I eventually found my Yam RD250LC in Blackpool. It had been stored for two years and had a bit of a dent in the right-hand exhaust, which is pretty typical of the breed - if it hasn't got a dent it's been fixed. I think I've yet to see one more than a few years old that hasn't been dropped. This particular bike was an ’80 RD250LC, completely standard with 11000 miles on the clock. The dent in the exhaust unnerved me, but the guy was willing to haggle, so a price of £475 was agreed upon.
Before putting in for the MOT I decided to have a closer look at the bike to make sure it was OK. The first upset was the swinging arm bearings. These looked as if they hadn't seen a grease gun since leaving the factory, result - cream-crackered. An interesting point to note here is that wear on the swinging arm bearings on early LCs was excessive as they were made from nylon. The later steel ones are much better and can be fitted to earlier models. The other problem was the front tyre, an original Yokohama that was swapped for a TT100 to match the rear.
After this little episode a trip down to the local MOT station resulted in a pass. For a 250 the LC pulled really well throughout the rev range. This was much more of a flexible motor than the peaky road rocket l'd expected. Cruising at 50-60mph around the 5-6000rpm mark was comfortable with a totally contented burbling sound from the motor, and town riding was a doddle. This certainly wasn't what the bike was bought for, but it does go to show the LC's versatility.
First good stretch of straight road (the M6) I opened it up. Acceleration was crisp up to 90mph, but to get the last 10mph it was chin on the tank stuff. 96-97mph caused the front end to go light and a slight weave cum shake seemed to be setting in. But there was no turning back, 98-99mph then the ton slowly crept up.
The next few weeks were spent scratching around my little piece of England (Wigan) and learning to pull the occasional wheelies. The bike was 100% reliable, starting first or second kick and only required tensioning of the chain and a new set of plugs now and again. The only gripes I had, in these wonderful weeks of owning the bike, were poor front brake and spindly forks, which had a tendency to flex under braking and cause the bike to weave slightly at speed.
One cold night, some months after purchase. I was returning home from college and decided to take a detour through a nearby village, just for the fun of riding the few extra miles. On coming to a slight downhill stretch I noticed three cars in front crawling along at about 20mph. I’ll be past these with a quick twist Of the throttle, thought I. So, booting down a gear and winding on the power, I commenced to shoot past the row of cars. Unfortunately, I'd timed my overtaking manoeuvre exactly with the silly cow in the leading car, who developed a sudden urge to make a right turn into her driveway without signalling.
Needless to say, avoidance was impossible and the first sign she got of my presence was the sight of a young man sailing gracefully through the air and over the bonnet of her car. If Billy Smart had been there, I'd have been picked for the trapeze act. but that’s just my luck, if I fell into a barrel of tits I'd come up sucking my thumb.
A legal wrangle ensued which lasted for a full five months and at the end of that I received only £150 compensation. This little episode put me right off fast road riding. It’s just too unpredictable or rather people are too unpredictable. Lesson number one, always expect the unexpectedl
From that moment, in the summer of '87, my attention switched from the road to the track. I tarted up the crashed LC and sold it to raise the money to buy a production racer. One was found for £300. This LC had a dent in each exhaust and a paint job that hid various scratches and dents from too numerous crashes. It had a full Stan Stevens engine tune, Michelin Hi-Sport tyres (£130 a pair for 300 miles of use). Goodridge brake hose which just about cured the weak front braking, a very useful steering damper, heavier fork oil and fork spacers to tighten up the front end.
All that would have been needed was a fork brace to cure the slight amount of flexing left under heavy braking and the normally weak and flimsy LC forks would have been transformed into really useful stuff, but aftermarket fork braces aren't allowed in proddie racing. The point I’m trying to make is that the bike I bought was in far better mechanical condition, better handling and braking, and generally superior to my road bike which I’d bought a year before for more money. A proddie racer could be a cheap way of getting a fast roadster.
I’ve since sold this LC and am now looking for a 350LC or YPVS. As far as I'm concerned the LC was and is a good bike in all respects, with a few cheap mods can be made into a great bike (I was actually out cornering an RGV at our local tight and twisty track). The sixties will be remembered as the time of the big Norton and Triumph twins, the seventies of the big Kawasakis. Jotas and Dukes, but the eighties belong to the LC. Hooray!
Rob Bartlett
"About £250 is all he wants for the RD250LC, only thing is it's been down the road. Headlamp, clocks, that sort of thing." Back to a July night in 1983. TWX58W was just over two years old and seemed a bargain even with the battle damage. Gravel rash on the tank, headlamp rim, shell, clock bracket, dents in the silencers, etc. £235 later, crash helmet with the entire aperture filled with a huge grin atop a man's body, putting petrol into the tank ready for the ride home.
Another quick dip into the bank account and with the aid of the magic spanners saw the headlamp and clocks in their new home and the thing insured. Well, almost. The chrome headlamp rim had no hook to hold it in place at the top. Never mind, a bit of the old masking tape will hold it in place instead (still there after seven years).
The tank had gravel rash but no dents as such, the front mudguard was cracked and the exhaust downpipes had their once kinky black satin finish turned kinky iron oxide instead, but remember, this bike was bought as a go to work and nip around to the chippy hack.
OK, so the finish isn't too grand but whassit go like? First impressions were that l was seventeen again, only then it was my mates who had RDs, etc, whilst I had a boring and slow CB250G5. This bike was just the opposite, I've ridden quite a few two strokes and the first thing you notice on the LC is the lack of clattering resonance. This is the watercooling.
Engineering buffs will know that this gives the ability to machine the barrels and pistons to closer tolerances by virtue of the more even heat distribution, and helps to deaden the sound. This is why the thing doesn't clatter when cold, plus you get a bonus in performance. The reed valve induction and expansion box style exhausts combine to endow the engine with decent performance for its size.
Out on the road, like any performance two stroke, the LC is very bland up to about five thousand revs with only sedate acceleration. Somewhere between five and and six grand there's a rather annoying hole in the power curve. Holding the throttle at these revs produces a stuttering. sawing motion. I learnt to go down a gear rather than ride through it.
From about six grand onwards she’s a little humdinger with the sort of performance that sees off rear tyres and chains in no time. By 9000rpm she begins to run out of steam. Gear changing at 8500rpm drops the engine neatly into the power band to give vivid acceleration. Don't try any wild heroics two up, though - in traffic light GPs the engine screams, the clutch begins to bite and the front wheel heads straight for the milky way.
Fuel consumption, in general use, was about 45mpg and racing the nob in the Opel Manta turned in 35mpg. Another bit of consumption was broken speedo cables, not a disaster, though, as in fifth gear 10mph equals 1000rpm so it's easy to work out how fast you're going. Not long back the speedo drive also broke. Only one tacho cable ever broke but I stripped the plastic thread at the engine end putting the new one on. Top speed was just under 110mph solo, which is reduced to just over the ton two up.
Nowadays the old girl is getting a bit tired and doesn't quite manage those velocities. Handling, when everything's in good order, is reasonably nimble. However, the usual worn tyres, leaking forks, etc produces much white lining and a less than secure feel.
In the whole time I have owned my LC l have only had regular bitches about a few things. First, the way chains and tyres go west (my fault, but I can't help it). Secondly, the front brake seizes up if not used for a few months, the bleed nipple is made of putty and the standard brake hose and seals need replacing. Lastly, the thing is an utter pig in the rain. My complaint is not of the wild power delivery spinning the rear tyre, the back end lashing out and the handlebars wrenching themselves from your grip. No, it's the bloody electrics. Just show it a picture of a downpour and the Yamaha becomes a stuttering, misfiring, stalling nightmare. All good stuff when you're pulling out of that junction with a forty ton artic bearing down upon you at 60mph on a rain sodden road. No amount of effort has brought about a complete cure, not even riding in shorts and shades to kid the bike into thinking the sun's still out.
Other small gripes include poorly designed clamps on the downpipes that let the pipes blow, even with two gaskets don't let them kid you into thinking that British bikes are the only ones that things fall off. l have lost one complete indicator, one lens and two exhaust baffles. Oh, and the quality of finish is terrible. The front tyre lasted 15000 miles, rear tyres are finished after 5-6000 miles. Chains should be replaced at the same time but I’m a bugger for removing links to save wallet damage. In 15000 miles we used one set of disc pads and am part way through another. The rear brake shoes are still original but getting a bit past it by now.
Nothing untoward happened until the winter of '85. Then I suffered my first tumble. Yup, even the best tyres in the world can't grip on black ice. A truck driver and a nice young lady picked me up. I guess I’m what you’d call a masochistic show off. I always fall off when everyone’s looking. Damage was the usual stuff, bars, winker lenses, clutch lever.
Through the start of '89 another, imminently more serious, problem started to rear its ugly head. The battery seemed to be repeatedly running flat. Being the original one, it wasn't foolish to think maybe it had cried enough. A replacement was duly purchased, installed and everything went hunky dory - then that one went flat too. Then, strange things began to happen. When the lights were on they went dimmer as the revs increased. It was the middle of winter, it was cold and miserable - and so was I.
It could be very frightening on the M62, when wagons were spewing up gallons of dirty water and no-one could see the Yam through the gloom, with cars trying to occupy the same space as the bike and I. One night's charge would last one to two days, almost as good as my life expectancy. Something had to be done.
Oddly, the engine never missed a beat as I gamely did my best to tackle this stupefying problem. I did what I could, all the block connectors were cleaned, the rectifier was checked, a secondhand wiring loom was bought, and all the fuse clips were removed, cleaned and fitted with new fuses, as the existing lot were pretty dire. Last of all, the alternator output -- aha, only output on two lines. A burnt out wire next to the connector was the culprit. Thank god for multimeters.
Unfortunately, the LC was showing its age with other fits of pique. One day on the way home. the temperature gauge began to shoot skywards. My brother’s house was a quick detour away, so I dropped in and found the radiator dry, topped it up with water and sped home. I noticed that what was usually a few spots of oil from the gearbox output shaft seal, had turned into a sickly green pool.
I changed the oil. Everything was okay, then one day l was a little late for work... my reward for thrashing the bike was for the radiator to empty its contents into the gearbox again. It was either £9 for a new water pump seal kit, put the case in the oven at a 1000 degrees for four hours or pay a tenner for a used case with good innards. No contest. A new gearbox shaft oil seal was bunged in for good measure.
A few weeks later I had my own personal apocalypse. Almost late for work, I was gunning down the M1 into Leeds. I saw a car's bonnet nose out into my lane as I sped serenely along. Further down the road. I saw him flashing his lights at me. I obligingly pulled over to let him pass. Bloody yuppie in his Granada showing off, I thought.
Turns out it wasn’t, though, it was a nice PC testing out his new video camera. We sat in the front seat of the car to watch a replay of life in the fast lane. He wasn't Spielberg but I looked pretty good doing a steady 89mph. The police owned the copyrights and they wouldn't pay me a percentage. One year later I'm still waiting for the charges to turn up - as the offence was committed in a 50mph zone the fine would have been huge and my life not worth living when the wife found out.
The following Monday, disaster struck again. The motorway was wet and I was following a slug's trail of diesel oil, wisely staying in the next lane. The sun came out and I couldn't see the oil any more. I decided to use the first of two possible exits, leaving the motorway by a sharp left-hander followed by a sweeping right.
The two vans were parked in the undergrowth next to the chevron marker, right on the point of the left-hander. Odd, I thought, the council must be out early. Next thing I knew I was sliding up the road to join them. I had braked to around 40mph for the tight bend, but the road was awash with diesel; no-one would have stood a chance. The audience watched with grim resignation as l ground to a scraping halt under their feet.
The bike fell quite heavily as the front wheel slid away. The old girl was still rideable but only just. The bars were bent again, the end broken from the brake lever, the forks twisted, the clock surround scarred. a front and rear winker lens smashed, and the main stand bent into the scraped nearside silencer. I struggled into work. Everything fixed eventually but when parked up pools of oil kept appearing under the machine. One of the casings had punctured in the fall.
A strange engine rattling gave even more cause for concern. I thought that the small end might be on the way out but it turned out to be a broken barrel stud. Stripping the affected cylinder showed that it could be an engine out job. The gaskets hadn’t leaked, I took a chance and rebuilt the top end and ran the motor without one stud. Also, the ingress of water had done some damage to the gearbox, higher gears are noisy at high revs.
Even after all the abuse heaped upon her, she still ran and continued to do so right until the insurance and MOT ran out. She sits in the garage as you read this, waiting for an injection of cash and tender loving care to get her back on the road.
The tank is a mess of rabid paint and rust, the pitted forks have wrecked the seals, most of the paint has fallen off the frame, she is grimy and looks unloved. But just a couple of kicks will bring her back into life, with a choking pall of blue smoke and my helmet still fills with a huge grin at the thought of riding her.
Willy Eckerslike