I hear you Burt.
8 months ago I thought I would try and buy a complete, but in need of mechanical repair, R65. My starting point was that i had the remains of a 1985 (but still twin shock) R65 under the house that I bought in 1994 as a source of parts to repair my wife's r65 that I had managed to get damaged.
Like you I am in Queensland, the first I chased down was a non runner 1980 that had been parked under a tree at Daybro for 4 years (and it looked it). You could have floored me when it went for $3,800. Next there was one much closer to me, a well used 1983 at Flying Fish Point, the seller had owned since new and used it daily (and it looked it). This one was attractive because it had a kick starter and genuine clock and voltmeter pods. It sold for $6,000.
After a couple more like that I went and had another hard look at my wreck and decided to buy the bits needed to stand it back up.
Most of the bits I've bought have come from England and Germany, some from the USA and minor stuff from everywhere. I have bought very little in Australia as the prices are just plain silly - good example, I had to buy a front wheel. The only two I could find in Australia were at a wrecker in Sydney who wanted $350 and one at Munich motors in
Perth who wanted $285 (and I would hand whittle a wheel from solid alloy before I would ever buy anything from them anyway). A wrecker in Germany wanted $90 for the wheel and $80 to send it to me DHL paketpost which took 9 days from Germany to Cairns. Needless to day, when I decided to buy a late model big valve head I went back to him and as I didn't need an immediately "serviceable" one (I was going to do valves and seats anyway so that I knew what was in them) he was happy to sell me a repairable core for around $110 + $30 post (By the way it is worth mentioned that when it arrived I had a quick look and frankly if I was desperately short of cash and needed the bike on the road immediately I'd have k-lined the guides and slapped it on and run it for 10~15k kilometers before getting too worried).
As far as the restoration goes, I've been a bit slack recently but will be back into it soon. About to send the heads off for new valves and seats . Once that is done I'm on the downhill run and will register it and ride it whilst my 1978 R100RS has a big birthday.
Long term what I really want is an early model GS, once the R100 is back on the road I will either sell the R65, or turn it into a GS - and bizarre as it may seem, that is not as difficult as it might seem - front end off a large Japanese trailbike, GS swingarm, minor mods to R65 frame to mount a monoshock, a GS rear wheel and the rest is cosmetic.
Topic: some old airheads in Belstaff web advert (Read 1806 times)