Don't know if you've seen this thread, Brett -
CLICK, but if you look about halfway down my list of past bikes, you'll find this one listed :
Yamaha XS650 C Chopper ‘76Wish I had pics of it still but all my really early photos (and most of my gear) went up in smoke in a fire in '81.
That model was the pick of them in my view, being the ones that really benefitted from having extensive modifications done to the frame to improve handling (aka RH 1100's) and if memory serves me correctly, retailed for $890 in 1976.
Unfortunately (in hindsight), I chose to go the chopper route with mine and fitted it with a 2.5 gallon teardrop tank, flat seat, shortened rear guard, mini gauges, twin rectangular hella headlights, 6 inch over forks, Z bars and had short upswept mufflers that were LOUD, but also sounded very nice.
Then things went a bit silly when I landed a job at the mines and money was no object so I got a fifteen inch rim laced up to the rear hub and fitted it with an RD201 Bridgestone car tyre (it had rounded shoulders) and got the frame widerened to accept a jackshaft through the swingarm pivot area with a new arm fabbed up at a local engineering shop in Mount Isa. It was a real work of art being a staggered "H" shape with eccentric adjusters in the pivots for adjusting the very short jack chain, the swingarm rode on needle rollers on the shaft itself, while it ran on tapered rollers that were tensioned from the non sprocket end of the shaft outside the frame. Neat Chrome guards kept all the moving bits safely hidden away. They did stick out a ways but dedicated forward controls kept my feet out of that area anyway. Upper shock mount extensions were also made up by the same firm to keep everything lined up nicely. It was a very heavy setup, but this was just a cruising (posing) bike after all, and it looked so cool!
Then I really stuffed it up good and proper!
Had a holiday and went to Brisvegas to get the last bit for the bike. I'd always loved the look of Springer front ends and I was going to get one for my bike. I was looking to change the whole look of the bike now, and was after the whole deal, forks, trees and 21" front wheel and was amazed that there was only about $250 difference between a short front end and a long one, so I came back armed with a 16 inch over Springer front end complete with 21 inch wheel with a spool hub (no brakes), but it was sooooooo SHINY!
Naturally, got back to base and fitted it up and the bike stood up like it was doing a wheelstand. So then I got the frame raked to suit by my mate (boilermaker) who did a fine job using chalk marks on the concrete floor to line everything up. Turned out to be straight as a die so I took it home and refitted the lights and gauges then took it for a ride.
Everything was different, in a bad way. At low speed, like starting off from the lights, steering input did little to help maintain balance, as the wheel only flopped from side to side as opposed to turning, on a normal bike, so I had to start off hard to get velocity when some actual steerage could be extracted from the front tyre. Every thing at the front end reacted in slow motion, while the natural forces of gravity and keeping balanced happened in real time, which resulted in me dropping it twice on the first ride, then another time after I'd started to get used to it, the front wheel simply tucked under when I leant it over to round a tight bend in the road. Out on the open road, it was as stable as if it was on rails. It was just the drama trying to get it to the open road.
I hardly rode it at all after I'd finished it. Ended up selling it to a workmate (non rider, but plenty of money) who lived in Sydney who'd seen the bike evolve before his eyes and just loved the look of it and had to have it. Didn't end up too bad financially for me in the end, so it wasn't too expensive a lesson learnt.
I wonder if anyone's seen it around? You couldn't miss it if you saw it.
