The Bikeshite Thread

[hairnet]

20 minutes ago, Jerzy Woking said:

Riding around Andalucia again for the last couple of days.

The more I explore it, the more brilliant roads I find. The Alto de Velefique is still stunning, despite this being my 5th visit here since December.

bassa

[hairnet]

@Cavcraft and another locals

wanna do mold ruthin and other bits saturday?

need to go out fuck sitting in the house

[Cavcraft]

2 minutes ago, hairnet said:

@Cavcraft and another locals

wanna do mold ruthin and other bits saturday?

need to go out fuck sitting in the house

I might struggle Saturday (working in morning) but definitely be up for it another time.

[hairnet]

afternoon would be ok - avoidance of sunday herberts

[Stinkwheel]

On 20/04/2025 at 17:52, mat_the_cat said:

I did notice these had been done recently 👍

What's the difference between these and the originals? They look perfectly suitable to me.

the originals are hard lines with rubber sections, the mild steel of the hardlines corrodes and leaves you with leaky oil pipes.

Some people bodge them repeatedly with JBWELD or similar, some people buy good used, some people buy the reproduced ones (when available) and other just use generic flexi braided honda blackbird lines (like on yours)

[UltraWomble]

Saw this on facebollocks

[castros_bro]

So Portugal has decided that road going motocycles/tricycles/ quads no longer need annual inspection (MOT). Seems to be move to get more persons on small two wheelers for environmental reasons.

https://www.olx.pt/carros-motos-e-barcos/motociclos-scooters/?page=3&search[order]=filter_float_price%3Aasc

[Cavcraft]

14 hours ago, UltraWomble said:

Saw this on facebollocks

🤣🤣

[martc]

18 hours ago, UltraWomble said:

Saw this on facebollocks

Top bants, miserable as usual. Doesn't wave.

YMCA

[Snake Charmer]

On 22/04/2025 at 18:49, Asimo said:

Spent a long time in a Hereford traffic jam today, next to a Honda 350 four;  L suffix, so 1972 ish. 

Did that model come to the UK?  I remember the 500 four, and the later 400, but a 350 is new to me.

I remember the 350/4 from books and magazines at the time as a US model, l have a vague memory of seeing one at a bike rally in the 70s. 

[Hawkeyethenoo]

1973 CB500K update. Have submitted V55/5 application to DVLA as historic vehicle. Fingers crossed. Applications can take weeks, so need to be patient.... Have been replacing fuel pipe, adding inline fuel filter, lashing the carbs with carb cleaner and fixing the chain & stowed main stand interaction by adding a longer bolt to the stand stop. I'm trying not to spend pending DVLA reply, but beer driven eBay interaction has seen a stock Honda front airbox and inlet rubbers bought as pod filters are gash. Who buys a cafe racer and sets about putting it back to stock? ME! 👀

[martc]

4 hours ago, Snake Charmer said:

I remember the 350/4 from books and magazines at the time as a US model, l have a vague memory of seeing one at a bike rally in the 70s. 

I think the 350/4 was for the French market. Prior to pan Europe harmonisation they had a tax and or insurance break at 350cc. Moto Guzzi also made smaller versions of bigger bikes, in particular the V35, V35 Imola and V35 Florida for France.

We had a similar situation in the UK where cc based insurance made some desirable bikes uncompetitive and uneconomic to buy, the Honda CB900 was actually 902cc so fell into the next insurance bracket reducing sales as it was competing with hairy chested 1000cc bikes. MZ's small bike was the TS150 in most countries, but for the UK they reduced it to 125cc to fall into the learner bracket, a good move as it was often the best selling learner.

 

[Stinkwheel]

1 hour ago, Hawkeyethenoo said:

1973 CB500K update. Have submitted V55/5 application to DVLA as historic vehicle. Fingers crossed. Applications can take weeks, so need to be patient.... Have been replacing fuel pipe, adding inline fuel filter, lashing the carbs with carb cleaner and fixing the chain & stowed main stand interaction by adding a longer bolt to the stand stop. I'm trying not to spend pending DVLA reply, but beer driven eBay interaction has seen a stock Honda front airbox and inlet rubbers bought as pod filters are gash. Who buys a cafe racer and sets about putting it back to stock? ME! 👀

I think it’s an admirable thing to return a cafe racer’ed bike back to more standard. A lot of folks who do the modifications don’t seem to realise they are making the bike run and ride worse with their ‘cafe racer improvements’ 

Don’t even get me started on how badly bikes tend to run on pod filters (unless a lot of expensive rolling road work has been done)

[Cavcraft]

My old 750/4 chop had these type of air filter covers on...

...they looked good, but were as much use as a pogo stick to Heather Mills.

[Snake Charmer]

2 hours ago, martc said:

I think the 350/4 was for the French market. Prior to pan Europe harmonisation they had a tax and or insurance break at 350cc. Moto Guzzi also made smaller versions of bigger bikes, in particular the V35, V35 Imola and V35 Florida for France.

We had a similar situation in the UK where cc based insurance made some desirable bikes uncompetitive and uneconomic to buy, the Honda CB900 was actually 902cc so fell into the next insurance bracket reducing sales as it was competing with hairy chested 1000cc bikes. MZ's small bike was the TS150 in most countries, but for the UK they reduced it to 125cc to fall into the learner bracket, a good move as it was often the best selling learner.

 

Were they popular in France?

[Stinkwheel]

Nice day for it, 100 miles this morning on some of the lovely roads round here

The bargain basement SV has turned out to be a pretty damn good purchase, which is nice 

[MrGTI6]

Just got back home after a spontaneous 80-mile ride and decided to follow it up with an equally spontaneous BBQ. 

Hoping for many more days like this in 2025!

[martc]

20 hours ago, Snake Charmer said:

Were they popular in France?

Don't know about the Honda but I think the Moto Guzzis sold well.

[Sham]

2 hours ago, Stinkwheel said:

Nice day for it, 100 miles this morning on some of the lovely roads round here

The bargain basement SV has turned out to be a pretty damn good purchase, which is nice 

My 2023 SV also clocked up over 100 miles today, glorious sunshine and lighter gear for the first time this year.

Lovely jubbly.

Pic isn't from today, because there was just too much riding to do.

 

[Barry Cade]

I was out for a bit  with a mate, been fettling his T509 Speed Triple for the last week.. brakes all refurbished, fork rebuild, horrible wiring issues sorted, EML dealt with, throttle bodies refurbished and remapped. Even put new bulbs in the clocks.. Did about 120 miles and it was freezing! 

My 1050 continues to be excellent. Longest I've ever had a bike!

[Matty]

3 hours ago, MrGTI6 said:

Just got back home after a spontaneous 80-mile ride and decided to follow it up with an equally spontaneous BBQ. 

Hoping for many more days like this in 2025!

I'm not a well known mardy arse but still, days like these (tm Matt Monroe) perfection 👌 

[scdan4]

Screen on the goldwing is knackered. Heavily scratched, a bit opaque and old sticker marks/residue. It's not like a normal bike screen that you look over, you look through it a lot more like a car screen, and this one is bad to the point of dangerous 

although it photographs well. Low light, wet or sunny conditions all make it distractingly bad enough that it needs sorting. A new one is £100, no bother really.

But wait...

What if I polished it up using wet n dry in a headlight restoration type way? Might work. .. 🤔 and there's nothing to lose so might as well give it a go.

Wet n dry out and soaked in the slightly soapy water. Start on one edge to make sure it works well before doing the whole thing. Feeling confident because the selection pack has given 2000, 2500, 3000, 5000 and 7000 grade papers. Surely that's going to polish it up proper good and clear?

🤣 Nope. Safe to say that has not improved it at all.

Dickhead. 🤣😂

New one on the way. 😄

[Fat_Pirate]

Went along to the Royal Enfield day at Sammy Miller's museum yesterday.  Loads of shiny bikes (apart from my 'Ceptor, I've been flat-out on house renovation so haven't washed it since last season), there were even some people under 50 years of age (not many, mind).

[hairnet]

17 hours ago, scdan4 said:

 

🤣 Nope. Safe to say that has not improved it at all.

Dickhead. 🤣😂

New one on the way. 😄

had this on mine - only bit of the bike not cleaned as i look over not thru it - even if ya clean it it stays like that

[hairnet]

1 hour ago, Fat_Pirate said:

, there were even some people under 500 years of age (not many, mind).

 

 

 

[hairnet]

was two smoke there

@Cavcraft will have been at the first meet

 

[andyberg]

Day off so I thought I had better enjoy the sun. Trip down to Cheddar, through the Mendips and a stop for a snack. It’s like being a teenager again🤣 sounds and smells from this bike that I used to hear/ see everyday. 

[Cavcraft]

Sixty eight and a half wonderful miles today, to a former scrap yard now nature reserve. Anyone's who ever visited it will very likely know where the place was, just from this bridge...

This was the main entrance, an office was here and some sheds/workshops further back to the right, iirc...

It was absolutely HUGE, it went right past the tress in the background and more besides. They cleared the place out when it shut a few years ago, but there's still the odd bit there and no doubt sill some buried.

Being the former tyre fitter and sad bastard that I am, I instantly recognised the Metro metric wheel and tyre and the Michelin XZX

There was a tree root growing through that beauty ring

I shamelessly liberated that mud flap (think of the environment!)...

Any ideas on the tail gate? It was another victim of a tree root (and half a wall) so I couldn't really get it much further out...

Bit of 0898 RED HOT BRIDGE ACTION XXXX

 

Went past a garage that's for sale on the A49 heading out of Whitchurch (mentioned on AS somewhere recently) so stopped for a photo

A very grand morning out. Even managed to overtake a few lorries and whatnot on the A41, and because I didn't have to be home desperately  quickly, I came back a different way from going and took some radnom narrow lanes here and there.

If a bit of a day out, some exercise, fresh air and random car part spotting (very random as most of it will be buried by now) tickles your fancy, maybe we could have a shiter's meeting there one day. It's not a million miles from the Raven/Midway truck stop or the town of Ellesmere, where in the latter case you can pay £275 for a cup of semi-warm tea, feed some ducks and possibly see Owen Patterson (again), call him a badger culling twat (again) but this time push him into the mere.

[scdan4]

Took the commute scoot the long way home from work to get fuel. 120 miles done on 4.3 litres. 😁 

Commute is much nicer in the warm sun so hopefully it will hang around a bit. 

 

[UltraWomble]

Using it for work at the minute 

Planning an oil change this weekend