Well Johnny and I have been working on the XR over the past couple of weeks to get it ready for riding and the first stage of fixes and such have been completed. To start with you can see that nearly everything above the triple clamp has been replaced. The handlebars have been replaced with a set of MSR bars ($24.99) from Cycle Ger. They were pretty wide at first but I have cut them down by and an inch and half to make them more manageable in tight areas. Both the brake and clutch levers and perches are new pieces from MotionPro ($21.95 ea) and were purchased over at Castle Powersports. Thanks go to Norm at Cycle Gear for finding them for me over there since he didn't have them in stock and he knew I was in a hurry to get them. The grips ($9.99) were replaced while I was at it and they came from Cycle Gear as well.

Now I needed a plastic side cover for the right side of the bike as it covers the muffler and without something over it could easily burn one's leg. While Johnny and I were at the Vintage Bike show at Barber he found a cover that we could "make fit" for only $3.00. Boasting a large number 7 on it, it was cut to shape (roughly) and attached with a set of zip ties. It may not be very pretty but it works perfectly.

The exhaust has several issues including no end can (hardly), plenty of rust, and the heat shield mount was broken. Some time with a wire wheel and some sand paper took care of the rust and some PJ-1 flat black made short work of the pipe. The heat shield has is now being held on with pipe wrap and while it looks like hell, it holds on securely and adds to the Road Warrior (Dirt Warrior??) motif that the XR seems to display in abundance. The lack of a can will have to wait for now as there's not much pipe left to attach one too. One disaster at a time as I like to say.

The left side engine case cover over the magneto had been bashed pretty good by the previous owner and as a result had a small crack that, even though they had JB welded it, still wept a good amount of oil. I ordered a replacement cover from Babbit's for $43.99 and, after adding some extra gasket goop to the wire entry area, oil from there is no longer a problem. Finally I was able to adjust the idle to get it to actually idle on its own without having to keep giving it gas from the twist grip. This is an improvement but it still will not run at all with the choke off so a carb cleaning/rebuild may be in order this winter.

At this point we felt the bike was ready for an actual ride so this past Sunday we took Johnny's YZ125 and the XR out to Castallian Springs for two firsts. My first off road ride on the XR and my first time riding on single track trails through the woods. Since I'm here to talk about it I obviously survived and the XR performed better than expected and that adventure will be another upcoming article.

Since we've got the bike to reasonable running status, the next stage is to start improving things. There are three main things that need attention. The expanding drum brakes are pitifully poor. We're not certain if they need to be worked or if they can even be improved at all as they may have not been much when they were new. The front forks seem to be ok but the rear shocks are shot and so far finding replacements for 16.5" long shocks has proved difficult. If I can locate a set though, that will help the handling a lot for sure so if any of our readers have some ideas where I can find some do let me know. The last thing that needs to be addressed is the aforementioned carb which probably has plenty crud in it from the rust in the fule tank. Taking care of the tank and carb should resolve the fueling issues and make her much more manageable.

I'll continue to post updates as we work on these issues. In the meantime here are some more photos for your viewing pleasure.