Sadly the RD's have recently gone and 400F replaced by the Blue restoration :grin: :grin: :grin:
Nice straight looking bikes Tink, I reckon
@Irish in Oz would approve of them. Hope you got good coin for them.
Nice those old RD's :onya:
I had a cou0le of older rd250's and 400's back when they were a couple of hundred £££ each .
Fantastic bikes almost as good as the rd350lc I had in 1987.
Wish I still had any of them.
Way to expensive now .
I'll never sell my RD, but I did say that about the Katana.
I have a few 2 smokers 65 Super Six, 69 Hustler, X7, 72 YCS5 200 Electric.
Nice one lrish :onya:
Lovely rd400
@Irish in Oz I'd love another one of those sometime I had a few back in the 80's when they were cheap.
Great bikes
Did the little RD's handle ? :whatever:
They sure did.
:rofl3:
Handling didn't seam to matter as much back then when I was in my late teens :facepalm:
They where the better of the bunch but they all needed a set of Koni, S&W or Marzocchi.
Here's a 55 year old. Will do when I get back to Oz, it should be about 60 then.
I look back at the old RD's and similar with awe when it comes to handling. Mine was an RD200 bought in 1977 and cannot understand how I and my mates got around tight left and right handers at serious speed with the foot rests sparking from hitting tarmac at 70 mph plus. The tyres were so thin and virtually square in profile back in the day. The grip was awful but we had no fear and somehow got round (well most of the time). Now we ride bikes on the road with 190 width tyres which are virtual slicks and worry about grip🤣😂🤣😂🤣
The first road bike I bought when I was 16 was a Mach 111 500 triple Kawasaki , going around corners was not in its DNA , lived with it for 5 years with many near misses, its in the shed for restoration so nearly 50 years later it will be good to ride it again to see how bad it really was. As you say Phil we don't know how spoilt we are (comparatively)
Horse
Thinking about it now I would love to see how the likes of Rossi would fair against the greats of Agostini, Phil Reed, Sheen and the many, many other greats of the 60's and 70's without all the kit they have in the modern era. I'm a big (massive) Hamilton fan (patriotism mainly I guess) but could he hold a candle to the likes of Lauda or Stuart back in my day of the 1970's? Or that said even James Hunt a great hero of mine of the 1970's. I do believe you can only be the best of your generation and if your streets ahead like Hamilton that perhaps makes you the greatest of all time. In all honestly we will never know. As with football my other great love, Pele, Maradona, Messi/Renaldo all the greatest of their era but who is the very best?????
I reckon true talent is just that, they would adapt but putting some of the fast guys back on the 500s would see some spectacular get offs whilst they were "adapting" Rossi on the other hand straddled both eras but putting them all back on the Agostini era bikes would definitely be interesting. I think the GOAT question is an individual thing as it will never be able to be proved one way or the other as I believe statistics don't provide all the facts to determine who is GOAT,
Only my opinion
Horse
Horse, wish i had Kawa 500 sitting to restore. Only prob is those old parts are so expensive. Yeah, what a ride those things were. Mine was about 30% more power than stock.
Mine too an engine rebuilder in the west was drag racing a mach 4 at the time ,ported and polished mine, with a set of chambers, a bit of re jetting it was manic ,nothing till about 6000 rpm and then just berserk, blue smoke everywhere and the scream of a banshee a bit of Castrol r 30 in the tank to get the smell to go with it . The frame and suspension was definitely not up to the powerplant like a lot of other vehicles in the 70s/80s .
Ahh to be 17 again ,
Yes don't expect the resto to be a cheap exercise but hobbys seldom are , you can't take it with you :cool:
Horse
A mate of mine from Melbourne phoned me one night and said, "Jeff I know where there is a Mach 1 500 and a Super Six for sale only a couple of K's from you, he wants them out of the way as a pair but I only want the Kawasaki" So the deal was I go get them hold the Kawa till he organised transport and I got the Suzuki :)
Quote from: seth on Monday, 18 January 2021, 11:10 PM
:rofl3:
Handling didn't seam to matter as much back then when I was in my late teens :facepalm:
Absolutely right! In my teens (mid `70`s), I was fortunate enough to be part of a large group of lads with bikes of all makes and sizes, and I don`t recall one mention of handling! We were obsessed with how fast we could go, and that was about it. The only limitation our bikes presented us with was ground clearance - especially two-up. Not just with the pegs either, have a look under the middle pipe of any 400 Triple (if you`re lucky enough to find one!), and you will find a flat spot where the metal should be round. Those (really) were the days :grin:
DP, never worried us much. CB750, lh corners with centrestand just holding the bike up, lots of sparks. Z1 was different, high speed tank slappers were scary. Mongrel bike. Perfect in most ways but always the frame bending on your mind.
Horse, forgot to mention. Your description of H1, so much same as mine. 550 Suzuki pistons, ports and chambers. Taking off uphill was delicate. 6k revs, incredible. Fuel stations always on my mind. My mate borrowed it, 1975, he still talks about the killer machine. I think around a 20 litre tank, fast trip one night, grandmother dying, 60ks and was running out of fuel. Maybe 8 or 9 mpg. Sure a bike to remember, always needed to be vertical at 6k revs.
Grog,
. 2 strokes are hard to get out of your system once your infected, have a RM 400 & 500 that get me a fix until the Mach 3 is back on the road, nothing like that feeling of the powerband ,a bit sad they are relegated to history I am sure it will put a smile on the dial when I get to ride it again ,
Have a good one,
. Horse