I've always had a particular loathing for Jap cum US customs. I suppose it’s related to my dislike for Americans: the things seem to embody all that’s vile about that awful, tacky, posers paradise. I can see them being ridden by great US clowns, like McDonald and Reagan; since I’m unfortunate in sharing the same first name with these characters I tend to avoid anything US in case someone makes the association.
Odd then that the only Jap bike I’ve owned this decade was a little GSX250T Suzuki (the eight valve twin in custom guise). While it was an experience that | personally would like to forget, I'm writing about it now because it was a primo example of getting a very useful tool together at an absolute minimum cost.
I bought the thing dirt cheap off a friend who'd spent quite a lot on it then lost interest and left it standing for 18 months. Like Guzzi’s V50, this model is ever popular with small women - this poor girl had loads of aggro cold starting the thing since Suzuki, in their wisdom, did not put a kickstart on it.
Overcoming a 10:1 compression ratio meant that she couldn’t bump it. It let her down on too many mornings, so she bought a Trumpet and left the little snotpile looking sorry for itself in the back garden. When I got it, it was virtually seized, all the chrome was rusted up and the back mudguard had been sent off for welding about a year previously (no-one was more amazed than myself when I found out that my friend had actually done it).
It did have a half decent chain and sprockets, and a usable rear tyre. 20000 miles on the clock, 1980 model, for a mere twenty quid. £50 might have been more like it, but a Triumph rebuild was in the offing and the cash was needed urgently. I decided to put the bike on the road for the minimum cash and effort, because I was broke and lazy.
The biggest single expense turned out to be the swinging arm bearings, since they were needle roller bearings at £21 a set. The originals looked like they had been assembled dry, so it’s worth greasing them occasionally. The other big hassle was that the owner's husband had done some typical Triumph owners things to the bike like connecting up the battery the wrong way round, thus destroying the rectifier/regulator. He tried to cure it by fitting a Zener Diode from a British bike. The problem here is that unlike British alternators, which churn out power all the time, the Japs are switched off by the regulators. While it worked alright and stopped the batteries boiling it meant the alternator was churning out power all the time. I solved the problem by forgetting the problem and not mentioning it to the person I sold the bike to until he’d handed over the cash.
I had a can of white Hammerite handy so did the rusty mudguards and swinging arm, both of which needed lots of bodging. The rest of the chrome and alloy (you could tell it was an enthusiast’s machine by the bare engine cases and spoked wheels) got the time honoured treatment of a good hard Brillo Padding. It all came up OK, though prone to corrosion again at the merest hint of rain. The cylinder bores had a similar careful, gentle loving enthusiast’s treatment - a quick squirt of oil then brute force until they freed off a bit.
I was planning on giving it at least a token running in period, but in practice it was so utterly gutless (mainly due to the motor being so tight) that I ended up just holding the throttle open in a low gear until the revs picked up. It was a hell of a job to get started initially. As I'd not had a Jap bike for long I thought I was probably missing something out, so I did an odd little Shinto ritual as offerings of onions, Go Cat and home brewed lager. It did start just after that, but I can never be sure if it wasn’t just because I connected three batteries up to it in parallel before pressing the button. With a sump of new oil and new suppressor caps, my classic restoration was complete. It handled a bit strangely, largely because I put an ancient Roadrunner on the front which was wider than the rear tyre.
It was dead strange riding it after years of European twins. I question the concept of making a bike with a laid back riding position and then having an engine that revs to 10000rpm. It was even stranger because of the lack of power and the straight through exhaust system due to terminally rusty baffles. Thus to get anywhere fast, I had to rev the balls off it, sounding like a F1 racing car with the performance of a Sports moped. Actually, this is a little harsh as it'll keep up with my brother’s 12 year old MZ250.
In fact, I suspect that the rings were gummed up on the left hand cylinder, as it was smoking and seemed a bit low on compression. I sold it for £175 to a bloke who lives nearby, with a knackered battery that meant it had to be bump started all the time, and I think it’s just run itself in with use. I had a run on it the other day and it’s going on with a nice spread of power. For the money, I was pleased with it.
Ron Price