Honda GL1000 Goldwing

[DGXSER]

James, to some extent, there is an attitude of disposibility. When I bought Banshee, the guy I was buying it from had no less than 20 or so cars, about ten versions of the Nissan 280ZX, two old Camaros, a Jaguar, couple MGs. He also had about ten other bikes, all Jap bikes. He told me that this foreign stuff and Jap bikes are so cheap there is no point in fixing them, just ride them till something breaks so bad you can't rig it and then park it and buy another one. And so my poor old XS11 was in such a horrible state when I got it.

As to making money, well, there is alot of truth in what Marty has said. When I wrecked on Thunderstruck, I figured I was done riding, and would not take parts for little to free from members here that were offered when I planned on selling the bike. And when I found the frame was bent up as well as both upper and lower engine case cracked, it was time to part it out. I sold parts for average price of similar items on ebay, used some on Banshee, and still have a couple boxes of parts left. In the process, I tracked what I sold and what I planned to get for the other parts. At this point, the parts I sold have paid for the initial price I paid both bikes, and all the parts I bought to put into banshee. So I am riding a more or less free bike.

It bothers me also to see people take a nice working bike with a title and break it down to sell off parts. The real issue here in the USA is that bikes this old get abanoned and wind up with someone having it that does not have the title or a way to get one. In most of the States here, if you have no title, you will not get one and you can not plate it to go on the street. So it may be a nice clean and running bike, but with no title it is just clutter, or parts. It REALLY bugs me and I hate it as there are SO MANY nice looking bikes on Craigslist for cheap but since they have no title there is no option to street them. So, due to an attempt to stop theft of bikes, or plating a stolen bike, alot of nice bikes that got abandoned, but could be a good transportation for someone, go to the dump or the parts man.

[crazy steve]

Everything in the UK costs more than in the US....
....When I see the prices you pay over there for used XS1100's, it makes me very envious. I mean $300 sometimes? That's £200 in UK £'s and that won't buy any bike at all, never mind a vintage XS1100...

...I can't help thinking that there is perhaps more of an attitude of disposability in the USA compared to here.. you know, throwing things out easily, I suppose. This appears to extend to bikes too. I'm not judging but only trying to see why you throw out/scrap bikes that we would restore here.

Well, not everything costs more there; I'm a bit envious of the 'old world craftmanship' you have available for some things. That stainless exhaust you had built (then removed because it didn't quite match OEM) would have cost 2 or 3 times what you paid for it here, assuming you could even find anyone who could/would build it. And I suspect your plating and painting costs are lower too; the EPA regulations here have driven plating costs to near-unaffordable levels, and a OEM-quality pro repaint can easily be well over $1K. Even that 'zinc home plating' kit you bought would cost 4-5 times more here than what you paid. You also have a better aftermarket; I see a number of parts available 'over there' that no domestic maker is building. Here, if it's not a Harley, there's not much out there in the way of aftermarket parts with only a few exceptions. You're also helped by the fact that Yamaha didn't offer all the different models like they did here, so you're not faced with so many 'one year only' bits.

Prices and 'disposability'? Very much related... The American consumer has been 'trained' to expect 'newer=better' (again, think about the proliferation of US XS models compared to elsewhere) so 'older' loses value quickly. Add in the fact that most US owners rarely keep up on scheduled maintenence (running the bike until stuff starts to fall off), and pretty quick you need to spend as much in repairs as the bike is worth if you're not doing the work yourself. Sad to say, but the dealers here are part of the problem IMO, as they're more interested in selling you new rather than helping keep what you have good.

And just for grins, I'll tell you I haven't personally paid more than $250 for any of mine with the exception of the one I bought brand new... Of course, none of these 'cheap bikes' were in very good shape (the best of them looked far worse than your 'wing), but as you pointed out, starting with anything better is a bit of a waste as long as it's not a total rust bucket.

[James England]

Well, not everything costs more there; I'm a bit envious of the 'old world craftmanship' you have available for some things.

I never thought of that and assumed that one can get anything in the USA. Interesting. The place where they made the exhaust for me is one of a line of four small businesses on the same industrial street. One does exhausts, another engine rebuilds, another powder coating etc. You can literally take a bike to them and, if you have enough money, it pops out at the other end, fully restored with handmade parts. Maybe we take this kind of thing for granted.



My respray cost $400 for the XS1100 to OEM standard. Oh and $96 for the decals. The zinc-plating kit was about $75. The GL1000 was $450 for the respray and $80 for the decal kit.

$250? Honestly, you can't get a kids bike for that here. I paid $400 for a complete XS1100, non-working, entirely in pieces, boxed into crates and crates. I sold it for parts.

I've certainly found that the hotter climate in some US states means that there are vintage bits over there which are all but unobtainium here. eg fenders and exhausts systems, chrome sissy rails etc. Both my sets of Dyna coils cost 30% less in the USA (and got here without customs interference). I just bought some OEM shocks for the GL from the USA, simply because any available here are rusty.

How did people renovate bikes before the internet???

[crazy steve]

...My respray cost $400 for the XS1100 to OEM standard. Oh and $96 for the decals. The zinc-plating kit was about $75. The GL1000 was $450 for the respray and $80 for the decal kit.

James, the materials for a OEM-quality repaint would cost almost that much here, not including any labor.. If I could find someone who would duplicate the paint on my bought-new '78 for $500, it would've been done by now! I was quoted $600 to respray a Harley tank (only the tank, nothing else) and those are easy as all of Harley's colors are available off-the-shelf. Custom-mixed colors are more money...

[DGXSER]

Some of those cost Steve is quoting also depends on where in the country (USA) you are. For example, anything in California (cant-afford-ya) is double the price practically. Also depends on if you know someone who does this sort of work. And the size shop you go to ...etc..etc. As to price of bikes, well, again, it depends where you go. Here in Cincinnati Ohio being a larger city, most folks will either assume a bike is worth over $1 a CC or part it out. I drove two hours away to find Bashee for $250. You can not just run out any day of the week and pick one up for those prices, you have ot look and look and look and jump quick to find one for those prices. It is alot mroe common to pay around $1 a cc for a bike.

[jetmechmarty]

I live in Georgia. I sent an XS650 tank and sidecovers to a friend in Alabama. He sprayed them black with purple glass for $100.

XS1100SG purchase maybe ten years ago for $2K with <10K miles. I went to Nebraska to get it. It needed nothing.

XS650E -free
XS6502F-$30
XS650SH -free
Suzuki GS550L -free (carbs were dirty and tires old. gas guage inop)
Moto Guzzi V11 EV -free

I come across some good deals, or they find me.

[James England]

James, the materials for a OEM-quality repaint would cost almost that much here, not including any labor..

Well, you learn something every day, don't you? I'd always thought of the USA as cheaper for everything and a place where you could get anythng done relatively inexpensively. My paint was custom-mixed to the right spec. for both bikes actually and didn't cost any more than stock colours would have.

[Mathh]

Hi James. I see U have the same interests as me
Here's my gl1000 project although older pics. Bike is almost finished, just waiting for the fixing of an electrical problem.





Here some other projects I'm doing at the mo:

Moto Martin CBX: top end overhaul




1974 H2B Kawasaki (old pic as well)


By the way: which zinc plating kit do U use?

[James England]

Hi James. I see U have the same interests as me
Here's my gl1000 project although older pics. Bike is almost finished, just waiting for the fixing of an electrical problem.[/IMG]

By the way: which zinc plating kit do U use?

Nice one! Parallel universe on the GL front. Do post some finished pix when you're ready. What's the electrical problem?

I was looking at a CBX today on eBay. I'm resisting the urge to bid on it!

I use a $75 zinc plating kit I got off eBay here in the UK. According to some of your compatriots though, the kits here contain things which are banned in the USA... a zinc 'brightener' which is added to the electrolyte and possibly the passivators which either blue or yellow the finish after plating. It makes a polished, clean piece of metal take a coat of zinc about as bright as chrome... very nearly. I've used mine loads and actually had to renew the zinc anodes because they wore away wafer-thin after plating lots of parts.

[DGXSER]

Yep, we have the good old Environmental Protection Agency looking after our good health over here. For a nation founded on freedoms and based upon being sick of the government interfering with everything, we certainly seem to have come full circle on it. You can smoke all the cigarettes you want, if you pay the taxes that triple the cost of the pack. (not that I do or ever did smoke, but still). And we can not be trusted to handle certain products properly or appropriately so for our own good we are forbidden from having them, just to make sure we can't kill ourselves. Ever notice in the USA we have notices on things like Hair Dryers telling you its not for use in the bath tub? I know I am always thinking I wish I could dry my hair while I bath, but that dang sticker says not to!!

[crazy steve]

Yep, we have the good old Environmental Protection Agency looking after our good health over here...

While I'm not particularly pleased at what EPA regs did to the cost of plating (among other things), I'm still glad they're out there. I live pretty close to Commencement Bay in Tacoma Wa, and that got so polluted that you can't eat the bottomfish you catch out of it anymore (or at least I won't). We had the Asarco copper smelter (now gone), paper plants, lumber treaters, all who dumped 'stuff' into the water or on the ground until they were made to stop. The residential areas downwind from the smelter couldn't grow anything in their yards decently due to the arsenic in the soil, their kids all had health issues...

Plating is a very nasty process. There was a local guy quite a few years ago who bought up a plating shop which closed rather than meet the regs when they came in and moved the equipment to his farm and opened an outlaw shop. He was in business for a few years before they caught up with him. Short story, he had poisoned the local groundwater (most people in the area were on wells), and ended up doing hard time and losing everything he owned. His wife stayed out of jail only by divorcing him right after he got busted and turning states evidence against him.

[James England]

The EPA thing does sound like a good thing though and we have benefitted immesely from stringent European legislation about similar things. We now have fish in the Thames and things are much, much cleaner.

However, it does seem to me that the EPA stance on keeping y'all safe is at odds with the fact that you can go and buy guns so easily! Really weird.....

[crazy steve]

However, it does seem to me that the EPA stance on keeping y'all safe is at odds with the fact that you can go and buy guns so easily! Really weird.....

We don't want to go anywhere near 'guns' as a subject...

[fredintoon]

Spitting in church

- - - We now have fish in the Thames and things are much, much cleaner.
However, it does seem to me that the EPA stance on keeping y'all safe is at odds with the fact that you can go and buy guns so easily! Really weird.....

Hi James,
as a child I wondered "If religion is about joy and light why are all the church buildings coloured black?"
Then they passed the clean air act of 1953 that stopped us burning soft coal in open fireplaces
and they blast cleaned all the churches back to their Bath stone's original golden glow.
However, the US Citizens' right to bear arms is protected by their constitution and questioning that is far worse than spitting in church.
If the EPA was in the life saving business they'd take peoples cars away and make them use public transport.

[James England]

We don't want to go anywhere near 'guns' as a subject...

Yes, agreed. Sorry about that. I was musing out loud. Forgive my naivete... I wasn't trying to provoke. Over here, it's not a subject as such, you see. We just haven't got them and it's not 'taboo', as it were.