If you know me well you also know that I once made a motorcycle on my own. If you don't here's how it looked like:
Fancy?
I did, my GF at that time did so feel free to like it too🙂
Let's take it from the start:
1999, my beloved YAMAHA DT200R starts feeling too small for my ongrowing wanderlust. By the way, wanna have a look at it? Here it is at the island of Lesvos:
No, it's not as prehistoric as it looks like, the photo was taken (as far as I recall) in the summer of 1997. We visited the island with a biker friend and he had a B&W film in his camera. No smartphones back in the day, not even cellphones in our hands either.
Funny how we used to travel back then (lots of bungee cords etc):
(Mine's on the left)
So in order to satisfy my wanderlust I had to either modify my DT or get something more touring friendly. The first scenario wasn't so attractive to me cause I had already replaced the piston of my DT (myself) and that kinda wrecked my trust to this - other than that - lovely bike.
The market back in the day didn't have a perfect fit for my taste. The more "touring" dual purpose bikes had too many plastics for my taste then while others where too "minimal" for long rides. And I definitely wanted a large tank. So as I walk back home one day I see next to my flat a YAMAHA Tenere 600, the very first one (1983) parked for sale with a paper reading a ridiculously low number (Greece was still in drachmas then). It had a seized engine but still felt cheap. I call a more experienced friend to share the news and he goes "wow!".
Next day that friend of mine calls the owner trying to get info on how that bike got seized in an attempt to see what it would take to fix it. Long story short, I buy the cheapest Tenere ever as the price was like "how wrong can you go" and it looked sexy even at that neglected state.
So then I started looking for a spare engine or parts to fix the original one. During this quest I find an ad for a crashed 1989 Tenere 600, something identical to this:
It was a write off from its insurance but had WP suspension front and back, plus it was coming from a FULL overhaul (engine, brakes etc) so I grab that same friend of mine to have a look.
We find it at a repair shop and first thing my friend does is press the start button. Starter works fine, engine turns without alarming noises at all but doesn't start as the tank is ripped and has no fuel. The poor bike crashed on a Porsche which killed the front end too. But ALL the rest of the bike looks perfect, miraculously including all plastic panels!
My friend whispers to my ear "bargain!". Ironically this donor bike costed more than the original one (300.000drachmas compared to 200.000) but still didn't feel expensive.
So now I have two Tenere 600s and I have to find space to disassemble both and then try to make one out of them. Funny how this could be a fantastic series of videos today but back in the day we were just living the moment giving zero Fs on recording them unless in case of jamming with a band. Yes, pity I have no material to share but not sorry at all for the priceless vivid memories away from cameras.
So the crashed blue Tenere goes to the yard of another friend of mine who used to have a car repair shop, while the white red one with the seized engine stays under my flat. In the same building I have a small studio on the first floor. Wanna make a guess? Yep, I disassemble it on the sidewalk and bring it up. My late father felt so sorry for all that effort that came downstairs to give a helping hand. Plus a friend. Lots of good friends back in the day right? Fortunately cause the engine alone is something you can barely carry solo.
I spend the next few days going to that car repair store to strip down the blue crashed one. At some point I give it some fuel and start the engine to have a listen to it and get an idea of what I bought. Boy... trust me, I have never heard of a more quite Tenere or XT EVER in my life, before or after. I stuck my head over the cylinder head with the bike naked and still couldn't hear anything but a smooth engine in the absence of metal sounds. So it was coming from an overhaul indeed!
When I had it all in parts I left at the shop all the junk (the crashed front, the tank and the frame) and took everything else back home with a mate's car. Which means I now I have a small studio full of parts and I can barely walk in to work. Since the white red Tenere would be the base of the new bike I got the frame sandblasted and painted. I chose black instead of the original red. Loved the new look but the paint guy did a below pathetic job. Imagine that at my first efforts of reassembling I drop a tool and it strips the paint as it hits the frame effortlessly. Meaning it wall all just one layer half ass job...
Back in the day I had almost zero mechanical experience (though I managed to change the piston of my YAMAHA DT200) and it showed sometimes like for example when I hit my head on the cylinder head while trying to unbolt a part. Yep, it came loose all at once like they tent to😅
A few stitches later on my eyebrow I was back in business. Fitting the engine on the frame without any help was the trickiest part, especially in the absolute absence of proper equipment, but I made it. I didn't even have a trolley with adjustable height to slide it under the frame so I used a hard top case as it brought the engine exactly where it had to. That operation to do solo took me a full working shift and exercised every single muscle of my body. The joy was hard to describe as the whole thing was getting close to be finished untill... I discover that the 1989 engine puts the chain a couple of cm on the left compared to the 1983 (electric starter vs only kickstart). Therefore now the chain hits the frame!
I'm almost having a heart attack. All this effort and the bike is useless now? So I take the front sprocket off and I notice that it's made with a built in spacer compared to the 1983 hence it places the chain this way. So I think "let's just flip it". Now it's perfectly aligned with the rear wheel, plus its teeth are brand new now that it works backwards🙂
Unfortunately I couldn't fit the 1989 swingarm cause it's also wider than the 1983 and I wasn't mechanical enough back then to improvise in order to put the rear disc brake so the old drum brake is back at work. And the bike is almost ready!
I press the starter to see if I have connected everything OK and the bike comes to life giving me a priceless feeling. I didn't like the original headlight so I got donated one from a TT250 Raid with a bent frame after a crash. Big and amazing. Like the one in this picture:
With some extra mods I managed to mount it plus the instruments from the 1989, much better than the 1983 bare ones. I go to a suspension shop where I put a pair of WP springs in the front and now I have one of the best adventure bikes, at least performance wise!
I would have made the whole project much better today if I had the space but even like this it offered me great fun times. I can't forget when there were times I stopped at filling stations and the employees would start looking under my bike for leaks as it took them so long to fill it up :)
Here's the last picture of it before it was recycled:
(owned by my brother by that time)
That's it folks, I owed this write up as a reference point for so many people asking me about it. Pity it wasn't recorded by Hollywood standards but I hope you get the picture.
Safe rides to you all!
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