Friday 27 January 2012

Friday bike

... is Saturday's bike. I'll be going tomorrow to collect my latest purchase, the first non-MZ I'll have owned since 1989.
This is the actual bike, a 1972 Honda CL350. I've always liked the Honda CLs ever since seeing them in the workshop manual. They were never sold in the UK, only the US and Japan, so when one came up on Ebay, it was just a case of clicking on 'Buy'!
I've never actually seen a CL350 before, so it'll be quite exciting when I get it. It's been imported from the US, and isn't registered here, so I've got plenty of bureaucracy to look forward to. Judging by the photos, it's all there, just a bit scruffy round the edges, but no too bad for a 40 year old bike. Things might turn out to be a bit different when I try and start the engine, though!
One small problem is that it's in a dealer in Newcastle-under-Lyme, so that's a 520 mile round journey in a hire van. Terry's coming with me for the run, if he's got his credit card with him and he sees something he likes, there might be 2 bikes in the van on the way back!
Before you mention the 'Easy Rider' look, the handlebars aren't original and will be the first thing to go! It should have 'normal' braced trail type bars, easy enough to find.
No doubt Larry will be along in a minute to say that he had one when he was in High School!

1 comment:

  1. Welllll, actually I had the baby brother CL-175 twin in high school...the 'new' model with the upright cylinder head,that at first glance most people back then would think was a 350. Didn't get my 350 till after high school. Bought a much used and abused CB-350 cafe racer.Learned a lot about bikes riding and working on these.
    Yours looks pretty decent from the photo. A friend of mine owned a '73 CL, that really ran well. They look more like a BSA or Triumph than the earlier CL-350's did. The chrome mufflers looked and sounded better than the big 'black' box on the earlier CL's in my opinion. Though I prefer the earlier two-tone tanks. Pretty lo-mileage I'm guessing, judging by that seat. I'm still playing around with several SL-350's, and probably have enough parts around to construct a CB. Get it running and post a video.

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