Gearbox
Member
Hi, Just joined as at 68 I'm like a schoolboy excited to have bought my first Triumph Bonneville T100, a bike I've wanted since first throwing my leg over a bike at 17. All bikes looked like this at that time but none did it so well.
My first was a BSA C12 250cc pre-unit construction which I bough for £10 and sold on for £10 two years later. It was a single cyclinder thumper which didn't need a rev counter as you could virtually count them. In those days you could ride a 250 on a provisional. Top speed was about 70 (with a following wind) but a great bike to learn about bikes as I eventually stripped and rebuilt most of it, engine and frame and yet when I started I didn't know what a gasket was. With the BSA of the time chaincase gaskets were apparantly of little use as no matter what you did there were always spots of oil underneath.
I was fortunate to have a granddad who was a bike enthusiast and bought me a newer BSA Bantam when I sold my C12. He had owned a lot of sidecar rigs with a stream of bikes including Triumphs, Nortons, BSA's and an Ariel Square four. If only I had them now!
The Bantham lasted a few years then I bought a BSA 250cc Fleetstar.A great bike to look at but it still incorporated a lot of engineering such as wheel and crank bearings from the pre-unit days and, especially the crank bearings, they couldn't take the increase in power and would wear out quickly.
A short lay off from bikes when I started work had me car driving which I never felt the same about as bikes. Then in the 90's I went back to them with a throaty Honda CX500 and yes you either love 'em or hate 'em. I loved it. The engineering might have been a bit of a backstep with push rods again as distinct from overhead cams but it was an easy bike to work on. But working on it was often not necessary as the engine was, as they say, bullet proof.
The CX500 lead into another very late CX500 and then after a couple of years I acquired chopper CB750 Custom as well. I had often fancied the four pot but it never seemed to run as well as expected and it was eventually sold to a guy who totally overhauled it and found an intermittent fault on the coils, something I and others had tested for but missed. After going through a bad patch I had to sell the CX500 as well which I found hard but it did go to an enthusiast and with all the work I had done on it, it was it tip top form.
After a couple of years I bought a Honda Pan European ST1100 and my wife and I toured on it here and in France. It's a big lump of a bike but when riding it I found it to be one of the most comfortable and easy to control bikes I had owned - but don't let it fall on it's side. The one thing about it which was really noticeable after naked bikes was the pain in the neck the fairings caused every time you wanted to service or work on it. The jobs were often doubled in time taken by having to remove some or all of the fairing modules. On the road the fairing was great keeping wind and weather off but for maintenance I had to get back to a naked bike and being our circumstances changed I suddenly had the chance of a 2012 Bonneville T100. At this time I'm like a kid a few days off Christmas, as it's being delivered next week, and I just can't wait. I'm reading and watching anything to do with it. Bikes, you've gotta luv 'em.
Thanks for reading my ramblings. I look forward to joining you all on the road, on the Bonneville
My first was a BSA C12 250cc pre-unit construction which I bough for £10 and sold on for £10 two years later. It was a single cyclinder thumper which didn't need a rev counter as you could virtually count them. In those days you could ride a 250 on a provisional. Top speed was about 70 (with a following wind) but a great bike to learn about bikes as I eventually stripped and rebuilt most of it, engine and frame and yet when I started I didn't know what a gasket was. With the BSA of the time chaincase gaskets were apparantly of little use as no matter what you did there were always spots of oil underneath.
I was fortunate to have a granddad who was a bike enthusiast and bought me a newer BSA Bantam when I sold my C12. He had owned a lot of sidecar rigs with a stream of bikes including Triumphs, Nortons, BSA's and an Ariel Square four. If only I had them now!
The Bantham lasted a few years then I bought a BSA 250cc Fleetstar.A great bike to look at but it still incorporated a lot of engineering such as wheel and crank bearings from the pre-unit days and, especially the crank bearings, they couldn't take the increase in power and would wear out quickly.
A short lay off from bikes when I started work had me car driving which I never felt the same about as bikes. Then in the 90's I went back to them with a throaty Honda CX500 and yes you either love 'em or hate 'em. I loved it. The engineering might have been a bit of a backstep with push rods again as distinct from overhead cams but it was an easy bike to work on. But working on it was often not necessary as the engine was, as they say, bullet proof.
The CX500 lead into another very late CX500 and then after a couple of years I acquired chopper CB750 Custom as well. I had often fancied the four pot but it never seemed to run as well as expected and it was eventually sold to a guy who totally overhauled it and found an intermittent fault on the coils, something I and others had tested for but missed. After going through a bad patch I had to sell the CX500 as well which I found hard but it did go to an enthusiast and with all the work I had done on it, it was it tip top form.
After a couple of years I bought a Honda Pan European ST1100 and my wife and I toured on it here and in France. It's a big lump of a bike but when riding it I found it to be one of the most comfortable and easy to control bikes I had owned - but don't let it fall on it's side. The one thing about it which was really noticeable after naked bikes was the pain in the neck the fairings caused every time you wanted to service or work on it. The jobs were often doubled in time taken by having to remove some or all of the fairing modules. On the road the fairing was great keeping wind and weather off but for maintenance I had to get back to a naked bike and being our circumstances changed I suddenly had the chance of a 2012 Bonneville T100. At this time I'm like a kid a few days off Christmas, as it's being delivered next week, and I just can't wait. I'm reading and watching anything to do with it. Bikes, you've gotta luv 'em.
Thanks for reading my ramblings. I look forward to joining you all on the road, on the Bonneville
Welcome, from Northern California.
TO TT , excellent introduction!
