There was also an oiling problem with the con-rods if IIRC.

Got to say that I never owned a Honda & never wanted to either, saw a lot of cam chain & tensioner trouble back in the 80’s.

Did repair an electronic ignition unit for a CBX 6 using components robbed from a CB250N unit once though, but that is a completely different story 😀

but that doesn’t make everything British bad, or for that matter everything japanese good–there have been some right dogs.

Too true Andy, the original Honda VF750 for instance, made Bike Of The Year when if first came out (’83/84? something like that), that was before the engines started falling to bits, it got so bad that Honda even honoured warranty work to the secondhand market out of the warranty period as the problems were well known & extreme.

I know all this because because a mate bought one, once he got it back (after a long time at the dealers) he couldn’t wait to unload it quick enough, I rode it a dealers in Brighton for him to PX it for a GPZ900R (far more like it) by the time I got it there, it was showing signs of problems & couldn’t ditch it fast enough!

Quite so, always enjoyed riding Brit bikes, probably my favourite was a mates Norton Commando, a generally nice machine that looked & sounded awesome.

Italian bikes, not that much experience, ridden Jota’s, both (180 & 120 crank) Ducatti Hailwood rep & once owned a Benelli 125! The electrics were appalling lol

Only ever ridden one Harley, not bad, but really not my thing.

BMW’s all quite samey, but not in a bad way, they all ooze reliability & confidence.

& the whole stuck in car on a hot deal is why I’m seriously thinking of getting on two wheels again, no more road rockets for me though, another big four stoke single enduro bike would fit the bill.

Getting Brit bikes to stop pissing oil is a piece of cake, I’ve even managed to make P&W R2800’s oil tight so doing the same for a bike is a doddle..:cool:

Careful assembly, good quality gaskets & Wellseal sorted the ones that I fixed up. 😉

The British bikes were generally hampered by a vertically split crank case which very dependent on perfectly aligned jointing faces, whereas the (larger) Jap stuff tended to be horizontally split which made a bit more sense.

Yep, also had the use of a BSA C25, but I have no pics of that one 🙁

Worked on plenty of Brit bikes, but that really is the crux of the matter, they needed a fair bit of it!
Not bad things to ride though, certainly more character than most of the Jap bikes & that counts for a lot.

Owned a couple of Kwackers-

GPZ550H1 Unitrac

& my last bike, up till now-

KLR650

unfortunately so are kwak tripples

& LC’s, another one I regret letting go 😮

A good XT is worth a few bob these days.

Don’t I know it! One of lifes regrets moving that old girl on 😮