600x1200 image. The previous owner said it would wheelie all the way to redline, and I'm inclined to believe him. It had a 2-stroke, liquid cooled 440cc twin, with a tuned pipe. I never did get it running, which is disappointing, as I didnt know much about 2-strokes and the theories behind them at the time. I'm sure I could have gotten it running if I owned it today. Anyway, it was huge, and since I couldnt get it running, my parents wanted it out of the garage. I sold it to a tech-ed teacher who was going to let his students work on it and try to get it going. He probably doesnt have a job anymore if they actually got it started.
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Oct 23, 2009 22:08
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Well partially thanks to this thread I just bought a 1978 Suzuki DS100 two stroke. Kind of an enduro looking thing and I guess at some point it had lights and possibly, currently it doesn't. Needs a new coil (old one had the boot ripped off) and a new throttle cable but other than that it looks pretty good. Might see if I can find a coil off something else that will work then grab a throttle cable from one of the shops down here and get it running. It was spray painted black and looks pretty hideous but it should be a fun bike to mess around with. Not sure what the plans are for it at this point once its running.
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Oct 24, 2009 00:57
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If anyone in the Raleigh, NC area has a carb sync, i'll gladly trade you some beer of your choice for the chance to use it! Im jealous of some your collections. That RV90 is one of the weirder things on two wheels I've seen, ha.
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Oct 24, 2009 01:15
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RogueEngineer posted:If anyone in the Raleigh, NC area has a carb sync, i'll gladly trade you some beer of your choice for the chance to use it! http://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=diy+carb+sync Not trying to be a dick, there's some quite helpful links there.
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Oct 24, 2009 15:07
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Yea, I've looked through several DIY manometers. I actually just ended up buying four Harbor Freight vacuum gauges for $12 each with a 30 day return policy woo
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Oct 25, 2009 16:56
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RogueEngineer posted:That RV90 is one of the weirder things on two wheels I've seen, ha. Thats what everyone says who's never seen one. I'm building another: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3066576
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Oct 25, 2009 19:00
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Jesus, Phat_Albert, I knew you had a bunch of old bikes but that's crazy. The RD350 is still my favorite. :3
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Oct 25, 2009 20:23
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rope kid posted:Jesus, Phat_Albert, I knew you had a bunch of old bikes but that's crazy. The RD350 is still my favorite. :3 The RD was awesome, it was built for someone about 5 foot nothing and 100 lbs though. Being 6'3" and not 100lbs it was just too tiny. They're seriously like a 3/4 size bike, its weird. It was a blast though. As for the rest of the bikes I've owned, I dont have pictures of most of them. Since I'm already exposing my insane amount of bikes, I may as well take it back to the beginning. I started riding at 7 years old on a Arctic Cat Prowler, unknown year. My great aunt had recently died, and my uncle was cleaning out her house (an old log cabin in the UP), came across the Arctic Cat, and gave it to me. It was a 2-stroke Sachs motor with two speeds and a pull start. It always ran well, but the pull start recoil broke a lot. She topped out at about 28mph, which was plenty fast for a 7 year old.  I then upgraded to a Kawasaki KDX-80. Came across it at a rummage sale. I was getting too big for the Arctic Cat at the time, so my parents relented.  I got the Kawi at around 11 years old, I believe. It was a whole different world from the Arctic Cat. It had great brakes, a really strong, peaky motor, amazing suspension, and was generally as close to a true motocrosser as I was going to get. I had a blast on it for a few years. It met its end when it siezed the piston while I was trying to keep up with my cousin on his Suzuki 125. I then moved on to a Suzuki TS-185. The TS was a very ill-fated bike right from the start. It seized not too long after I got it, and we had the cylinder punched out and an oversized piston put in. I dont know if the bore-job was bad or what but the thing always ran white hot after that. I only owned that bike for a couple of months and we unloaded it. My dad basically got sick of throwing money at it.  Then came the widowmaker. A Yamaha RT-360, 2-stroke. This thing was a monster. It was big, hard to kick over, and was insanely cold blooded. But when it did run, it RAN. This was the first bike I was really ever afraid of. At 14 years old, a 360 2-stroke was a lot of muscle.  The 360 met its demise at the hands of a friend of mine. I let him ride it on the condition that he would be very careful and not rev it above 4K. Of course as soon as he got out of sight, he whacked the throttle open, the bike came on the pipe, started wheelieing and went over at the top of 2nd gear. The bike was destroyed, my friend was pretty banged up and broke his wrist. My dad sold the 360 and his Kawi F11-250 to a guy one town over. The same guy that I bought the F11 back from about 12 years later. He still has the 360, it hasnt run since we sold it to him. Its in the exact same wadded-up state, and even still has grass and dirt jammed in all of its nooks and crannies. It hadnt changed at all since my friend crashed it 12 years ago. After the 360, I took a break from bikes for a bit, mainly because I couldnt afford one, and I was soon to head off to college. I got back into them as soon as I had some money to my name in college, however, and so started my love affair with the street bike, beginning with the purple CB650 mentioned above. Beve Stuscemi fucked around with this message at 21:11 on Oct 25, 2009 |
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Oct 25, 2009 21:09
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Phat_Albert posted:Then came the widowmaker. A Yamaha RT-360, 2-stroke. This thing was a monster. It was big, hard to kick over, and was insanely cold blooded. But when it did run, it RAN. This was the first bike I was really ever afraid of. At 14 years old, a 360 2-stroke was a lot of muscle. Love that RT! And speaking of monster Yams...here's the 4t version  
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Oct 26, 2009 15:40
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Amazingly, with all my "old" bikes, I really don't own much earlier than 1980. I've had a 1979 and still have a 1977 GS550. Neither ran. They were parts bikes ot make my 1980 GS550 happy again. I have a 1978 Peugeot 103. And a 1979 GS425. I'll get some pictures up later.
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Oct 26, 2009 16:07
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Gnomad posted:Can anyone enlighten me on what this absolutely gorgeous machine is? I think I've just found a new holy grail.
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Oct 30, 2009 06:50
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the letter b posted:Can anyone enlighten me on what this absolutely gorgeous machine is? I think I've just found a new holy grail. Honda (yes, you spotted that) TL 125 or TL250. Mid to late 70s Honda twinshock trials bike with a lot of road kit on it.
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Oct 30, 2009 07:45
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Thats a Honda XL-250, I believe. The TL's were differently designed, and the XL's came with all the lights/blinkers/etc. Its an early model XL with the carb mounted on the right hand side of the head. Later models had it in the center. This is my old XL250 that was posted above. You can see the casings are generally the same. Mine was the later model with the center mount carb. Click here for the full 1600x1200 image. Beve Stuscemi fucked around with this message at 15:18 on Oct 30, 2009 |
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Oct 30, 2009 15:14
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Phat_Albert posted:Thats a Honda XL-250, I believe. The TL's were differently designed, and the XL's came with all the lights/blinkers/etc. Its an early model XL with the carb mounted on the right hand side of the head. Later models had it in the center. So the XL was the trail bike version?
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Oct 30, 2009 17:26
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Saga posted:So the XL was the trail bike version? The XL was the enduro. The TL was a lightened and stripped XL as far as I know.
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Oct 30, 2009 20:06
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Here is my 74 CB750
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Oct 31, 2009 02:01
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 19:52 |
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Here's my first bike -- I inherited it from my brother. It's a 1980 Kawasaki KZ550 LTD. I actually really like the bike. The Kerker exhaust is a bit of a screamer though. Regardless, it is in pretty okay condition for being 29 years old. Some paint worn off here and there and a couple rust spots but it runs beautifully. Yes yes, I know. The seat. I love it and have actually received a ton of compliments on it.   
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Oct 31, 2009 15:10
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