Hi Guys,
Some of you have seen my other thread with the basket case V35 Imola that I’m working on, and while that’s been an ongoing process, I was approached to restore a V65SP. The motorcycle has been with the previous owner for over 20 years. He’s hasn’t been riding it a lot and the motorcycles occupied the corner spot amongst his vast collection. The motorcycle was painted by the previous owner half way across the country who also happened to be a friend of mine... the motorcycle connections are real strong here.
While the motorcycle is visually intact there are a lot of pieces that have either suffered dry rot or gone brittle or just worn. There was considerable clatter from the left cylinder and a whole lot of oil all over the engine block.
For an engine with about 30k on the clock, the engine looks like it’s really taken quite a beating... the big end, connecting as well as the pistons are shot. The oil pressure switch was also Macgyver’ed and as a result the sector has been destroyed.
But the good news is that the build is well under way, the plan is a bone stock restoration back to original colours. I’ve managed to source a brand new front fairing in original red, so I can match the paint as well, and turn lights from Italy. I hunted down a set of pistons from Germany Ebay. One cylinder block was well out of spec and a new/used one is on its way from the UK, thanks to the guys at gutsibits.
The engine cases, gearbox and other parts have been bead blasted and ready for assembly. While the carbs are off to the ultra sonic cleaners.
I plan to replace the CB points with a dyna s kit. But the biggest challenge for me are the front forks. They are severely pitted and it looks like hardchroming them may be a waste of time. I’ve got a set of 35 mm Paioli forks with conventional damper rods which I may adapt to fit the stock bottoms. The damper units on my V35 are mismatched as well and look like they’re gonna be a bigger hassle and expense to get right and was thinking of going down the conventional damper rod route for that project as well. If you guys have any suggestions to solve this problem, I’m all open to try them.
Thanks for reading, will post regular updates as the project progresses. Which may take a while as we’re under a 3 week lockdown here in India. Heres wishing all of you reading this good health.
Stay smart and stay safe.