Mr Bignel

happy days - this pm at bignal towers 🙂

thunderace is go - went to Great Tew in Oxfodshire with John (my farmer friend) who likes to pull miserable faces in photos, apparently the Beckhams live in Great Tew, we thought we would lower the tone a bit 🙂

happy days are here again, back on the road..yippee 🤗

two steps forward and one back...but it is running!

still struggling on EXUP working following replacement ICU, now fitting new ignition switch, will probably have to fit another generator (used) as regulator is suspect. trouble is the core part is the bit that suffers so you might as well get your existing re-cored as opposed to trying to find good used.

greetings fellow yamaha club persons, my bike which is nearly 30 years old - been off the road for a while -- as you can see i'm having great fun sorting all sorts of niggle type items in the hope of a breakdown free summer.

facebook and youtube have both deteriorated imo in so far as some material presented appears slightly suspect, if it makes me less inclined to sit at the pc although maybe that's a good thing lol. Well done winning a motorbike!

on tyres my limited experience is of avon road riders (?) which i thought good all round, last a while, good for relatively budget. then with the thundercat 600 i tried mitchelin pilot 5's i think, these are reputed to be good in the rain and I believe that they were but i felt the rear wheel go a couple of times in the dry so that slightly tarnished them for me although possibly that would have happened with any bike because the thundercat is an agile bike that lends itself to mild abuse ha-ha. Now on the thunderace i see that i have bridgestone tyres, so far these have been fine although somehow one doesn't tend to subject the thunderace to anything too tricky because of its size and weight i suppose, once i had to brake violently but that was OK. Just my rambling thoughts.

not what you would expect from a tyre fitter - weather here in the UK is horrible but I venture out a bit on chores, it is the time of year that we don't get a lot of daylight which, together with overcast skies, gives a feeling of gloom, not biking conditions although, in the past I've been a motorcycle commuter so it's what you get used to. The alternative was a train, each week one day my train would be cancelled so the next one was brimming full, rather face grim weather on a motorbike than that lol. Our railways here have always been awful, in my time and my father's time.

got to have tyres in a condition that you can trust - our only points of contact 🙂

I find myself thinking about this coming year with a certain amount of nervous dread I regret to say which can't be a good thing. Where I live it is getting busy, more traffic, house building and rush - you can get round it with planning routes and times, that is the new way to go it seems.

The Tunderace was meant to be with mechanic Simon at Milton Common motorcycles, about 10 miles east of Oxford UK today but it turned out that his place was shut and according to a note on the door and a conversation with a relatively nearby shop/cafe owner he has been off ill since late November. Later, I found out that he had a heart attack, presumably recovering at present. Arranged to take the bike to another place and booked it in for about a month from now.

lower fairings off pending a visit to a local bike mechanic (panels off saves his time) for a bit of checking and refurbishing, temp bodged some indicators on the front top fairing to ride it over to the mechanics place, hopefully it will be good for 2026 thereafter. Main worries are a noise which is likely a worn EXUP valve, I'd like another opinion and a check on the tensioner for the cam chain if necessary. Other thing is a tendency to back fire when restarted, it lifted the carbs off their seating on one occasion. Perhaps carburettor balancing will resolve that, I hope so.

PS oops should be 2026 on the card, my mistake 🫨

i've had much worse, usually i'm to blame lol.

thank you for sorting it out - hopefully things will be OK

unexpected backing up on exits happens here in the uk too now, part of the incident may be down to constrained vision available due to the concrete and tunnel effects but you'll be aware next time. we all get caught out occasionally so bad luck covers it i suppose although having had that happen it sharpens the old sixth sense so not all bad and no contact is something to be grateful for. hope you have a good Christmas and new year.

finding that the site, this site YOC, has been 'off the air' as it were the last few times i have attempted to visit.

you somewhere around leeds s/bite? i was a student there for four yrs in early 70's - over 50 yrs ago lol at the then polytechnic.

crumbs i'd better check my radiator. your valves shouldn't need doing again for another 27K I think it is. I've got a loose exup valve in the exhaust system, still works but makes a clicking sound at times, mainly when cold. Replacements are difficult to find in operational order. You can't get too excited riding in these parts around Oxford and the Cotswolds as it is relatively crowded, there's dual carriage ways and motorways but they are busy too. For quieter roads I need a whole day to leave the area and get over to the west towards Wales. Have you noticed how Thunderace prices are dropping in recent times? I guess if problems were to mount up one could realistically consider another similar bike if you could find one without without issues.

a lot of money to find but the equivalent here doesn't sound that bad at £714.65 UK have you hasd to pay out on the t/ace much s/bite? don't like to tempt fate but so far it has just been low level stuff for me like oil, filters, cables..

swingarm would be difficult as not possible to protect the wiring that well, as it is i can largely keep feeder wires out of harms way but yes that's something one might associate with a cruiser I suppose, low lights, hog style. My motivation is hearing about or seeing videos of bikers getting rear ended, so trying to attract attention or catch the eye might assist.

yep, bit on the marginal side but having put them on just flipping thewm back was easy and anything that may help..... bit obscured but Ok I think

amber/yellow flank led with red led facing rearward rear quarter view