Back by popular demand! (Well two people asked)
It won the challenge, but it wasn’t really a fair fight.
If you remember the date had been set, and although my brothers and I had rescheduled for a full three weeks later in order to allow MOT’s etc, one of them did at least have the decency to phone a few days before and admit he’d failed.
He’d set his heart on a X7 for some bizarre reason, either that or a jawa outfit!? eh?. Anyway, it seems that the little suzuki has gone the way of RD’s though – prices gone through the roof no matter what condition they were in.!! Not wanting a fully restored item, and not wanting a basket case at £800 meant he’d held off, and so was going to have nothing to show at the challenge. He’s still looking though – looks like the idea of returning to a 2 stroke is calling him.
My other brother was suspiciously quiet.
My mighty KR1S was ready for the fight however. I even T-CUT the tank that I got from RedDevil and tailpiece to a dazzling finish to phsyc out the opposition.
The faring was still in a million pieces in tesco bags, and I haven’t bothered to find a new one in case I ended up buying one of that dangerous Danny Harris chap, so it was going into battle naked.
The majority of the carburation leaks were cured, but the inlet rubbers looked in such poor condition that I daren’t subject them to any further agony by refitting the airbox. I looking in my old moped racing spares box for some K&N filters, but only found one, which alone looked stupid, so the carbs stayed open.
I’d previously checked that the autolube system was working correctly as the service manual read, and it was do no more running premix.
Before I decided that I wasn’t going to be ready for the MOT, I had been struggling with the back brake. I didn’t want to buy a new disk (remember the budget) but all the rears I could find 2nd hand were really badly worn. The ridges on them were huge, really attracting attention to the wear. I’ve never seen an MOT tester get his micrometer out though, so I put the disk in a lathe a work and skimmed the ridges off it, then shot blasted it. Made a bit of a noise cutting over those drillings but looked good when finished if a little thin!
I changed the rear tyre, put a new chain and sprockets on it, some new pads in the rear and that was that.
For reasons of legality I trailered the Ditch Salvage to within a mile of my brother’s, unloaded and then conducted a selection of top speed runs past his house early one morning until he came out to see what all the noise was.
He looked slightly depressed to see the fairingless beast smoke rattle and roll it’s way past.
He perked up slightly when he saw the petrol soaked inner thighs of my jeans where the poorly set up air-boxless carbs has been spitting fuel back out. He cheerfully pointed out that the battery looked like it was melting.
His GPZ was clearly not ready for the challenge. When I asked where it was he said it was in the sheds. “Sheds?” I enquired.
Yeah, half’s in that shed and half’s in the other! Sounds like his “gasflowing” hadn’t gone quite as planned.
He pulled out a “back on the road” Ex-CB500 cup machine that he’d picked up cheap, but not cheap enough to qualify for the 750 (pounds + cc’s) challenge. He fired it up a proceeded to rev the nut’s off it in neutral so I could sample his home-made exhaust. This went on until his neighbour came out waving her jam making spoon at us in a threatening manner.
Anyway, the victory was clearly mine, but despite the fact that it runs (really quite well at high rev’s) the Ditch Salvage is clearly in a bad way. I’m going to have to go a bit further back before I can progress any further forward and so I really need to have the crank out and check it’s condition. (remember all that sludge.)
In total it stands me nearly £200 pounds, but it’s probably time I got rather more realistic. Don’t get me wrong, I’m going to stay thrifty, but some things you’ve just got to pay for.
Doubtless engine removal will cause the crumbling loom to disappear and so it’ll need rewiring.
Doubtless I’ll cock that up and burn out the CDI or something equally as horrid.
I’ll not post any of the boring stuff that you’ve all done yourselves before, not unless something weird and wonderful happens or if I find myself in the depths of depression, needed some encouragement.
What I have noticed from the forum is that we’re all very different. I’ve certainly not got the same skill set or patience as Waki, and sadly this KR is never going to look like one of his. But, as I say, we're all different - variety is the spice of life - and the question you’ve got to ask yourself is can Waki make a raspberry meringue?
