Tinkicker

As you say, marina fees are getting well out of hand. In 2007 we dipped our 22ft binliner into the waters of the river ouse at naburn marina York. Cost was around £850 plus the vat. By 2012, it had gone up to over £2k plus the vat. Meanwhile, they were busily building new shower blocks and parking for caravans and we were paying for it. The smaller boats as noted, were well attended on a weekend, the larger ones, your 40ft Princesses and Fairline Targas nope, never saw anyone on them, yet they were kept valeted and kept well by the marina staff. I suspect they were corporate tax avoidence devices, under the guise of " hospitallity". Naburn, although a delightfully picturesque marina got far too expensive and the less expensive boats started moving out as did we, we ended up in the very industrial " timber yard" on the Aire and Calder, where the fees started at £800 per year. Then the newer, bigger boats started arriving... And the mooring fees starting rising faster and faster, and the winter lift out, hull insurance, river licence, and the annual maintenance... By 2015 we had had enough, it was costing us over the year, the equivalent of £500 per night for every night we spent on Moonie. She had to go.. I admit, I shed a tear when I walked away from her. My heart grieved, but my head danced.. Still miss it sometimes. I do not miss the 4 mpg that I was getting from that chevy V6 motor at 6kts however...

Oil tank for the 175 duly arrived and fitted. An amazing reproduction of a long out of production and unobtainable part.

Still recall my green VFR750 bought brand new in 1997. It is on SORN and has no MOT history. Last change of logbook was in 2012. I look on ebay at least twice a week for it turning up, but apart from one exciting prospect that ultimately turned into a false find, nothing.

Finally got the vfr taxed and ready for the season.

And we come to the devil bike. How would she fare? What part have I not attended to in the past? If there are any, I can expect the worst. Never mind, time to get her road ready. First job was remove the left sidepanel to ensure that the oil pump check valve had held the oil in the oil tank, and not allowed it to fill the crankcase over winter... Oil tank appeared full. Great. Check valve is not leaking and is doing a good job since I rebuilt the pump. Boo. The oil tank had inexplicably parted company with the hinge over the winter. I had noted some very fine stress cracks in the hinge flange before, but they did not appear to be spreading. But of course, this was the item I had not replaced previously... I went on ebay to buy a remanufactered tank on ebay and found the supplier sold out ( it may be that my public service announcement on a dedicated yamaha enduro forum last week, pointing out this supplier may have been a shot to the foot - me and my big mouth). I have sent the supplier a message to see if he plans on making more. Is this the only part left that had not been replaced? Why it has failed after not been moved for 6 months is a bit perplexing. I shook my head and soldiered on. Fill with fuel, fuel tap on, allow carb to fill for 30 seconds or so and 4 kicks later, away she went. I warmed her up, changed the dead battery in the cylinder head temp meter and ran her carb dry again. I was going to give her a run today, but not with the insecure oil tank. Devil bike 0 Alkylate fuel treatment - sucess. That is 3 out of 3 sucesses and the way I will store my bikes over winter from now on. As for the other problems, that is just playing the vintage bike wack a mole game. Every part that fails and relaced is one less failure in the future. I think apart from the frame, the entire bike is brand new. Looking lovely in the spring sunshine and I must admit, she sounds as good as she looks. That comprehensive engine rebuild was money well spent.

Join the club. I have permanent jet engines roaring and whining away in my ears....

Another disappointed Oxford Boss Alarmed Disc Lock here. After 12 months of being sat on the bike in a dry shed, the alarm unit failed. New batteries did nothing. A quick look on google showed it was a common problem. Had no trouble with the lock itself mind you.

Up and about early. We put our clocks forward last night, so it is not a big shock come Monday morning. 20 mins work and she is done. Just needs taxing on Tuesday. I intend to put the big blue back on the road tomorrow. Of course, she is mot and tax exempt but I will do a full mot inspection on her before she ventures out on the road. Just a five minute job. Another ready for the upcoming season..

As with all my restorations, it is pretty much a brand new bike. Although the base engine has not been touched. A complete waste of time, every breaker knows that offering up a vfr engine meets with zero demand....

New o rings arrived. Fitted them and put the carbs back together. This time, since it was not a complete rebuild, I split them so I would not have to alter any adjustments. A far more fiddly way to do it, but if it meant saving my fingers from getting burned while rebalancing the carbs, so much the better. Thankfully Honda put everything on indexing spigots so everything would go together in exactly the same relationship as before. Otherwise burned fingers time.. Would my hope to avoid the dreaded balancing be true, or be thrown on the scrapheap? Only time would tell. Carbs fitted, tank on loosely, spin engine over till pump stopped clacking, then choke on and away we go. Run for a couple of minutes, look under bike for drips. Nothing. Remove tank and check the fuel manifold tubes.. Dry as a bone . Yey! Good for another 25 years.. Fitted airbox, put everything else back together and warmed her up. Checked idle speed. Smack on 1000 rpm as before and she idled as nice as before, so no burned fingers. It keeps raining and to put the side panels on requires the panels to be at eye level, and I need the bike outside to fit them, but thats only a 10 minute job for tomorrow. So instead of an expensive job requiring £60 for an extremely expensive set of Honda O rings, It cost me £3.37 in o rings ( with 6 spares) and three hours of my time. Happy with that. Till next spring and more gnashing of teeth as some other elderly part decides to croak... The joys of the vintage bike owner. Waiting for fairing panels and tax, then she is road ready. [

No autolube. That came in 77 complete with power restriction and pedal delete. The bent bars in front of the engine were an optional accessory in 76. Not sure if 77 went from rotary disc valve induction to Reed valve induction too.

New for 1976. Front hydraulic disc brake. Bigger forks, different carb and choke setup. And the all important yellow tank and sidepanels with the black Kenny Roberts speedblocks. NWY923P.

Yamaha FS1DX. Sold for £150.

Indeed it is.

School is what it is... A preparation of what is to follow. They say you cannot put an old head on young shoulders. But.............. If they did, the teenage pregnancy statistics would have spiked... I thought the girls were taking the piss, and I was far more interested in the products of Yamaha to bother studying any aspect of these crudely conceived " introductions". If not, the word would have soon gotten around that sit on my knee in a pretend piss taking way to embarrass the quiet lad would quickly lead to breasts being fondled. They started it.. Not moi. If I could go back now, but still be myself as today. School would have been far more fun.. And far less challenging. School is far easier than the reality of working for a living.

Be nice to have a look around the old place and bring back some hot memories and provide and answer some burning questions regarding my nostalgic view of those days.. Moved away from the area over 20 years ago and feeling nostalgic, put Birkdale High School into google.... Hells bells... I feel the need to assert that my 3rd year chemistry experiments are not to blame..

Carbs off and one split away to get to the offending seals. Honda wants you to buy two "gasket kit B" at over £20 each to get the required number of seals " which is why I never bothered last year. I thought they were a special size. It is seemingly top secret info as to the size of the o rings. Plenty want to rebuild your carbs with new o rings, but never tell you the size. So I removed a good seal and measured it. Bog standard 8 x 2mm o ring. On inspecting the leaky one, no idea why it leaked, it is pliable, clean and undamaged, with very little or no distortion. Plenty of "squeeze" left in it, but clearly not enough. I measured the outside diameter on the T tube at 11.5mm. So assuming a new 8 x2 o ring will give 12mm outer diameter, the old one has deformed by 0.5mm. I have ordered a pack of 10 viton o rings for £3.32. There you have it. 8 x 2mm. The cat is out of the bag and no longer a secret. BTW. To measure an o ring pick it up squarely with calipers on the inside diameter, let the calipers close, watching the scale closely until the o ring starts to slip and drop off under its own weight. That is your inside measurement. Then measure the cross section at 90 degrees to the loaded plane. If the o ring is deformed, the measurement will be a little " over" example 2.25mm. O rings are sized by 0.5mm increments so if 2.25mm, it has been squashed outwards slightly, so assume when new, it was 2mm. You can usually see if it has been deformed.

Got the long awaited phone call yesterday. My new tyres are ready for collection. Collected them this morning, all good. Fitted the right way around ect. Bloke in bike shop spoke to the importer and it transpires that bike tyres are flying out of the warehouse door as fast as they come in. They can't keep up with demand.... So much for biking in the doldrums. A very nice pair indeed. Refitted the wheels, took the bike outside and put a gallon of fresh fuel in. Will my scheme of emptying the tank and carbs and not touching the bike again all winter pay off without resorting to dismantling the carbs and cleaning them out again? Whir, gave it a few presses of the button to allow the carbs to fill and away she went nice as ninepence... Great. Wait! What is that drip under the bike? Aw bollocks its fuel, one of the floats must be stuck. bast*rd thing, I put all new needles and seats in last spring. Gave what looked like the offending carb a tap with the screwdriver. Drip, drip. Crap. Off with the airbox lid and filter, deffo not the carbs overflowing. Can't be the float bowls leaking because the gaskets were also replaced last spring and the bike behaved impecably. No leals whatsoever. That only leaves one thing... Shiiite. Of course, with my great luck only the most difficult job on the entire bike, entailing removing and splitting the carbs yet again. Remove airbox, stack horns and top plate to get a better look. Yup. One of the fuel manifold O rings has dried out over winter and I need to split the carbs yet again to replace them. I could scream... I should have replaced them last year, but they felt fine. Kicking myself... Wet brown pipe marks the spot.... AAAARGH! Mightily pissed off with old bikes at the moment... Its never an easy job that plagues them.

Just a suggestion apparently. Note to myself... Avoid London like the plague. Horrible place.

Nope. The sun has to be shining at least 14 days before, and forecast to be shining at least 14 days after I venture out. Have no need for pinlocks. They remain at the bottom of the hemet box.

Well I wrote off another comanche on a flight from hell. Brought the comanche back to leeds yesterday and this morning disembarked on a flight to Aberdeen. Returned this afternoon. After an uneventful flight, I was heading south over the Dales,with about 25 miles to Leeds. The cloud lowered and I suffered moderate icing over moorland tops and had to descend to just a couple of hundred feet above the moorland to get into warmer air. The ice slowly melted. Phew. Then the engine cut out suddenly.... A glance at the gauges showed plenty fuel, but no fuel pressure. I switched to the tip tanks, no change. I switched on the electric fuel booster pump.. The engine gradually picked up again. By this time I was getting ready to put it down on the moor, barely 20ft of air between aircraft belly and the ground. Obviously the engine driven fuel pump had failed. Disaster averted. Flew into the pattern at Leeds, lowered the gear handle and nothing.. Gear was not moving. Moved out of the pattern and put it on autopilot to figure out what was wrong. Checked my control bindings, all ok and working, so it was not a sim glitch. Tried to lower the gear by way of the mouse cursor operating the switch. The switch moved from "up" to "off" or neutral position, but would not stay in the down position. Great. Never mind, I still have the manual gear extension handle.... It would not work, jammed solid. Something had failed big time in the landing gear. So a wheels up landing on the runway at Leeds. Cut fuel, engine mixture and battery power over the threshold. and held her off as long as I could. Bent prop, broken crank and other mechanical mayhem ensued. What a hellish flight. Edit. Just about to shut down the PC and got a notification that windows wants to update and restart the PC. I bet that feckin update was the cause.. it was probably trying to open a window to "notify" me that it needs to update and restart.

Yup. Should a nuclear warhead detonate in the vicinity, I can guarantee that the two bikes in the pic will be the only two running vehicles for miles around... If they survive the fireball of course. Of course, you all know me by now, I have a spare VFR750 CDI lounging in an old biscuit tin for such a scenario.Dunno what is wrong with me. My default stance is always "what if"? Maybe it is because I always had shit luck...

Unsolvable?

Its one of those times when I am doing a little soul searching... I have three bikes to insure and keep roadworthy. Do I really need them? My heart says keep them, my head says sell them and buy something like an Africa Twin to do some serious miles on when I retire, or a full motion rig for my flight simulators. Ok, the VFR would do the miles, no bother, but not really the thing for two up long distances. The other two are not serious road bikes and never were. Just low mileage fun bikes to hoon around on once in a while... My heart gazes fondly, while my head says I am looking at around £9K of dead money taking up room in the conservatory.... What a quandary..