2stroke4stroke

Unless they are rarities or you have a great personal attachment I would have thought that the cost of getting them here would be out of proportion to their usefulness. There's no shortage of used bikes over here, though good used bikes may be a different matter, depending on age. There are some remarkably young and scarcely used bikes advertised at times.

Just unscrew the nipple from the top of the plug. It could be that there is not a brilliant connection between plug cap and HT lead. Cut it back slightly then screw the cap back on. Is there a screwed connection at the coil end? I don't recall resistor plugs specified for Fantic so you want neither resistor. I have known bikes with a poor looking spark that ran well for years.

I seem to recall a Bantam years ago where the exhaust was the main frame. No doubt someone will remember who made it.

If you want to find out about a real stuntman and injuries then look up Putt Mossman.

I think your logic is flawed, but it may depend where you live. I remember the stushie when trials fees went up to £7 about thirty years ago. Now we seem to pay a tenner for the average trial. That does not seem like an excessive increase to me.

Something and nothing. They weren't trying to do a backflip at that speed.

Prepare to be seduced.

I will be prepared to take the rubbishy original off your hands and dispose of it in an environmentally sensitive manner

I consulted Silkolene and they said 50 to 1 unless using in sand etc where a bit more was recommended due to the motor working harder. Semi synthetic. Oils are much better now than when we ran 50 to 1 thirty years ago.

The late Ralph Venables had similar ideas but, as nobody was receptive to him, they won't be to you.

Possibly but, given that it was "running great" before, there may be no need?

But slacken the pinch bolts first!

Given the pressures the crank seals are designed to hold at full chat I would expect the bung to be forced out before the seals would fail. Just hold a bit rag lightly over the exhaust if you want to quieten it for the neighbours while running for a short period.

Just as an aside I feel the real value of registration is that it enables identification of historic or significant bikes. Now that so few bikes are registered, let alone that some supported riders seem to use several bikes in a season, we have largely lost the ability to say that a bike is ex so and so or the one that somebody won the Scottish on etc. I feel this is a loss to posterity but probably most folk no longer place the same value on history/provenance with modern bikes? You may well be right about the value. I know someone who had a BSA that had been owned by someone notable (whose name I can’t now recall) but he sold the registration number thus reducing the machine, in my opinion, to just another old BSA.

I stored a TY for a few years and filled the crankcase with oil to prevent corrosion. The bolt was useful when it came time to revive the bike.

The 450 had, as I recall, a totally different motor, all black not that that matters.

A pal bought a Bultaco back in very early Seventies and the numbers did not match. The local dealer said this was something to do with avoiding purchase tax which did not apply if the bike was sold in kit form, which it wasn't. The introduction of value added tax closed that loophole.

I never had one of those, it was my very early Bultacos then Ossa, Montesa and Suzukis that disappeared. And, to answer Deryk's point, the young lads weren't buying them as showpieces for there was nowhere to show 'em really.

It seems to be done but the reasoning is beyond me. Why seal a bearing when it sits in a constant supply of fresh lubricant mist?

Cue rapid increase in prices of these scarce early machines as demand soars in order to take part in these events. A side issue of which is something that always puzzled me; why, after selling a trials bike in those days, did they never seem to be seen again - who bought a trials bike not to use it?

A bit of tyre soap makes getting the tyre on the rim dead easy, even with short levers (or none at all if you're lucky). Getting it blown in to position on the rim should not really be a problem if you take the advice above. If the tyre comes (and a second hand one won't) with the two sides close together (some have cardboard packing to space them out) then put something in to space them apart and leave for a few days. If you can get a good seal using the strap or bicycle inner tube then it is possible to blow the tyre on with a bicycle track pump. Not many garages have a decent compressor nowadays but the guys at your local tyre fitters might be open to persuasion.

I'd say a lot of that looks like old damage. I bet it had a healthy rattle before?

You'd need a heck of a sook to tear the filter material apart where it is held down by the airbox top, which is what would have to happen. If you think about it, for any given period of running, there's twice as many chances for a filter to be drawn in on a twostroke and I can't imagine it has ever happened.

Indeed, but one works machine winning a title (ridden by a rider who we now realise probably could have done just about as well on an enduro bike - see the videos) doesn't negate that most private owners seemed to find them something of a headache with starting problems etc. Not many take on Honda at their own game and beat them. As I said I'd like to see it but I don't think it's realistic.

"Adequate" was the term used, I believe. If it's even the same as the 4RT it will be plenty for its intended use I would have thought.