My Very First Bike

I notice a couple of members saying that they have owned this bike and that. Got me reminiscing about my very first Bike.
I grew up on an orchard so bikes were always about. But you want your own. So I saved up till I had half the amount. Dad promised to go halves. I used to visit the local MC shop and drool over the new Honda trail bikes. I had my heart set on a shinny red SL 100. I think ( now this was 40 years ago ) it was around the $600 mark. Maybe less. A lot back then for a 15 year old. The day arrived and dad took me down to the shop. I showed him the SL and said that that was the one I wanted. Dad went Hmmmm. Looked around the tiny showroom and said, what about that one. A silver XL 125. I had looked at it on previous visits but was a little intimidated by it. 125CC. Wow.
Our busted up farm bike was a clapped out Yammy 90. Yellow. Plus an old 500 BSA that sat out in the weather for years.  Dad asked the owner of the shop what the difference was and I think it was about another $150.  Dad said if I wanted it then he would pay the difference. I took it for a ride and when I got back I still remember being so excited that this brand new bike would soon be mine. At that stage I had my car license, but no Bike. Rode about for a year before I got the Bike added to me old paper book license. Which I still have in a drawer some where.   So that's my first ever bike. What's yours ?  And remember. Just the very first one. Not a big long list of every bike you ever owned. Cheers.

My first bike was a Yamaha AT2E trail bike - 125cc, 13 BHP @ 7000rpm, 1.38 kg-m torque (hang on to your hat!), 100kg net weight, and fitted with a starter-dynamo (ie 12 volt starter doubling as a generator, so no alternator). I still have the servicing manual for it.  I bought it in 1975 with money we earned from carting hay at 3 cents per bale.  I can't remember exactly what I paid for it but it was about $300.  We lived on a dairy farm so it was used to round up the cows for the afternoon milking. I rode it to high school on days when I didn't feel like catching the bus.



The manual was very good and puts Haynes ones to shame.

     

Like you I learned to ride bikes on farms, they were mostly AG bikes with the occasional trail or enduro bike. None were mine, they all belonged to friends and their parents.

At 14 I can remember arriving home from school and Dad saying "you'd better have a look in the shed" When I opened the door there was a Honda GL175, a 2 cylinder AG bike. I'm not sure what age it was, late 60's would be my guess.
Dad worked for a stock and station agent and was auctioneer at a farm clearing sale that day, this bike had no one bid on it so he bid $40 and it was mine.
The starter motor died within a couple of months, about 6 months later the kick starter shit itself so for the next few months it was push started until I saved enough money to buy a bike with my own hard earned cash but that's another story...............................

The first bike I bought was a Jawa 250 California .I hated getting stuck in traffic on the way to work even back then ..............(only one road, main sth rd to get into the city then ) I always loved bikes & rode mates bikes before that , but like most youths , parents had a say in what you bought until you were old enough , or moved out of home .Funny thing was , Dad used to ride in his younger days........maybe it was Mum who had the most say ????

For Christmas 1973 "Santa" left us a Honda CT90 for farm work and trotting along behind the cows at milking time. It was a good bit of kit for a 9yr old even with a centrifical clutch.
I still have nightmares about how easily those things crash and still have a scar on my left hand where I was pitched into a tree about 5yrs later.
Although not technically "mine" I reckon I did most of the KM's on it. A few yrs later it was joined by a CT110 which was no faster but wasnt any slower maxed out than my mates on RM/YX/KX80's. Dad was dead set against 2 strokes.
Incidently both were still in service when the folks retired and moved to town in 2005. Yep over 30yrs of cow shit and mud and abuse by 7 kids!

Well, about 6 yrs ago, bruce told me to get my licence, then he would buy me a bike of my own. So he taught me to ride the old paddock bike in his back shed,
then he bought me this little bewdy, the Honda cbf250, which was the one I ran over (and killed) a border collie dog, a short month later..

Geez, Ewok - all the rich kids had shiny Hondas (2WA, Chook, Hammy, reddog, Kaupy, Suzy)

We were the houso kids with the poor smokers.

At least we weren't the special kid in the corner : "The first bike I bought was a Jawa 250 California"

First bike in 1977 was a 1974/75, can't quite remember the year but it had a disc brake front end, Ducati 450 single, orange in colour. When to start it next day to meet my mates for a ride and after it trying to break my leg with the kick starter and pushing it for what seemed like miles I jumped in my car and fetched my mate who started the thing. A great bike once I worked out how to start it, it cornered on rails. Unfortunately I crashed it into the side of an EH Holden 6 months later and destroyed it, broken frame etc..............
Graham

#Tag wrote:Geez, Ewok - all the rich kids had shiny Hondas (2WA, Chook, Hammy, reddog, Kaupy, Suzy)

We were the houso kids with the poor smokers.

At least we weren't the special kid in the corner : "The first bike I bought was a Jawa 250 California"

Sounds like a bit of envy creeping in there    

It had a black red & chrome tank with cream coloured guards .......the gear leaver doubled as the kick starter ( push it in & turn it up )
250cc /2 stroke single & cost $375 new ................on a good day with a tail wind it could just about manage to pull the skin off a rice pudding   
You still haven't told us what your first bike was.......... 

#Tag wrote:Geez, Ewok - all the rich kids had shiny Hondas (2WA, Chook, Hammy, reddog, Kaupy, Suzy)

We were the houso kids with the poor smokers.

 at $40 mine didn't have too much shine left by the time I got it & a hell of a lot less by the time I traded it in, managed to get $150 as a trade in about a year or so later

My dad bought my first bike before I was born at auction and then promptly dismantled it.  It sat in the rafters of our garage for many years without me even knowing it was there.

Finally when I was about 14 or 15 dad got it down and started to reassemble it.  I got a bit of a surprise when I realized what it was that came down from  the roof.  It needed a few new old parts to get it going,  and also a part had to be manufactured (I think it was a crank key,  or something like that).

When it started to take shape we repainted the tank,  wheels etc until it started to look like something worthwhile.  Anyway,  it turned out to be a 1938 Panther 350.  Single cylinder which used to fire at every second lamp-post.

Went alright but I was still only 15 and couldn't legally ride it on the streets,  not that it stopped me.  Finally some other interest came along so we sold it (I believe to the editor of Two Wheels or one of the other magazines at the time).

Paul said :   Some stuff
In reply:

This One?

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The first bike I ever sat my eager little arse on was a Deltek. But the first one fresh off the floor that I bought with the sweat of my brow was :



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#Tag wrote:Paul said :   Some stuff
In reply:

This One?

" />

The first bike I ever sat my eager little arse on was a Deltek. But the first one fresh off the floor that I bought with the sweat of my brow was :

 Close ..............this one but with the 250 motor not the 350 one. ( my second bike was a trail bike )

My first bike was a 350cc BSA.

I was too young for a license and the bike was not registered but that didn't keep me off the streets.

I was riding along one day and there was a truck ahead of me.

He momentarily put on his right hand indicator which was understood to be an opportunity for me to overtake - which I began to do.

Unfortunately what the truck driver did was make a right hand turn.

My bike finished up under the truck and was badly damaged.

I walked away with a few scratches.

To this day, when a truck flashes the right hand blinker I never see this as an overtaking opportunity, once was enough.

1972 XL 100

Some great stories guys n gal.  Dekenai !  You will have to try a little harder next time. 

Hammy wrote:Some great stories guys n gal.  Dekenai !  You will have to try a little harder next time. 

I was going to say how I remember trying to learn how to powerslide.  Of course, the XL100 wouldn't pull the skin off a rice pudding, so I ended up pitching it in faster and faster, and without the power to keep the back wheel spinning it would slide, bite and try (and succeed) in high-siding me.  After a few falls, I concluded this wasn't the bike for it.  This was the first XL 100, but really just a re-badge of the SL 100.  Funny thing is I have always wanted its big brother...the SL 350...kinda dug the CL 350 too.

You may have been disappointed in the CL350 too Dekenai.
A friend had one for a year or so.
It made not much more power than the littlies and weighed a lot more.

It nearly killed me one day - one plug thread had stripped and we bodged it somehow (probably banged it in with a hammer and said lets see how that goes) I was kneeling beside it when he fired it up. It went kabang and the plug blew out taking a small chunk of my right ear with it and ended up a couple of hundred yards down the road. AAhh - those were the days.

A big old heavy XS250 with a seat that you could lift off at any time (hinge and latch both buggered), racing slick front and rear and a side stand that you had to put down before you let go of the handlebars otherwise she would fall over. 
Yes. I learnt many valuable lessons on my first ever ride of a motorcycle.  
Ahh, those were the days. When a seventeen year old could walk into the RTA, answer twenty questions and walk out with a piece of paper which made it legal for me to strap an L plate to a machine,  then proceed to learn how to operate said machine on the public highway without ever slinging my leg over a bike before. I was lucky to make it home safely the day I entered the motorcycling fraternity.  

1982 XT 250...what a weapon...not!!

I started late into bikes, about 22yr. Had ridden plenty of mates bikes before that time, but never had my own until then. 
 I`m glad I didn`t in some respects, as I would have killed myself I recon.

I see just about everybody here suffered the same fate, and that was the dreaded DRUM BRAKES!!! How good were they hey??

all of this reminiscing, I can remember being scared as hell the 1st time I hoped on a 250, even the 1st time from a 75 to a 175 ag bike was a bit scary
 

It'll be interesting if anyone can dredge up a pic of my first bike to post up on here for me.
It was a Kawasaki G2, & had an awesome 90cc "power" plant   
Am I the only one that had a Kawasaki as a first bike?

This one Steve  ?

Kiwisteve wrote:It'll be interesting if anyone can dredge up a pic of my first bike to post up on here for me.
It was a Kawasaki G2, & had an awesome 90cc "power" plant   
Am I the only one that had a Kawasaki as a first bike?

Was it like one of these Steve?





You beat me by 1 Steve, my 2nd was a Kawasaki (It was the 1st I bought with my own hard earned $$$)

Hammy wrote:

This one Steve  ?

Very close Hammy. My one must have been faster, it was red