Our Classic Motorcycle Restorations
The saga begins late in 2004. My son, Nicholas, came to us with an ad in the local neighborhood flyer, the Wekiva Treasure Chest, for two classic '83 Honda Magna motorcycles, a 750 and an 1100, in parts, in boxes - $300. He was very excited and Ann gave me that "humor him" look. It was already late in the evening and I was reluctant to call about them, let alone go take a look at them. But something told me we should, so we did.
We arrived at the seller's garage, filled with a dune buggy and dozens of cardboard boxes full of motorcycle parts, frames, wheels, etc. Nick was in heaven, and I must say, so was I. As I crawled around this guy's garage, sifting through box after box of parts, trying to identify all the major components and sub-assemblies, it brought back fond memories of my teenage years when my parents bought me a Honda SL125 on/off dirt bike, in parts, in boxes, for Christmas.
It looked like everything was there to put together two motorcycles, but I still wasn't ready to buy. I was about to tell him I needed to think about it, or maybe I did, can't remember. To add to the pressure, he told me a motorcycle salvage dealer was coming with a trailer to haul it away if I wasn't interested. Nick had that "Please Dad, I'll do anything" look and $300 really isn't that much, so... We bought and resurrected them from the dead, or at least all those cardboard boxes of parts they came in.
This is the entire reason to create the original Stew's Place site. The restoration of those original two two classic '83 Honda V4 Magna motorcycles, an '83 VF750C and an '83 VF1100C, took years. But it soon grew to be many more. An '85 VF500C. An '85 VT500C. And my favorite, an '87 VF700C SuperMagna. Even a dirt bike for Nick to tinker with! An '82 Suzuki RS175.
We made a great start, assembling the rolling frames of both originals from all the boxes of parts. Shop manuals were available on eBay, along with gasket sets and other assorted replacements parts, even the specialty tools we needed. From there we were able to cobble together those two into running bikes. That 1100 is fast! Scary fast! It was the fastest production motorcycle on the planet in 1983!
What we learned from those first two we applied to other motorcycles. We bought an '85 VF500C that we should have just walked away from. At least we didn't pay much for it. Twice as much as the first two, but we did manage to get it running... After swapping in a rebuilt engine! Turns out cylinder #2 was cracked from being run out of coolant. That motorbike ended up being a motorbroke!
The idea was to rebuild it quickly so Ann could take her endorsement test. After finding the engine was total junk, we bought another motorcycle, an '83 VT500C. She found it on Craigs List. The hope was we could turn it around quickly so Ann could now use it instead of the motorbroke to get her endorsement. We paid $800 for another "motorbroke". It had a number of ailments, but they were eventually remedied. It became a reliable practice bike for everyone to use to improve their riding skills.
Meanwhile, I remembered my best friend Tim had offered to sell me his second generation Super Magna ('87) for what he paid to have the shaft drive rebuilt before he parked it, $700. It had been sitting in his garage, beach side, for the last two years while he was overseas defending our country. So I figured, what the Hell? I called his wife, Kathy, to see if they still had it. They did. We made a day trip of it, Ann, Nick, and myself. We met Kathy for lunch at our favorite hangout beachside, Coconuts on the Beach in Cocoa Beach, FL.
