50 years old go and ride your 1973 bikes.

mauricejota7604

mauricejota7604

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Location
Victoria Australia
For all those with a 1973 year model bike guess you don't need to be a mathematician to recognise that your bike is now 50 years old.
Yesterday as the weather was perfect and I have been feeling a bit sorry for myself I decided I should ride one of my 1973 bikes just to celebrate motorcycles built 50 years ago, in fact I managed a 1000 kms, it was about 24 degrees all day with the sun shinning on my back and a gentle sea breeze with rich green grass in all the paddocks as we have had so much rain!!
Quite a contrast to what would normally parched brown paddocks with dry waterholes everywhere, there seems to be large groups of Kangaroos enjoying the extra feed alongside grazing cattle and sheep.
Motorcycling its just the best medicine!!!!
 

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Made me think what I was doing 50 years ago. I was 16 and had bought 3 Royal Enfields for £7 off a classmate's dad. They were Model G 350s in various states of repair and I managed to build one from the parts, but had to wait eight months until I got my licence. Back to present day and a friend has almost completed another from the remaining parts.
 
Fifty years ago I was punting (if that's possible) a Honda CB200 around the south of England, including trips to the west country and Scotland.
 
I was trying to convince my parents into letting me buy an MT 125 Honda, the road-legal and glacially slow version of Hondas 2 stroke Elsinor MX bike. After constantly hearing no I just went and bought one and got it delivered, Fuck it I was 17 and it was my money. I couldn't even ride a bike with a clutch but Minibikes had seduced me for life.
 
mauricejota7604 said:
For all those with a 1973 year model bike guess you don't need to be a mathematician to recognise that your bike is now 50 years old.
Yesterday as the weather was perfect and I have been feeling a bit sorry for myself I decided I should ride one of my 1973 bikes just to celebrate motorcycles built 50 years ago, in fact I managed a 1000 kms, it was about 24 degrees all day with the sun shinning on my back and a gentle sea breeze with rich green grass in all the paddocks as we have had so much rain!!
Quite a contrast to what would normally parched brown paddocks with dry waterholes everywhere, there seems to be large groups of Kangaroos enjoying the extra feed alongside grazing cattle and sheep.
Motorcycling its just the best medicine!!!!
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Brilliant Maurice!
 
Good on you Maurice.
Love to see the older bikes being used.
Also nothing like a motor cycle ride to clear the head.
Have a great New Year.
Chris Narrikup Western Australia.
 
Nicely done Maurice. Good point, my SF is 50 ish, so that will be getting some TLC for when the UK weather warms up a bit.

50 years ago I was trying to perfect doing a wheelie on my push bike and just drooling against motorbike shop windows. I had to wait another 6 years until motor power came along. Funnily enough on the push bike I could wheelie indefinitely, on a motorbike not such a hot shot at it, bloody useless actually. I could have done with Ron as my tutor.
 
as Haggis, but I am slightly older, 50 years ago I was badgering the life out of a saleman to sell me an SF1 for £1000 in cash which I was waving, this was the owner of Commerfords in Thames Ditton, the same place that Steve Mcqueen chose to prepare his ISDT bikes at, it escaklated from a numpty no nothing, to a proper salesman and then the boss, it was a very lon and gard awkward session, I had not a fiver more to buy his £1199 Laverda SF1 which was a single unit of the two he was allowed to sell before Slaters withdrew their dealershipstaus from him, I never knew what happenned to the other one, it might have even gone back to Slaters. The long and the short of it was that I WON and RPF715L was mine, six weeks later and having clocked 3,500 miles (the first service was done at Slaters for a quid and half labour (yes £1.50 with the oil charged at £1), I had wrecked it to the point that it was costing £900 to repair, the invoice included a new frame and a new cylinder head but both damaged items were reused, I never told Norwich Union about that! the head I knew about, very quickly, but the frame took some time, the numbers were correct (well they would be wouldnt they) and Graham Binnion confessed that they made a turned dolly, so as to head the head stock to cherry red, and beat it back into shape to take the bearings which had broken and spilled out! I would be amased if the frame was staright after that, but it rode OK, and was wrecked again six years later (another story) it might have even been the worlds first insurance write off 750SF1.

I still have it and it is languishing, it is now a Clegbiverdason, you can see it in Andy Wagners catalogue or pictured below as was before the leading links came into play. 50 years in the same persons ownership, without a break,? is this a record? or a black circular vinly thing.
well dome Mo!
CLEM
 

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I'm liking motorcycles over 50 more and more.
A drum brake triple is too much like a modern bike without brakes. :)
50 years ago, I was starting my medical studies and trying to pass my bike test.

Paul
 
I got my first taste of motorised two wheels in 73, on a friends honda 70 field bike. It was another few years before I got a licence and not until ’78 when I got the GTL.
 
In late 1973 I was with my older brother who was going to buy a motorcycle at the Suzuki dealer. They had just received the first 1974 Suzuki RE-5 rotary bikes which I was lusting after. My brother wanted a GT750 but did not buy it. He eventually got a 1969 Kawasaki H1 which to this day is the worst handling bike I have ever ridden.

I ended up with a Yamaha RD250.
 
Back in 73 I was in my last year at prep school hoping the girls, on school trips, would get their tits out on the back of the bus; and doing my best to avoid getting beaten by our sadistic house master. therefore, Motorcycles didn’t feature heavily in my thought processes at the time. How times have changed.
 
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