Bike Hoarders/fetish

[Yamaboy]

Having sold my YZ465 because it was faster than my 56 year old reflexes can handle I've reverted back to the bikes that I cut my teeth on. I'm currently waiting for the Faber frame to arrive from the UK for my BSA B44, and have a DT1 and black tank RT1s also underway. There's also a CZ 380, Bully Sherpa T and a Montesa Impala powered 1966 Bully Sherpa S basket case waiting for their time.

While I agree with 414 that there isn't enough adventure among the VMX fraternity in their resto choices, at least they are doing it and are a part of the movement. I'd like to think that the guys who restore the safe bikes will, like me eventually venture on to something more challenging and different. The one make only guys are indeed missing out on a great learning curve restoring something they previously knew bugger all about. Look at 090 and his recent CZ awakening and the huge cross section of bikes in the Kevlar Kompound at CD5 to understand that there is more to our great pastime than sticking to the CR/YZ/RM easy bikes. Just my 2 bobs worth.

[VMX247]

AJS
Alfer
Ancillotti
Aprilia
Ariel
ATK
Benelli
Beta
BMW
BSA
Bultaco
Cagiva
Can-Am
Cannondale
CCM
Cooper
CZ
D-Rad
Dalesman
Derbi
DKW
Fanatic
FN
Gas Gas
GileraHarley Davidson
Hedlund
Hercules
Hiro
Hodaka
Honda
Horex
Husaberg
Husqvarna
IMZ
Indian
IZh
Jawa
Kawasaki
Kramit
KTM
L
LemLito
Maico/MStar
Malaguti
Matchless
Mazzilli
Monark
Montesa
Nauder
Norton
NSU
Ossa
Penton
PMZ
Praga
Puch
Rickman
Rokon
Rotax
Sachs
Sokol
Standard
Suzuki
SWM
TGM
TIZ
TM
Triumph
Velocette
Vertemati
Victoria
VOR
Yamaha
Zündapp .......when I growd up I gonna own one of each

[Tim754]

Wheres Wasp, EML, SPP, Hagon etc     and why you got some of the above twice? only half as good???

[yzhilly]

 I happen to luv sitting on the start line watching RM's getting pushed up and down the pits , Not everyone wants to own a cosmipolitan ,stands out like dogs balls piece of exotica that you have to learn spanish to obtain parts for . I quite like my old common as mud YZ's and after young Doddy gave my YZ a workout it was good to hear that he was impressed with the old banger . So it's back into the shed to see what tweaks i can do to continue the evolution the mighty YZ400E. To me thats what it's about .Personalizing your own ride whatever colour it is . Ouch for clarence.

[Nathan S]

There's heaps of reasons for avoiding the non-mainstream bikes. One or more of the following applies to every non-mainstream old dirt bike I can think of:

1. More expensive.
2. Hard to find the bike.
3. Hard to get parts.
4. They weren't any good in the first place.
5. You generally need to be part of the 'inner circle' to get bits/information*.
6. Etc.

Obviously, everyone has different priorities - but if you're building a race bike, then you'd start with the best bike for your budget (inc ongoing runing costs).
Garage Queens generally seem to be built based on either the owner's personal history or what's the Bling Thing at the time.

*Which is not to say that its hard to break into the highly secretive AT1 Owner's Group , but that your life which be much harder if you don't.

[TM BILL]

There's heaps of reasons for avoiding the non-mainstream bikes. One or more of the following applies to every non-mainstream old dirt bike I can think of:

1. More expensive.
2. Hard to find the bike.
3. Hard to get parts.
4. They weren't any good in the first place.
5. You generally need to be part of the 'inner circle' to get bits/information*.
6. Etc.

Obviously, everyone has different priorities - but if you're building a race bike, then you'd start with the best bike for your budget (inc ongoing runing costs).
Garage Queens generally seem to be built based on either the owner's personal history or what's the Bling Thing at the time.

*Which is not to say that its hard to break into the highly secretive AT1 Owner's Group , but that your life which be much harder if you don't.

Hear hear Nathan good on ya Boy
I cant believe im hearing forking snobbery in VMX its forking bullshit
Personally i like and own various different marques , I particulary like Suzukis because

A they are a good all round race bike

B I raced them when they were new

C Yes they are easy to get parts for and easy to work on ( i will save my efforts to try and improve my riding )

Over 30 plus years with dirt bikes I have owned and raced Euro bikes and British bikes and i can appreciate the good and bad in them all Suzukis included

In all my years of racing i was only ever an average B grader but i have never been passed by a forking Montossa , until recently i owned a Cota trials bike , great little bike and was capable of far more in a trials enviroment than i ever will be.

Iv'e got an Italian Missus who shares my apprecition of all things with 2 wheels and a motor regardless of where there built so get off the high horse and live and let live

[crs-and-rms]

i think lots of us get the bikes we had or wanted but didnt get and thats what im doing ,i was a big suzuki fan in the mid to late 70s and a honda fan in the early 80s and that reflects in my collection its not about being diffrent for me it . is about me and the bikes i liked and wanted and had .im doing 8 bikes at the moment  and  i have 15 and im picking up two this weekend , and as for being hard i do all my own work every thing even hand strip the frames the only thing i dont do is rebores that makes it harder . i love to hear about other guys bikes and what and how they are doing to them so keep workin on those bikes , enjoy while we are still alive to fix them , ride them we are the lucky guys doing what we want every week

[Gerard De Ruyter (Twistandshout)]

i only go for jap bikes because they were the ones that my slightly better off mates had when i wuz a lustful teenager so i drooled over them bigtime (and so need to get now). 

i also drooled over pics of husky's and the likes in magazines and at mister motocross races at amaroo park, but they were at one remove (ie, i had no hope....).  so i just plain don't relate to them quite as much.  blame it on mass production.

[firko]

In reply to Nathans points:
I: It's a broad statement to state that non manistream bikes are more expensive. I recently bought a basket case CZ for $500 and my mate Jonsey recently bought a 125 Wassel for $250. Some bikes are expensive (490 Maico) and others are cheap as chips (DT1 Yamahas). The same could be said about the mainstream bikes as well. Have you priced parts for a '79 Honda CR250 lately, or tried to buy parts for late 70s Kawasakis?

2: Sure the bikes are harder to find but I like the notion that the hunt is an integral part of the joy of old bikes. Without getting into another heated debate on this, 411 is right, the bikes are definitely out there just waiting to be found.

3: Parts for Bultaco, Montesa, Maico, CZ and others are not only freely available from a number of sources, they are often much cheaper than the Japanese equivalent. Don't believe me? check around.


4:Saying that they were'nt very good in the first place is another very broad statement. During the 1970-1980 era there were very few Japanese bikes that were even remotely competitive with the European makes. When I moved from an RT1 Yamaha to a 350 Maico in 1970 it was like climbing out of a Corolla and into a Carrera. The world of motocross was a different place prior to the Japs getting their act together and it was full of bikes winning races that are considered left of centre today.

5: Inner Circle? Just what is that? Every brand of bike whether it be mainstream or not has its group of enthusiasts that by the nature of their bikes tend to congregate and swap ideas, parts and information. The Suzuki swarm that frequent this very forum and who gang together at races and CD5 is a mainstream inner circle. If you bought a CZ you would eventually end up hanging out with other CZ folks, bet on it. I'll bet you hang with the Volvo guys in the Rally scene and use the information learned from other Volvo racers. We are all a part of some "inner circle" or the other.

I have seven different brands of bike and it has opened my view on this sport. Back in the early days of vintage I was a purely Maico punter with only a small general interest in other makes. I then built my DT1 and then a Champion Honda and before long I found myself venturing into previously unchartered waters. I soon bought a couple of CZs and built a couple of engine swap bikes, built the project TM/TS 250 Suzuki. Without really thinking about it I  became much more interested in other peoples bikes, especially the left field stuff and saw that one of the advantages of VMX as opposed to other diciplines was the huge variety at our disposal. I gained a new respect for the bloke who dared to try something different. That difference in their bike choice has made the sport a much more interesting and varied place.

Like 414, I too hold no disrespect for any person or their bike choice. I'd just like to see more people see more variety. I don't see any snobbery Bill, not from any of my group of vintage mates anyway. I do however see a lot of bias against particular bikes and that pisses me off. I never criticize any brand of bike despite what that Bultaco club wanker el Presidente says. There is no difference between my TS90 pit bike project and Black Betty except the money spent on them. The passion involved in building either bike is the same.

[Tim754]

Just Enjoy

[brent j]

I've got bikes that have a connection to the past and I class as easy to restore and maintain.

5 XT500's mean a common spare parts stock and easy knowledge as to what makes them tick. Funny thing is that as a youngster I always wanted one but never owned one.

My other choice is Suzuki TM 125's I had one for a few years and ended up fitting a 185 motor. Now I have two, one will be standard to race and one with a 185 for Vinduro and maybe pre 75 250 VMX.

I've always thought of Euro bikes as being difficult to find bits for but as Firko pointed out the stuff is there and once you own one and get into the circle so to speak it gets easy

As for projects my KTonda (XR200 powered KTM) came about as I had the bits and it seemed like a good idea. Now the realities of having and potentially running 9 motorcycles starts to hit home. That's a lot of tyres, chains, grips, levers plus the work to keep them all going. I don't know about you guys but I find it difficult to get the time I'd like to spend on my bikes, on the bright side though, the projects I have will last a long time with minimal further expense, hopefully!

Brent

[yzhilly]

Well i took 414's advice and went out and got a exotic XR250 for my boys . I looked at some sexy euro models but to me there like the babe on the beach in a G string and the huge boobs . They look fantastic  but expensive to ride and needy ,so the XR will fit the bill it,s not pretty and needs work but it met my criteria it was cheap .yeehah .

[Nathan S]

I wasn't trying to stir anyone up...

Look, the list was prefaced with "one or more of the following will apply". It was meant to be a general statement, not a criticism of any particular type of bike - I can't think of a single bike where ALL of my possible points apply.

I mean, if one bike was cheap, readily available, reliable, easy to get bits for, and made a good race bike, then we'd all be racing 'em!
So we all compromise in our choices - and when it comes to race bikes, most people make compromises that lean toward making life easier - stuff like parts availability and competitiveness rate highly.
And that's why we see seas of YZs, CRs and RMs.

Personally, I'd love to own and race a Phantom, a YZ250A, any number of different Montesas, a Cooper, an AT1MX, and several other non-mainstream bikes that you rarely see at the races, but they all fall down one one or more of the points I listed.

Away from the VMX racing scene, there's even more stuff I'd love to own, but don't... Even once competitiveness is taken out of the equation, one or more of my 6 reasons puts a stop to it...

[Rosco400]

Very interesting results % wise so far, will lock off at 100, now thinking to myself are most of you in the keep collecting stage or culling out excess bikes,(wont run  a poll on that one ) but its a very even result across the board, strange that 80+ voters and only 1 person has one bike, 2 have excess of +42, that is interesting result in its own right

Doesnt really matter who rides what or collects what, as long as they are out and about getting used at local meetings, its all good

[Nathan S]

That they weren't any good in the first place!? That's a really big statement. So anything that wasn't mainstream when you were around (??), "wasn't any good in the first place"??

Settle petal.

That's NOT what I said, either time.

Lots of good bikes weren't mainstream even when new because they were too expensive, too hard to get hold of, had bad reputations (which may, or may-not have been deserved, particularly in hindsight), or people simply didn't know they existed/were available.

Like I said before, if a bike was cheap, fast, reliable and easy to get bits for, then everyone would own one - and that applies equally when bikes were new too. The closest a bike goes to meeting that criteria (that I can think of) is the 125 Elsinore - and surprise, surprise they were everywhere back in the day, and are everywhere in VMX nowdays.