Post by: badger_eng on August 20, 2026, 11:23:59 AM
Very soon to be 64 y.o. living between Durham, Sunderland & Newcastle although born in Hull.
Apprentice trained mechanical maintenance fitter before going on to be a mechanical & process engineer for a couple of large blue chips. Eventually setting myself up as a consultant engineer and travelling extensively to ply my trade.
Started riding bikes (C50's, Raliegh Runabouts / Wisps, NSU's etc etc) illegally on old railway lines and fields as a 13 year old with my buddies and hardly been without a bike since.
First legal road bike was a FS1E, progresssed onto an RD250E before buying my first big bike at 18... a Honda CB750K6. Stuck with various Honda's for decades after the SOHC.... owning a CBX, CB900FD, CBR1000F, a number of CBR600's including a CBR600RR when they first came out in 2003.
I moved away from Honda's in 2006 into a few different manufacturers, subsequently owning a Yamaha FZ1 Fazer, 2 x Kawasaki Z1000SX's / 1 x Ninja 1000SX and as of June 2026, Suzuki GSX-S1000GX+
I've been retired just over 5 years and my plan was to tweak, restore and generally fettle old bikes thru the winter and ride them on sunny Sundays alongside my main bike which the wife and I travel around Europe on for 2-3 weeks every summer.
I love the 24hr endurance races and been lucky enought to do Le Mans 24 (Car & Bike) a few times, The Bol at Magny-Cours and also Spa 24 back in the day when the privately funded Phase One team were going up against the manufacturer backed SERT, Kawsaki and Yamaha teams.
We do less races now as camping and hard floors no longer sit well with my aches and pains but as mentioned, we get into Europe most years enjoying the alpine mountain passes, the castle routes of Germany and the generally pristine road surfaces in Spain & France. We've just returned from the sweltering Dordogne and have got permission from upper management to start planning a 2 week trip thru Germany in 2027.
To a degree, the post retirement plan has worked and I've nut & bolted 3 bikes so far. A 1974 Suzuki GT380, a 1981 Honda CX500 and currently left in the garage a 1976 Suzuki GT500A that is going up for sale later today.
Having yesterday purchased a 1977 Honda CB550K, I thought I better join this forum so I can mingle, learn and no doubt swap some sh!t.
Thanks for having me.
Pete
[attachimg=1]
[attachimg=2]
[attachimg=3]
Post by: Johnwebley on August 20, 2026, 12:31:57 PM
Some tidy bikes there
We love anything with a motor,
Have fun
Sent from my SM-A546E using Tapatalk
Post by: Nurse Julie on August 20, 2026, 12:33:25 PM
Post by: Otis on August 20, 2026, 12:41:59 PM
Is the third picture a 250 because it looks amazingly similar to a bike I rode (not mine) in the 70's. Two stroke and a right handful if I remember; it was either screaming or juddering and difficult to ride slowly.
Post by: McCabe-Thiele (Ted) on August 20, 2026, 12:48:15 PM
Post by: Orcade-Ian on August 20, 2026, 01:09:06 PM
Welcome to the forum - lots of great info and help on here - many 550 owners too who will no doubt chime in at some point. As Julie says, quite a few from 'Ull, me included but now living in Orkney for the last 20 years. Still enjoying tinkering with a few Hondas and cars and still looking down on the grass!
Ian
Post by: Bryanj on August 20, 2026, 03:28:08 PM
Post by: badger_eng on August 20, 2026, 04:01:08 PM
Nurse Julie - West Hull of course ;D
Otis - No, its a GT500, most people that see it think its a GT250 but the large diameter downpipes are the biggest obvious cue when in partial disguise like mine is. Took a few goes at getting the carburation right after I'd built it but now its sweet thru the rev range. Sad to put it up for sale but needs must.
Ian - You live in a beautiful part of the country now. I ventured onto Skye with my mate on his Triumph 1200 in July for the first time ever and loved it. We've been doing a yearly Scotland trip since we retired but this was the first time we've made it onto an island. Cal-Mac has cut short our other attempts!
Bryanj - Its a 1977 550K American import (UK registered now) according to the seller. I'll find out for sure on Wednesday when it arrives. I love a Pandora's box.
Post by: Athame57 on August 20, 2026, 05:43:10 PM
Welcome here, at 63 you are not especially old around here, so don't worry. Lovely bikes, I like the GT380 best, I had one that got me into lot of trouble in the 1980s. ;D
Post by: Rozabikes Tim on August 20, 2026, 06:11:20 PM
2 of 3 are custom. Is the 550 going that way?
Sent from my Pixel 5 using Tapatalk
Post by: Orcade-Ian on August 20, 2026, 06:31:30 PM
Ian
Post by: SteveD CB500K0 on August 20, 2026, 08:10:27 PM
Ian and Johnny looked after us brilliantly (directed by their better halves of course!)
They even arranged a whisky tasting at 10:30 in the morning to fit our itinerary
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Post by: badger_eng on August 20, 2026, 10:18:51 PM
Athame57 - Glad to be among some similar old timers. Can’t beat grumpy old men for a good laugh. The GT380 paint job was very very special. Unfortunately the guy who did it no longer does painting for others. He was a great paint sprayer (It was his self taught hobby) and an even better guy.
Tim - The GT500 is on eBay as of now if you’d like to contribute towards the Honda CB550 resto fund ;D
I’m not 100% decided on what route to take with the 550, without doubt it’ll get full strip and rebuild (powdercoat, paint, vapour blast, zinc and full engine strip etc). That’s the bare minimum with all my projects. Keeps me busy during the winter months.
Will I strip back and cafe it????? Not sure. Want to see the bike first and assess but for sure it won’t be returned to factory standard. What’s most prominent in my mind at the moment is to paint it CBX red with maybe a black engine with polished covers / casings.
Ian - Ha, spent many an hour down Bev Road at Temple Street in the bike scrap yard trying to keep the track bikes alive on pocket money and paper round pay!
Thanks for the Orkney info, it’s my mates turn to plan next years trip as we alternate but fingers crossed he’ll get an extended pass out so we can take in Orkney.
Post by: Laverda Dave on August 20, 2026, 11:17:41 PM
Some lovely, lovely machinery there and I bow to your engineering skills. I do love a scratch built bike that has been retro modded as you have done.
As for the spannering in winter, riding in summer idea, great in theory but as I've found out, it seldom works in practice! Trouble is with me I start a restoration and don't want to stop it otherwise the big fear of leaving it over the summer is come next winter and the interest has gone!
As for Phase One endurance, I used to follow the team (and Team Bike before Phase One). I used to ride to Spa and Le Mans with a group of mates to watch world endurance but like you, my back can no longer take camping (and my ears can no longer suffer the noise of V8 engines stuck into shopping trolleys with HUGE megaphone exhausts that plagued the campsites!). You may have read the article published in Bike Magazine last year where Karl Ride (and his team manager) were persuaded to ride an old RC30 in an endurance round at (I think) Spa. He'd never been there, never rode in an endurance race and yet he rode around the outside of experienced endurance racers on far more modern machinery.
Great to hear you have seen the sohc light 👍
Post by: Johnny4428 on August 21, 2026, 08:05:26 AM
Post by: Johnwebley on August 21, 2026, 08:30:08 AM
Welcome to the forum Pete.The old Phase one is still being run with RC30 's
Some lovely, lovely machinery there and I bow to your engineering skills. I do love a scratch built bike that has been retro modded as you have done.
As for the spannering in winter, riding in summer idea, great in theory but as I've found out, it seldom works in practice! Trouble is with me I start a restoration and don't want to stop it otherwise the big fear of leaving it over the summer is come next winter and the interest has gone!
As for Phase One endurance, I used to follow the team (and Team Bike before Phase One). I used to ride to Spa and Le Mans with a group of mates to watch world endurance but like you, my back can no longer take camping (and my ears can no longer suffer the noise of V8 engines stuck into shopping trolleys with HUGE megaphone exhausts that plagued the campsites!). You may have read the article published in Bike Magazine last year where Karl Ride (and his team manager) were persuaded to ride an old RC30 in an endurance round at (I think) Spa. He'd never been there, never rode in an endurance race and yet he rode around the outside of experienced endurance racers on far more modern machinery.
Great to hear you have seen the sohc light
Ian Martin still does regular updates on X
@IanTeamBike
Sent from my SM-A546E using Tapatalk
Post by: Rozabikes Tim on August 21, 2026, 10:13:53 AM
Read recently he did similar wizardry on an old TZ250.
He is not only quick but so rarely falls off.
Sent from my Pixel 5 using Tapatalk
Post by: badger_eng on August 21, 2026, 12:03:35 PM
The first time I took my wife to Le Mans and we rode into the campsite, we parked up, she took her helmet off and said “Where the F have you brought me”, bear in mind we were at Terte Rouge that was like business class in comparison to general camping. Great times tho.
One of life’s best experiences was waking up at dawn, sitting on the bench seats at the stand near the Dunlop bridge with a coffee and a croissant watching the bikes come up the start and finish straight and thru chicane before disappearing under the bridge. A truly magical moment in my life.
Johnny - I’ll no doubt be leaning on your 550 experienced shoulders having 2 1/2 already in the memory locker 👍