The Cliche....

[Fat Albert]

Hi all, I am a typical bloke in his 50s who rode bikes in his yoof

My Wife has been against me getting back into it for decades, but her viewpoint has softened this year when our 19 year old son did his A2 licence and agrees it would be sensible for me to get back into it to keep an eye on our lad.... 

What has hastened this is the accidental acquisition of two bikes.

Firstly my son found a pair of derelict bikes in the farmyard over the road, the farm had been sold so the farmer just told us to take them as the yard was going to be cleared. Turms out it is an almost complete XT125 and half of a DT125R. The DT had no frame number so I broke that and sold off the parts.

It took about 6 months to get the Registration sorted for the XT, DVLA could not help without a reg even though it had matching engine and frame numbers. After some googlage I found the very helpful Paul at https://www.motorbikeregistrations.co.uk/ Who was able to access DVLA's own systems and provided a full download of all info held including the registration number  - turns out it is an 1982 so one of the first! I stripped it right down, resprayed the frame and swingarm and am now rebuilding it.

One of my friends was needing to clear out a factory unit he had and having heard that my son had fallen off of his SV650 offered me his XJ550 that was complete apart from the carbs being off as a stop-gap, but it hadn't run for over 11 years....

Life has got in the way a bit, but the carbs are now clean and back on, the forks rebuilt, the brakes, oil and air filter changed and it now runs - however not as smooth or reliably as I would like, so new sparkers and plug caps arrive Friday which will hopefully smooth things out - if not then valve clearances are next...

I never did get my licence back in teh day, so have done my CBT and Theory, and as soon as I have smoothed things with the tax man will book my Direct Access course for Jan/Feb

 

[drewpy]

great intro