Just thought I’d post a line or two about what’s happening with the bikes around here.
1982 Honda Passport
On Saturday May 20th my little Street Cub project from my last post took a best in class award at the 2023 VJMC National Rally. We had a great time at the rally which was held in Eufuala Alabama this year.
A real Dream of mine.
A few months ago I finally got my hands on a nice early Honda Dream. This is a 1962 model CA77 It would actually start but wouldn’t idle or charge a battery. I went ahead and installed a VM22 Mikuni carburetor on it and got it running well. The original ignition switch fell apart so I rewired it with a modem switch and a solid state regulator – rectifier and now it’s extremely reliable. One day I plan to take care of the cosmetics but it’s fun to ride like it is. It’ll never be purely stock again but it will be very nice one day. I’ll tell you more when the time comes.
1983 Honda VF750F Interceptor
At the Fast Lane swap meet during Daytona bike week this year I snagged this ratty old Honda Interceptor to keep my Royal Enfield Interceptor company. It was dirt cheap because it had no title but after a thorough carburetor overhaul and a new fuel pump it ran good enough that it was worth it to go through the “barn find” title process. The paperwork finally came through this week so it’s time to get it safe and ready for the road.
It is the end of the second day of the 2015 VJMC National Rally, and a little rain is falling from a passing thunderstorm this evening but for most of the day the weather was beautiful and the group rides went off without a hitch.
We all had a great time on a various rides to various different places in the mountains. My wife and I actually followed the tiddler group up to the Sugarland visitors center, after a brief visit to the museum we proceeded to the Metcalfe Bottoms picnic area where we had a nice lunch.
In the meantime the convention center continues fill up with an ever increasing assortment of nice bikes as people rolled in.
It turns out I’m not the only one who brought a 185 Suzuki.
Above is an entire row of classic Kawasakis.
Here’s a nice original XS500
After a great BBQ supper we listened to a presentation from Pete Boody the owner of Pistol Pete’s services who is restoring the prototype Goldwing serial number 2. Pete gave us a good run down of the early history of the development of the Goldwing and the difference between the prototypes, the pre-production units and the final production units.
It has been a terrific day and I do have some video footage from the ride that is up on YouTube.
Today was the first day of the 2015 VJMC National Rally
Here are a few more pictures from the first day’s action .
I actually feel bad about loading the Suburban Assault Scrambler onto to a trailer for this short little trip, but I wanted to take both bikes.
This blue and white Suzuki water buffalo is terrific looking.
Another blue and white Suzuki.
A Honda Grom and a CB 1100 parked outside of the Convention Center.
A raffle bike from the Cincinnati group.
It just wouldn’t be a vintage motorcycle rally without a Honda ST90.
A beautiful Yamaha but check out the odometer below.
Before I sign off for the day, I just have to include a picture of my Suzuki TS185 sitting inside the convention center with all the pretty show bikes.
Boy life has been running wide open these last few weeks, There have been a few ups and downs but overall more ups than downs, so if you hear me complaining, just ignore me things are actually pretty good around here.
In my professional life (the one that pays the bills since I seem to be unable to sell enough motorcycle parts to survive) the last few weeks, my spare time has been devoted to studying to take the Certified Solidworks Associate exam and this past Saturday I took the test and passed it! So now in addition to my other software skills & certifications I am now also certified for Solidworks 3D CAD as well.
A couple of weeks ago I was trying to change out a 20 year old motorcycle tire when I bent a top of the line name brand made in U.S.A. tire iron. Instead of taking this as a warning I continued try to wrestle with the ancient rubber until I pulled a muscle in my shoulder.
So I decided at last to try to buy a manual tire changer. My Dad already had the Harbor Freight cheapie car tire changer that he used to change his truck, lawnmower, & small tractor tires and was very happy with it. He finally got himself a new truck and decided last week that being 72 years old, he didn’t want to fix his own tires anymore, and sent the tire changer home with me. I ran up to my local store and grabbed the motorcycle tire attachment. Unfortunately as delivered out of the box with the changes that have been made to the rim clamps on this latest redesign, it was useless. It might be capable of mounting a fresh new tire without modifications, but if you are like me and frequently deal with the treasures, (‘er junk heaps) that you have dragged up from old barns, cow pastures, and junkyards then it won’t be of much use to you either.
Since the next cheapest manual motorcycle tire changer I could find was 600 bucks it’s time to order a few parts & make a few changes. I will post more about those adventures later after I get all the parts in and put it all together. In the meantime I broke out my reciprocating saw and took care of the next pesky tire.
I like cutting up
We are heading into the heart of motorcycle show & rally season now here in the southeast, The Myrtle Beach Hog Rally, and Atlantic Beach Bikefest are the two biggies along the coast. For the vintage & antique bike lover, this weekend (May 2, 2015) in Panama City, Florida is Bikes on the Beach, in Spencer, North Carolina is the Carolina Classic Motorcycle Show, followed in two weeks by the AMCA Southern National Meet in Denton N.C.
It’s time once again for the one of the premier shows on the Vintage Japanese Motorcycle Club calendar; The Destination Eustis Vintage Motorcycle Show! I attended this show last year and although I am unable to attend for this year I was so impressed that motopsyco.com is one of many fine sponsors of the event this year. At this time I am definitely planning to return in 2016.
Please note that just because this is a VJMC show does not mean only Japanese bikes, Bring out any old iron you have be it American, British, or European there are classes for everything as long as it is vintage!
Just a reminder that this Vintage Motorcycle Show will take place inside the Lake County Fairgrounds EXPO Building. It is a secure facility with the ability to load and unload motorcycles inside the facility in the event that it rains. This is a premier VJMC show venue. There will be no Bike for Sale signs on any bike entered into the show. Also only bikes entered in the show will be displayed in the main expo building.
Here’s a little walk through of last years show to give you an idea of the quality of machines you can expect to see there.
The International Motorcycle Swap Meet and Vintage Motorcycle Show is taking place at the Lake County Fairgrounds in Eustis, Florida March 6-8, 2015. This year’s event continues a legacy of more than 20 years of vintage motorcycle events at this location. We would like to thank the City of Eustis for graciously supporting this event. Once again they will host in our honor a Downtown Block Party on Friday evening, March the 6th. On Saturday, March the 7th local business will provide entertainment and local restaurants will open their doors for all event attendees. So come join us as share our event with the City of Eustis and their local businesses.
A few weeks ago I attended a small but but high quality motorcycle show hosted by the VJMC (Vintage Japanese Motorcycle Club) of which I am a member. It was nice to see the other folks in the club at this meet which was held in conjunction with the Squealing on the Square barbeque festival in Laurens S.C.
Fantastic 1967 Honda CL77 Scrambler
One of our state field reps and one finest gentlemen you could ever hope to meet brought a portion of his collection. One of the bike he brought was this most excellent 67 Honda CL77 Scrambler. Since I have a soft spot in my heart (or is that in my head?) for this style of motorcycle no matter what it’s country of origin, year of manufacture, or even it’s condition I decided to take a few extra shots of this one and do a bike feature on it.
all the gauges you really need
Need some parts for your Scrambler? Click here!
Even though they are all commonly called 305s today you can see that the original tank badges on this one call it out as a 300 cc. This badge is completely authentic but it is exactly the same engine.
Note the steering damper in the above photo. To me the early Honda twins like this are some of the finest looking engines ever built. The fact that nearly every surface on the cylinder and the head, except for the points cover are covered in cooling fins really sets it off from later machines.
Of course we can’t forget one of the coolest looking features of these old scramblers, the high pipes.
High Pipes Baby!
An interesting feature of these early scramblers is that the mufflers are not an integrated part of the exhaust system but were actually an add on that the owner could choose to install and remove at will depending upon where they were riding.
So when you see one out in the wild and it looks like this remember the muffler isn’t missing, it was optional.
Twin leading shoe drum brakes brakes on both ends were state of the art back in the 1960s, and are still reasonably safe & effective on lightweight machines like this for today’s traffic when set up properly.
Truly a handsome old bike from all angles so I am going to close out this post with a head on shot that I really liked.
The 67 Honda CL77
Peace Y’all
P.S. I am going to be accepting submissions and suggestions from other motorcyclists for this feature, please click here to reach the contact form on my about page, and let me know what you have, and if I think it is cool and/or oddball enough to suit my tastes it will be featured here..
Here is a little video I shot of the show in Florida on March 8th 2014 enjoy. For my thoughts about the weekend keep reading below the vid.
Last weekend I did a few live blog posts while I was at the VMAs swap meet in Eustis Florida. Today after I’ve had a week to sitback and reflect upon ago I thought I would share of you things I learned from the experience did take a few used items for sale along with the display of Rock oil products and the battery or two, but my main goal really were to help publicize this blog, and just get out and have a good time and made some people. I am a member of the vintage Japanese motorcycle club so I went for the show and to help support the group. It turned out to be really great show using my favorite judging system which is 100 percent people’s choice the winning bikes decided by audience vote and not by a judging panel. This did lead to a couple of interesting surprises, such as in the all custom motorcycle class a heavily modified Tomos moped took first place while a Harley Davidson V-rod took second. It’s just totally crazy and restores my faith in humanity when things like that happen.
T’was great fun and very educational for us meeting some of the other vendors and talking to them. I have a confession to make, I have made a point of deliberately avoiding large motorcycle rallies due to the snobbery of certain groups and types of posers riders and I had forgotten just how much fun it was truly hang out with a bunch of great old fashioned bikers who didn’t really care what you rode as long as you rode. I love old motorcycles of all kinds, hell I love most new motorcycles too, there are just certain styles of machine that I prefer and certain companies whose way of doing business leaves me cold. Motorcycling is about freedom, individualism & personal style not conformity to someone else’s expectations.
Mrs. ‘Psyco and I would like to thank the other vendors who were so helpful to us, especially the wonderful lady from Crazy Bob’s Biker Apparel who really helped us out with setting up our canopy.
everything I wanted growing up!
The show was actually very large but the swap meet area was not quite as big as I was hoping it would have be but it was still nice and there was a large variety of different motorcycles. Next time I go to a swap meet, especially if I’m selling I do want to camp out at the meet between the gas and the fact that I wanted to stay in a hotel this week’s profit was not existent but I had mainly went just to enjoy myself and have a good time. My beautiful financial manager said next time we should definitely camp out and she would have done it this time as she is the one who is hardcore where as I’m the old guy with the soft chewy center. In all honesty as far as taking used parts to a swap meet unless they are things that are really older and valuable from a strict point of dollars and sense you’re better off to sell them online, but you would miss the camaraderie the chance to stumble across the good deals or to find unique objects. Even so I have learned a few lessons and next time I won’t take any disassembled mid 80’s motorcycles project bikes and parts. Unless it is something that would be a really great deal to sell as a complete motorcycle those should be left at home, just pack & sell the things that are truly nostalgic. Almost all of my early seventy’s on the stuff was gone the first day I sold a few dirt bike parts, couple a spark plugs, & some points but that was pretty much it.
I should have bought this and installed an early GSXR1100 motor in it!
There were quite a few good deals to be had and next year I might have to leave room in the van so that I can do a little shopping myself. Since I returned home my day job has kept me wide freaking open so I have not even had the chance to fully unpack yet. At least I found a new owner for the Kawasaki that no one would even look at in Eustis, so it can be unpacked at its new home this week. Look for us at a few more events around the southeast this year.
euro trash makes for fun restorations
It was great time and I hope to see you all on the road out there, somewhere, someday
Peace y’all
early Sunday at Lake Eustis
I should probably go back one day just to go fishing…
Welcome to the Asylum 