Recently purchased from the original owner, a 1975 Bultaco Sherpa 250.  The bike was registered in Northern Ireland and I have brought it back to England.  I have sorted out the registration as it only had the original hand written document issued in NI.  So, a new V5C has been issued after DVLA sent an engineer to check it all out.  The bike is exempt from road tax and MOT, and as no lights were fitted when new, it does not have a brake light.  I realise I can only use this bike (on the street) during daylight/good visibility, but would anyone know if I have to fit a brake light.  I have read elsewhere that if the brake light wasn't fitted from new then it is not needed.  But this was a classic bike forum and not specific to trials/off-roaders.  I know for safety it would be good to fit one, but this detracts from the originality.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

No tail light leaves you required to hand signal stops.  1975 Bultaco Sherpa 250 pretty sure did come with lights unless they were removed at the dealership to race prep.  Brochures from the period show them with scooter sized lights and a rubber plate mount on the rear fender, speedo and a horn.

I had a 1960 trials bike mot'd successfully with no lights of any sort . (Bulb horn  and cycle type Speedo fitted)

Does the bike currently have a lighting coil installed?  

In the UK/NI a 1975 Sherpa supplied as an observed trials machine would not have had lights fitted. Brochures of the period featured machines as supplied to other than the UK/NI market.

The machine may or may not have had a lighting coil as supplied, but this is irrelevant to the stoplamp question as the stoplamp was powered by the ignition coil on machines supplied to other markets with full lighting equipment.

To quote from the UK M.O.T Testers Manual  (excerpt from the relevant section) : -

Section 4.3.3 states  stop lamps are not needed on motorcycles that : do not have front and rear position lamps.

HTH

Edited July 5, 20242 yr by lorenzo

Thanks guys for the replies.  No lights fitted from new, which I know could be had, probably as an option.  The reason I bought the bike was because it was the exact model, colour etc that I learned to ride on (in 1st gear) when I was 10Y/O.  I have a photo of my dad's bike which he used to commute to work on, and he only had the bulb horn, front number plate (as this was required I believe at the time) and his rear number plate, both black backgrounds and white numbers/letters.  No lights at all.