What, Where, Why, When... your first streetbike

86 FZ600, I was 16 in 86, didnt have it long, went back to riding in the dirt until 93.

 

That's a bike I'd buy tomorrow if I came across a clean one. I like me an FZ600.

 

A used 1982 Yamaha XS650SJ Heritage Special...which was the blacked-out version. Rode it around for about 6 years.

 

First bike was an old 70's mini trail my dad bought for me and my brother at a flea market when I was 5. First real bike was a 2003 CBR600RR I bought for myself when I turned 25 and could afford the insurance (Feb of 2004). Since then I've bought an 02 954RR, an 04 VFR800, and an 06 GSXR750. 750 is the only one in the garage right now, along with my wife's (dying because it never gets ridden) 99 R6.

 

Wow a post for ,back in the day.Here it goes.

My little brother sells me his 1984 VF750F intercepter for 800$ so he could go to college.He bought it from his buddy in the marines.I got it in 1989.
It was painted ferrari red and had dual vance hines headers.Man that thing was loud.I used to go under the over pass and drop that bitch into 1st or 2nd and the pipes would go off with the sickest sound you ever heard.
I lived in Dallas at the time and drove it to Oklahoma to see my kids where my X moved to, one weekend in 1991.i could never got the title from my brother because he could not find the owner.Fucking cops pulled me over and took my bike and inpound it and throw me in jail because i could not prove it was mine and did not have insurance.never got the bike back.

 

1983 Yamaha Seca 400 - bought it from a motorcycle salvage shop. Needed some work. Seat reupholstered, tank fixed (Hours of bondo and sanding made it look good), a few missing trim items. Good deal for $650. I sold it a few years later for $850.

I was living at home for my first year of college. I saved up for it, bought it, and stored it at a friends house. I had been riding up and down his country road practicing for weeks. When my mother figured out what I had done she stopped speaking to me for about two weeks. Luckily Dad interceded and told her I would always wear my riding gear....helmet, gloves, jacket, etc. Otherwise I might have been living in a cardboard box.

 

I've been a GP fan since I was 14, but there was no way my parents would allow me to have a motorcycle. I bought my first one at 22. I had signed a deal to trade in my VW GTI on a leftover Corrado. The day came in for the exchange, the dealer made up some story about my new car being sold by the dealership they were supposed to get it from. I'm sure they just got a better offer than the smoking deal they had given me.

I took my $8000 check back, drove 20 miles to a Yamaha dealership and bought a VMax. I didn't have a motorcycle endorsement, so I couldn't get insurance on a ZX-11. Which I couldn't have afforded anyway, at 22 and living in Philadelphia. Premium would have been something like one third of the cost of the bike.

It wasn't entirely a out-of-nowhere purchase: my then-girlfriend had once told me she would leave me if I ever bought a motorcycle and I also kinda wanted to see if she had the balls. She didn't.

If you think that was an impulse purchase, I once went shopping for a coffee table (ironically enough, in my second GTI) and came back home with a Ford F150 Lightning.

 

What a f*cking squid.

 

1995 KLR 650, Denver, 2005, $650, not running. Cleaned the pilot jet, got a new battery, rode it to Seattle with Army surplus gear and a milk crate strapped to the back, put 13k on it that summer, sold for $1800 that fall. Still miss it.

 

'74 Suzuki GT380, because it was in the garage at home. I was about 14 when I figured out how to start & ride it

 

1980 - I was 16 years old. Bought a 73 RD350. I completely tricked it out.
milled Heads,ported, FPP Chambers, Solo boat tail seat, TZ racebody. Home made rear sets. It was badass. It smoked my dads 1980 cb750F. Kep the bike until I went into the usmc. bought my first car when I was 25.

 

Was that not clear from things I have said over the years here about my street riding?

 

LOL. I got my first bike in 1992 when I was a senior in high school. 89 CBR600.

 

The BMW Owners of America club is doing a "First Rides" series among their 40,000 members, with this same concept.

My first bike was a 1967-68 Honda 305 Scrambler ( I didn't have it long enough to learn the designation) One of my college dorm-mates had it, and he was a total stoner. He said to me "It doesn't start. If you can start it you can have it." I did my best mimicry of Steve McQueen from The Great Escape" straddled the bike, popped the gas cap and shook the bike, peering inside as if I knew what I was looking for. There was no gas visible, so I rolled the bike down the hill about 200 yards to the gas station, put in a dollar worth of gas (topped her right up) and it started on the third kick. I tore out of the gas station and out onto the highways around Burlington, VT.

For two days I rode that thing every chance I got, until a car driver swerved into my lane on a bypass offramp, and I dodged off the road and down into a ditch. The bike went airborne, hit a tree broadside, about ten feet above the ground, and stuck to the tree. the frame had bent enough that the footpeg and passenger peg scissored into the tree trunk and locked the bike there, upside down and leaking vital fluids. Later we got a Jeep and a Chain and pulled the bike off the tree. The ensuing fall to the ground finished it off, broke the bars, crushed the tank and just made a mess of it. I just shoved it into the cattails swamp and left it there. If I could remember the place, it is probably still there, 40 years later.

Then I had the bug. A couple days later I was at a party, and a guy had a Bridgestone DT175 Scrambler.
I apparently made a deal for the bike in return for $50 and my Ruger 10/22. I rode the bike back to my apartment, parked it and went upstairs loaded, to pass out. Two days later it snowed, and I wondered what asshole had left that cool motorcycle out in the snow. Later in the wweek, I found my carbon copy of our handwritten Bill of Sale, and my Ruger was missing. To this day I have no recollection of making that deal, executing the paperwork, or delivering the rifle and cash. There was a lot of potent dope around UVM in those days...

I rode that Bridgestone for over a year, then I totally disassembled it, made a list of the stuff that was obviously broken, and took the list to a local bike shop. The shop owner had a Bridgestone parts microfiche, and an account with Rockford Motors, the Bridgestone USA distributor. I ordered up all the parts, including carb parts, transmission gears, a couple crank bearings, two mufflers. It all came to about $65. The shop guy said to me "If you get it running, bring it by."" Five or six months later, I rode the bike to the shop, gas dribbling from one carb (note to self, don't use blue silicone seal on carb float bowls...) The shop owner took the bike for a spin around the parking lot and offered me a job as a bike mechanic.

I've been a motorcycle mechanic and rider since that sunny Spring day in 1972...39 years and still going strong.

 

Hahahaha, I've been there.

 

built a vw trike in '71
was my only form of transport for a couple of years

 

Bought a 1986 RZ 350 when I was 16, sold it a couple of years later to buy an FZR 1000, fast forward 15 years, I bought a few old bikes from a dealer that shut down, my old RZ happened to be one of them, it only had about 200 miles more than when I sold it, still have it today and actually raced if a few times over the last couple of years.

 

1987 FZ 700 with the lowers, just like the one in this pic (but that's not mine):
http://forum.motorcycle-usa.com/attach.aspx/10983/1987-FZ700---Pandora.jpg

 

well... i've wanted a bike since i could walk. parents always hated them, said no. around the time i was ending high school, looked into them, but my insurance was coming up at like $3500 because of all my speed tickets.

then around the end of college... in like 04-05', bunch of my friends ALL got sportbikes, stored em all together in some storage unit, and so it was kinda the cool thing to do, but only really one of them was a foreal bike guy. so of course, end of 05' they're all losing interest. well 1 guy, the most non-riding of them all, had a 02' R6. he bought it from his neighbor, clean title, for like $3200 in great shape with 10k on it. neighbor had like 7 bikes and just needed to get rid of some so he hooked him up.

well this dude, including letting other people borrow it a bunch, only put like 3000 miles on it. so we're sitting there one night outside this place eating and lounging in september of 05', and he's like, "man i wanna get rid of this thing." and i go, "well... i got $2300, its yours if you want." and done.

so i got a 3.5 year old, clean title R6 with like 13k on it for $2300. that bike saw a cross country trip and had like 36k on it by the end of 09' and still going strong until i got hit by a car and it was totalled.

funny thing is... if it woulda lived 4 more weeks, i was gonna sell it to ANOTHER friend for like $2000 for it to be HIS first bike, pass on the good vibes i got on it, and then go get a new bike on payments and that would be that. Ended up getting like $7000 all said and done, and it paid for my Speed Triple straight up and then some. i liked that bike tho... o well, on to bike heaven.

 

Very first bike at 15 years old?
Norton 750 Commando!

Bought it from my older sisters boyfriend for 750.00 as he said it was totally reliable. In 7 days it started and ran twice. My mother threatened to beat his ass if he didn't give me back my money. So he did.

Week later:
Suzuki GT380 (3-cylinder / 2-stroke) I think it was a 1979 and I bought it from the next older sisters boyfriend for 500.00. Good thing too as it was another POS that constantly had electrical problems.

Six months later and with the help of a family friend (we were single parent family at that point in our lives), we bought a nearly new Honda CB650 Custom. That bike was the shit and basically rode me through my teenage years until I finally crashed and burned it badly.

My brother-in-law ended up with both the GT380 and 650 Custom after I moved away from home and he has over the years restored both bikes. I rode the GT380 one Christmas a few years ago and it was amazing! The 650 Custom wasn't quite done at the time but it is finished now for when I get back home again.

3 bikes in 6 months?
Not a bad deal I guess