The magazine for classic Japanese motorcycles

Project titan - Part 3

Well so far so good; the Titan has successfully covered a few hundred miles without significant issue and following the fitment of the rather groovy (sic) Dunlop Arrowmax tyres feels a lot more planted on the road. Unlike the outgoing rock-hard Kendas, the new tyres get warm and sticky in use which means I can hoon around without the fear of ending up in a Bedfordshire hedge. Something of a bonus.

Given the Suzuki’s reputation of being a solid old stager with almost limitless stamina… a quick shot outside an appropriately named pub was too good an opportunity to miss. As an aside, it’s now apparent that old tyres have a value so don’t take them down the tip or pay your local supplier to scrap them. Fellow enthusiasts building project machinery often need old tyres to put on to a dry build.

The two Kenda tyres we took off last month are now supporting an Italian classic and I have some unexpected gin credits... which is nice.

Back in the Project Titan workshop there’s an opportunity to do a little tidying, the odd upgrade and a bit of rectification work. Although not averse to the odd bit of modification, I like my classic machines to look right and don’t mind paying out a little to achieve this.

Two areas that look bare and downright wrong from an authenticity perspective are the missing seat strap and the grab rail. The former is probably a little anal but the latter is a definite no-no. I’ve heard from numerous sources that both of the above were often removed on American market machines by new owners so it’s not too surprising, but all the same find the rail is unlikely to be easy. Working on the premise that you should always deal with the easy jobs first, a call to R K Leighton reveals that making a new seat strap is not an issue and one can happily be run up.

Removing a T500 seat always strikes me as being more of a faff than it should be, but having grown up with pin-hinged seats on Yamahas, bolt on units are always going to be a little tedious. With the two upper rear guard bolts removed and the guard supported off the rear tyre, with the obligatory handy piece of wood, the seat can be lifted off for a quick fettle. Fitting the strap is a case of cutting a neat hole to fit over the bolt or stud on the underside of the seat pan, flipping the strap over the seat and repeating the process on the other side.

I used a set of ancient brass cork borers on the vinyl but any suitably sized tube can be used; sharpened and chamfered on the inner face it will give a nice clean cut.

Getting the tension just right means there’s no gaping holes twixt seat and strap and no unnecessary pinching of the seat cover and foam.

With the strap fitted the missing grab rail now looks even more apparent... well to my anorak mindset at least. Missing panel work and trim are unequivocally the Achilles heel of any Japanese project bike. Quite often the parts are unique to a marque and/or model year and components from a similar machine patently won’t fit. The Japanese classic world is only just starting to move into the replication of rare parts and it’s still something of a haphazard supply chain. People like Yambits have seized the initiative and had lots of unavailable Yamaha parts made and good luck to them. Similarly Badge Replicas in Australia has made a huge range of classic Japanese tank and side panel badges. Unfortunately, no one has yet made the potentially rash move of setting up Grab Rails ’r’ Us, which is a bit of a pain.

While wondering who I might possibly borrow a T500 grab rail from, so that I might just be able to persuade some naïve artisan to run me up a replica, I’m cruising eBay. Searching under the heading of Suzuki T500 somewhere in among the umpteen pages I see a thumbnail of a T500 grab rail, hallelujah. On closer examination it’s not an NOS item, it’s a replica, which means it’s not silly money. A flurry of emails followed by a gentlemanly exchange of funds sees a superbly crafted replica T500 grab rail in my possession.

Metalsmith John MacKay modestly reckons his range of replacement tubular steelwork aren’t finished to show standards due to the cost and resource restraints of pre-chrome plate polishing but it looks damn good to me and certainly on a par with original Japanese chrome of the day.

Once again a little digging and a few polite emails has revealed another expert quietly producing high quality facsimiles of unobtainable parts. Mr MacKay’s portfolio apparently includes period luggage racks, engine bars etc. and we at CMM reckon if you gave him an item to copy you’d be a very happy bunny. As all of this episode’s work seems to be at the stern end we might as well carry on with the theme.

So far the Titan has lived up to all the expectations and most of the supposed urban myths. It has character in spades, pulls very strongly, turns into bends slowly and vibrates at certain frequencies. The bars are rubber mounted and the hand grips sufficiently cleated so as not to transmit much in the way of vibration to the rider but the chassis can and does suffer.

If evidence were needed that the Titan needed a little more thought it’s in the left hand exhaust where someone has had to weld up a broken mounting bracket. With no evidence of any offs or gravel rash to the system the only logical conclusion has to be that the mounting has succumbed to the machine’s natural harmonics. This is generally supported by the fact that most aftermarket T/GT500s come with rubber mounts at this critical area.

Casualty number two has been my tax disc which was lost somewhere on the Great North Road. The nice people at the local DVLA office supplied a replacement free of charge because the bike is classed as a Historic Vehicle but I doubt they’d want to divvy up a fresh one on a regular basis. There’s the option to use another screw-on holder but even with some thread locker I’m not too sure it’d be much better. A lot of the modern tax disc holders look just that... modern, hexagonal, and are not in keeping with the period look but I managed to find the ideal compromise on the Oxford Products website. With six little socket headed screws holding the circular bezel in place the whole thing is effective and unobtrusive; if only all jobs were this simple.

And so for the last part of this episode; right from day one the Titan’s rear shocks have struck me as just plain scabby. It’s now entirely possible to get period Japanese shocks stripped, cleaned and replated. My mate Rob Davies-Evans of Kernow Shocks has done a couple of sets for me and a good job he makes of them but I fancy a subtle upgrade on the Titan. If anyone is honest, period Japanese suspension is acceptable at best and goes off the boil fairly quickly. There are a large number of aftermarket suspension systems out there and it’s hard to buy really bad quality shocks unless you either make a real effort or are stupid.

Of course there’s one name that stands out as being what the modern world calls a preferred supplier; Hagon. I’ve used the company’s products several times in my riding career and first ran a pair of its devices back in 1977 on an RD350B. The units I’ve used and those on mates’ bikes have convinced me that when it comes down to the value-for-money versus performance little else gets near them.

Therefore I stay in my comfort zone and treat the Titan to a new all chrome set. Fitting them is a breeze but the heavily rusted acorn nuts would visually let the shocks down. Although not a bling merchant I cannot justify reusing the old fixings so it’s a call between rechroming the originals and going for stainless steel. As I have no other parts for chroming in the near future it’s a call to Phil Denton Engineering for a set of his tasty replicas, which will complement the shocks.

A pleasant, stress busting, evening in the garage after another day from hell at work sees everything bolted on and the resultant ensemble looks so much tidier. The one job I’ve been putting off for ages now looks like it’s worked its way to the top of the pile; there’s a cold starting/carb issue that needs to be attended to and I can’t put it off much longer. Such is the nature of classic bikes I guess.