Just a Photo

This bike belongs to Vic, Triumph engine in a Yamaha frame, not got too much in the way of details, hopefully Vic will fill us in with some spec....

Jack Pine custom Triumph

A nice wee follow on from the Friday Bike post...

"Peter Egan provides historical perspective on the Jack Pine custom Triumph in the August issue of Cycleworld, on newstands July 5. Here's a little kick start for you until you can get your paws on Peter's print exclusive feature"




click title as usual for an interesting link...

Friday Bike

Nicley sorted small unit Triumph :-)

Heres a near standard 68 T1000C Bodger, the one at the top seems to have Italian forks and a Honda TLS front hub, might even started life as 5TA

Larry just sent me a couple of pics of Bruce Springsteen, one of which hes on a Triumph, it looks like its a pre unit... someone might tell us the story of him and the bike??

MZ pt4

Just a quick up date with the TS250. It went for its MOT today and glad to say it passed without any problems. Well not quite true, as it didn't want to start when I was about to leave for the testing station. Think it was down to the two and a bit year old fuel in the tank, well I was told it would run on anything!!!... a wee push and away it went. Tank has now been drained and some fresh fuel/ oil put in. Now I'll try and get the road tax for it in the morning.

Another Stray......

Just having a read through Larrys latest post, and had a laugh at a comment his mate said, calling him a" motorcycle magnet". Well meet his opposite number on this side of the pond.... another stray motorcycle is making its way to my door step, more info on it tomorrow night when I get it home.

Well here it is, Ex Army Armstrong MT500, to be honest its far better than I thought it would be. This all came about due to me looking for a Rotax engine, still looking for one as this bike is staying together. I'll keep you post on how I get on with it.
MZ booked in for MOT tomorrow :-)

CRMC at Knockhill

The CRMC were at Knockhill race circuit on June 4th and 5th for their 5th round. I had heard from a few friends about how much they had enjoyed the meeting the year before, so I thought I'd go up for a few hours on the Saturday. I arrived just before 10am to a dry but overcast Knockhill, for those that don't know his place it has a weather system all of its own, the sun could be out a few miles down the the road, but when you get to the track it could be wet and windy (usually is!!!).
A not so quick look round the pit area, with so many interesting machines to view, people to talk to the time flew in.

I love the look of the Tri/ BSA triples

P&M Kawas :-)

Main reason to be there was to watch the racing so I headed down to the hairpin. No sooner than I got there I spotted two people in the distance jumping up and down, it was none other than Bill and Kat, whos tales of last year had lured me here today.
An hour or so of watching some great racing was followed by a bite to eat then a look at the pits again. Its good being able to have a close up look at the bikes and talk to the owners/ riders, so different from the "modern" race meetings.

Just doing a quick crankshaft change in a Suzuki 200T

The afternoons racing went well, with only a few "offs" and nothing serious.

Watching the sidecar nutters was one of the days highlights, these guys were putting 110% into it, the race at the front between the BMW and NRE was fantastic, I never knew an old BMW twin could go so quick.

No7 is the NRE Triumph and No8 the BMW

The plan to head home at five ended up streching out till eight... and the one day visit turned into two as I head up the next day for another Classic Racing fix.

Talking to few of my mates about the weekend I think there might be a few more of us up there next year... even plans of a few bikes going ouy on the parade laps... more of that later

Best pic of the weekend, get them started young, working on Dads Ducati !

click title to see a few more (lots) pics

MZ pt3

Busy day, headed up to Knockhill early to watch the BSB racing, more of later. Arrived back just after five and spent an hour on the MZ. Puncture fixed (new tube), all the bulbs changed, headlight and lens back on. While back wheel was out I freed off the brake shoes/ lever. So that's it ready for its test.


I took a pic of the regulator, can anyone tell me if its one common to later MZs?



Here's a pic of the kit Norman (UN) sent me the link to (click title to go to it), same as fitted on my bike.



Just had a read through Powerdynamos "knowledge base" and it seems the 16 volt output might be normal, I'll test it again tomorrow against their instructions.

Up date, Last week my mate was having a problem with the charging system on his Kawa, I had dropped off two rec/reg units to replace a faulty one he had. He phones me later and says the bikes charging, but showing 18 volts on both the units I had gave him. I said if that's the case try a new battery in his multi meter, I had high reading before on a meter due to a low battery. A new battery in and its charging 14.5 Volts.
Anyway you can guess where this is going, yip low battery in my meter, now reading just over 14 Volts. Roll on MOT time.....

MZ pt2

The plan to look at the TS 250 on Friday got sort of rained off, literally. So did my trip up to Knockhill to watch the British Superbikes today (Sat). So in between showers, too may Kawas in the big shed to work inside, I spent may be an hour checking the the TS over. Nothing seemed a miss, just a few parts to refit and a couple of wires to sort. On Thursday night I had filled the new battery, it came with the bike, and charged it so it was ready fit. Popped in the battery, check what was/ wasn't working with the electrics, only real the indicators not working. The fuel tank had fuel in it, and I suspect its been there since the tax disc ran out in Feb 09, but I'll give it a try. Following Mikes (Mr Combo) instructions on starting, I was shocked that with the second kick with ignition on it STARTED!! After about 30sec the choke was off and it was idling away nicely, and the engine is very quiet, no ringing from the cylinder or rattles!! nice one! While running I thought I'd check the charging system, yip its charging but just a bit too much... 16 volts at just off tick over. So I'll have to look into the problem. I did notice its got what looks like a more modern voltage regulator than I expected to see. I think I'll be taking a few pics and asking for a pointers on the MZ sites.... All in its turning out better than I thought :-)

Friday Bike

Just felt like I needed a 2 stroke fix today, what better than a Kawa and Yammy

MZ

Thought I'd quickly post a few pics of the latest bike to arrive at my door step, its a 1978 MZ 250 TS. There was an email from Mike, the Editor of the MZ riders Thistledown, posted out to everyone saying that a member was looking for a good home for his MZ. So come the following morning I was on the phone to find out a bit more about it, it sounded good so made arrangements to pick it up.
So as you can see in the pics its a bike! The plan is to try and get it running over the weekend , with an idea of taking it for an MOT test at the start of the week. I'll let you know how I get on....

Blog

I've been having a few problems trying to post things on my blog the last few weeks, hopefully I've got it sorted out. It seems to be the setting on my computer, as I can log on with no problems at work. Loads to post once it sorted..... cheers

HD XR750 (GLF)

A couple of weeks ago my mate Andy gave me a call on the phone, he was on his way home from a trip down South to pick up a bike as it turns out. We had a blether and he asks me to guess what sort of bike his friend had bought, knowing the type of bikes Dick likes it had to be a Harley, ah but what model? I started off with early Sportster, KH, nope, then it clicked a XR 750?... it was indeed and as it turns out it was the same one that Side Burn had posted a link to when it was for sale.
I haven't seen the bike yet, but Andy sent me these pics.... very nice!






and a few words from Dick

"The bike was, apparently, built in 1985 by Jim Kelly (later Jay Springsteen's mechanic) for Scott Pearson, who raced with the number ‘95’ plate that season.

I have added the letters GLF because I had a shot on it this afternoon and it does indeen Go Like Fuck !!!!"

Friday Bike

A while back there was a post on an advert showing the last of the BSA line up for 72, which lead on to talking about the BSA Fury/ Triumph Bandit. As expected when the factory closed there would be loads of spares to dispose of, and among the parts was quite a few frames for the "new" Bandit/ Fury's. I remember seeing a few dealers advertising them for sale in the magazines, even into the 80s. Over the years I've seen a few specials built with the frames. Triumph/ BSA had a go at building other "projects" with them, with a couple of them on show at the NMM.
So what brought on this post? well I was at a CRMC race meeting and spotted the bike below, its built round a Bandit frame, using a late 650 (70s) Triumph motor with a 750 parallel inlet head, topped off with a Bandit fuel tank... it goes as well as it looks