And I have started to put #1282 back together, starting with the rear, after a good cleaning, greasing, etc. It’s starting to look good. Worked on the exhaust where I had to deal with non cooperative plugs. These have to be functional in order to set the carburation properly. New brass ones screwed in with copper grease. And we’re back to OEM clutch master cylinder. Waiting for the choke control to finalize the left handle.
While I am waiting for the carby to be cleaned, I am tackling details, front and rear. Exhaust, licence plate, turning indicators… Last but not least, I managed to find a pair of correct mirrors. These are not originals, though, but very decent quality brand new repops. You can tell by the way they fit on the nose of the bike. Things are starting to look tight and tidy, I love it!
Pressing with the little details that will make the difference when I am done: Rear brake light wasn’t functioning when I got this bike. And rubber boot was toast. Ugly and broken… I replaced both the mano-contact (easy to find new) and the rubber boot (not so easy to find, NOS), and refurbished the connectors. It now works perfectly and looks much nicer.
These are fantastic to both work on and ride. D2s are indeed simpler to tinker with and you ride a Time Machine from the late 80’s. It’s almost like listening to Duran Duran…
There was an amazing Poster of Simon Le Bon I think posing with a Ducati 888 SP3 or SP4 - had that on my wall when I was 16. My only concession to pop culture lol Ha ! Found it.. https://i.pinimg.com/originals/77/95/45/7795459477f652e60745542a877f20bb.jpg
I've reached the age where I can't do two things at the same time... like listening & wrenching. And the meditative silence can be refreshing.
For the purposes of admiring the bike or a smoke screen for your massive fandom of Simon Le Bon. He owned one though didn’t he? I wasn’t a fan but got offered free tickets to their acoustic show at Symphony Hall Birmingham, they did an absolutely brilliant show.
Strange but true - Simon lB and his brother David raced with us in SS400 for a while. No idea how his record company allowed it, because it was when Duranx2 were massive, but he was friendly, unaffected, and enthusiastic about his racing, chatting about bikes or getting the teas in at the paddocks greasy spoon caff. No star chasers, everyone was there to race bikes. He was on a ZXR400 but wasn’t very quick at the time. Not sure if he got any faster. Yasmin certainly lit up the paddock. As you can imagine, the paddock at a wet Mallory park clubbie needed a bit of brightening!
I wish the story was as exciting as that... I just really liked 888's before the 916 came out and I thought the picture was cool ;-)
Got the keeper’s forks back. Nice and clean. With this and the refurbed rear shock, the bike is ready for a new trip, at the end of this month, in the Alps this time (trying Switzerland for the first time, but with locals. We’ll see how that goes... ). The twins looking good together!
Went for a quick test ride yesterday evening. 50 miles in the back country and all along, I couldn’t help singing that song from Steppenwolf, « Magic Carpet Ride »… Incredible what difference a properly maintained and set up suspension makes… I am in absolute awe!
