Cheers for the history lessons, mine is far shorter and far less interesting, but there's a handfull of bikes involved in it still.
First was interested in bikes when a family friend offered me a go around their yard on the peewee 80 when i was around 10 (around 1989), i got as far as halfway through the controls tutorial before my mum cottoned onto what was happening and pulled me off that thing quick smart
. Didn't think about bikes for a long time after that.
Fast forward to mid 2002 and i started thinking about wanting to do things for myself after a the end of a horribly shit relationship. I did some research, borrowed a trailer and bought a a971 cb250 that was effectively a rolling wreck thanks to the extremely half arsed electricalwork done by a past owner. Got my L's and got that badboy working after effectively rewiring about 20% of the loom and replacing all sorts of bits and peices on it. It was tall, heavy, and went like stink. Just a shame that it was running lean and left me stranded on the M2 about 25km from home with a hole in a piston
. Couldn't get it repaired for a decent price, so sold it to a mate to turn into his dream cafe racer. He got as far as stripping it down and then put it into the too-hard basket and offloaded it on ebay. I had put about 1000km on it before the motor grenaded.
Next up was my first Kawasaki, an EL250 that had been fitted with flat bars, this was a hell cool little bike and did everything i asked of it for the 8-9 months & 8kkm i had it. I then found another kawasaki, this time an ltd450 that was a real chopper-y style bike. I wasn't a fan of the bike style, but i knew the motor was basically half of that of a gpz900, so i knew it would be a solid engine. It's a shame they didn't make a different model that was a little more sporty, but it was the only bike i could afford to buy at the time and was actually quite reliable and zippy considering what it was. I had this bike until a week before my P's ended when i sold it (10kkm on that one).
The day after i got my full license i bought a GPX750R, this bike was fantastic, and the only reason i sold it was the fact i had gotten the shits with the old-tech suspension and the 16/18inch wheel sized & associated choices in rubber. That bike had everything, reliability, a super sweet smooth motor that i still miss to this day and for a big bike was super easy to just throw around. I put around 30kkm on that in about 2.5 years.
Next up is the era of shame, where I sold my Kawasaki and bought my current bike, a RF900R. Some people love the looks, others hate it. I'm rather indifferent about it. One of the biggest reasons i got it was the fact that it went well, had a sweet motor with a fat torque curve the entire way through and a bulletproof gearbox/bottom end from a gsx1100 (
they use these in drag race bikes bored out to 1350cc with the bottom end stock & untouched). I've had it about 5 years now and have ridden it considerably less than the other bikes, partly due to a couple of indiscretions with the law costing me a suspension and unfortunately removing some of my enthusiasm, which is a bloody shame. That being said, i have two bikes as well as a car, i just need to get out and ride more i think. Thus far i've put about 35kkm on her in that timeframe and she's just rolled over the odometer to 0 in the last couple of months.
Lastly is my second current bike, a little gsx250 that i bought as another rolling wreck in 2008 as i always regretted not bringing the cb250 back from the ashes. She's been a right bitch as old bikes often can be, and i'm hoping that I've gotten the bugs out of her. I just need to take her out for a good cobweb removing blast in the next couple of days. KM done so far, about 8km since purchase, and remember that she was non operational for the first year or so.
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