A bit of progress to report. I cleaned it at the weekend twice, it seriously needed it, the amount of ingrained grime was amazing. I gave it a good go with various detergents on Saturday, then took it for a ride later, then cleaned it again with traffic film remover on Sunday. Looks better now, the wheel rims are particularly good, I didn't discover much else either, other than spotting that the speedo drive is free moving & only stopped from spinning with the wheel by the cable anchoring it. Bit odd that.
I gave it a check over- all fluids ok, oil looks fairly fresh, front master cylinder lid hasn't been off for years, I was relieved when I got the 2 seized Philips screws undone without damage. All chassis bearings seem good. Fork tube chrome is really good. Calipers aren't seized, that makes a change for me.
Riding. Ok it's a sod to start from cold. Sometimes. But I'm onto that, I think it is due to several problems with the choke cables, plungers & lever. The engine sounds good, rides well and pulls up to 80+ swiftly, though doesn't feel very right at all low down, I suspect the throttle cables are miles out of sync. The clutch works aok too, and I was pleased to discover all gears are present, after my project BMW's test ride a couple of years ago discovered that it had a neutral instead of 5th.
The handling felt dismal though, most unpleasant turning into corners, the tyres are pretty worn and a check of the date codes shows them as 2003 vintage. I work with people younger than that. So new ones are called for.
Also called for is some electrical attention- check out the battery terminals in the photo. If you look closely at the +ve one you may be able to see that extension/ busbar has 4 or 5 wires attached to it. All the more exciting for there being no insulation and no fuses.
