HerrDeacon
Over 1,000 Posts
I'm not totally finished my other project, but since I'm not going to be selling it until spring I'll just pick at it over the winter. I wanted to start on the 350 before winter set in so that I could try and get it started so that I could do a bit of evaluation, especially with regard to compression.
I picked this bike up back in late October. Before even viewing the bike I pretty much decided to buy it. These bikes are, for some reason, very rare around here. This is the first vintage Japanese twin I've seen for sale in the past two years of looking, so I couldn't pass this one up. He was asking $395 but I was able to get it for $360, not a bad deal especially around here where I find bike prices to be really inflated for some reason. The deal only got sweeter as the following week he gave me a box of extra parts he had laying around for free. Great score as it contained a brand new petcock, points, condenser, brake shoes, throttle cable, spokes, plugs, plug caps, as well as some other used parts. Very generous of the seller as this was not part of the original sale, really appreciated it.
I'll be going the cafe route with this bike, but will be keeping the stock parts so that I can return it to original look if I want to change back in the future. This project is going to be a very slow and long one (especially compared to the 400 project) as I'm cash strapped and so I'll just have to work on it as funds allow. I'm not in a rush anyway as I have a daily rider anyway. I can relax and take my time.
The sale of 400 in the spring will hopefully help things along.
Here is how it looked as I bought it, pretty much complete just missing a few things like tach cover, battery, fuel line and a few small things. I'm far from an expert but I don't think the mufflers are original. All three of my bikes have this same exhaust. Also, on first glance the tires looked fairly decent (lots of tread) but on closer inspection the rear is totally dry rotted. Front and rear didn't match anyway so I'll get new ones just before putting it on the road.
Overall its not in too bad a shape, far from great, but very workable. The frame has some surface rust. I was hoping the chrome on the wheels would be good but there is a fair bit of rust, looks like I'll have to end up stripping and painting them. :cry:
I picked this bike up back in late October. Before even viewing the bike I pretty much decided to buy it. These bikes are, for some reason, very rare around here. This is the first vintage Japanese twin I've seen for sale in the past two years of looking, so I couldn't pass this one up. He was asking $395 but I was able to get it for $360, not a bad deal especially around here where I find bike prices to be really inflated for some reason. The deal only got sweeter as the following week he gave me a box of extra parts he had laying around for free. Great score as it contained a brand new petcock, points, condenser, brake shoes, throttle cable, spokes, plugs, plug caps, as well as some other used parts. Very generous of the seller as this was not part of the original sale, really appreciated it.
I'll be going the cafe route with this bike, but will be keeping the stock parts so that I can return it to original look if I want to change back in the future. This project is going to be a very slow and long one (especially compared to the 400 project) as I'm cash strapped and so I'll just have to work on it as funds allow. I'm not in a rush anyway as I have a daily rider anyway. I can relax and take my time.
Here is how it looked as I bought it, pretty much complete just missing a few things like tach cover, battery, fuel line and a few small things. I'm far from an expert but I don't think the mufflers are original. All three of my bikes have this same exhaust. Also, on first glance the tires looked fairly decent (lots of tread) but on closer inspection the rear is totally dry rotted. Front and rear didn't match anyway so I'll get new ones just before putting it on the road.


Overall its not in too bad a shape, far from great, but very workable. The frame has some surface rust. I was hoping the chrome on the wheels would be good but there is a fair bit of rust, looks like I'll have to end up stripping and painting them. :cry:

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