Wrench'n Ride'n

How different can this modified SR 500 be?? This is a truly amazing bike. It was posted on the SR 500 forums . When most builders go for that Brit single BSA/Norton look, this guy goes for something else altogther. I love it. So what did the builder do??? -Tig welded, hand built frame with billet motor cradles. -Honda NT650 Hawk single sided swing-arm w/ Kosman widened rim. -CBRF3 fork -P.M. 4 piston caliper w/ floating rotor -Magura throttle & clip on's. -Hand built exhaust with carbon fiber muffler. -Over-sized stainless valves, bronze guilds, 550 Venolia piston. -Trail tech L.C.D. meter for speed, tach, temp, odometer/trip. -About 50% of the bike is powder-coated.

MZ have been busy getting ready for 2008 with some great looking styling changes to their 125 range of singles. The below has been taken from their site . Dear Friends, At the beginning of the new season we have something very special for you. Our 125 ccm models have a new look and carry the following names: "Blizzard", "Elegance", "Copper" and Camouflage"....... Your MZ-Team MZ 125 SM Blizzard MZ 125 SM Elegance MZ 125 SX Camouflage MZ 125 SX Copper Of course we wont see these here in Australia. If you own an MZ 125 single I would love to hear from you. Would be great if I could get a road test from someone who owns one.

Yamaha have realeased their new 660 based single. The MT-03. See I so want one....MT-03 The bike can be had in Europe but not here in Aussie land. I have asked Yamaha Australia if they will bring them in. They said "No plans at this stage to introduce the MT03 in to Australia." To rub salt into the wounds, axxess , the forum admin guy at http://forum.monoconnection.nl/ got to ride one. NOOOO!!! So unfair. He translated his ride impression into English for those of us who will not get to ride this. Thank you mate for doing this for us. So lets see what he has to say..... Saturday 16 February I could try the Yamaha MT-03 at Gebben Motors. I could try a brand new red 2008 model. After a short instruction and a warning because of the new tires we were ready to go! The first thing I noticed was the enormous wide steer and the upright riding position It gave me a feeling of absolute control and power! The seat was quit hard but not uncomfortable at all. Unless it was still freez...

Yamaha have gone and done it now. They have taken their wonderful 660 single engine, same as what powers the Skorpion, and thrown it into one mean looking package to create the MT-03. This is what MZ could have done had they kept making the Skorpion. Yamaha have this to say about their mean steed. MT-03 is a motorcycle for its time – born for the kind of 21st century roads where bigger high-performance bikes struggle to unleash their full potential. MT-03 has instant, pulsing low-down power from its fuel-injected 660 cc single-cylinder engine and a totally new sports chassis concept engineered for hardcore street sports riding. You get a short wheelbase, low seat height, focused centre of gravity and forward-biased riding position for hyper-manoeuvrability, superb rider feedback and excellent traction. So MT-03 is perfect for intense fun riding, it doesn’t matter whether you’re doing it on tough urban streets or mountainside hairpins. And with side-mounted rear shock, aluminium swingar...

It's a MuZ feast. Today we meet BlackMuZZer and his MuZ Sport. He is MuZZer's son. (see From Skorpion Sport to Sport Cafe Racer posting to this blog) Seems that MuZs run in that family. :-) So over to BlackMuZZeR to tell us about his superb MuZ..... He is in Belgium. Just like my Dad I’m very fond of thumpers and I always wanted a Skorpion since my dad had one. I have my drivers license for two years and I ride that single since the first day.. It’s a second hand black MuZ, had only 14.000 miles. The first months I only could watch it in the garage and making plans to change the bike, more sporty looks. Early this year I went to the Ardennen in Belgium with mother and father and a few MuZ riders. There I met Zzero ( see yellow Skorpion on this blog) and he made told me everything ‘bout going flat at the track. A few months later I try kneedown with success. So next year I’m going to the track in France with the Monoconnection gang. Now about my bike. It started with a standar...

Time to have a look at another great MuZ. I asked ZzerO, who hangs out at online on the forums at http://forum.monoconnection.nl/ , to tell us about his lovely yellow MuZ. So take it away Zzero… He is in the Netherlands. The this bike is officially called a Skorpion Sport Cup, they have the side fairings standard, mine where taken off for a while because I had a minor crash with a pushbike rider, not my fault... I've had the bike for about 1.5 year know, bought it in May last year, but I didn’t have my drivers licence yet. I got my licence in August so from that time I could actually ride my MuZ. At first I only rode for commuting and for fun. Then I went on the track for 2 times ( Croix en Ternois ). That was so much fun that I only wanted to ride on the track. As I’m still studying, I can’t afford to go to on the track that much. So now I don’t use my sport to much for commuting, and I’m saving up some money to go on the track more often. mods made to the bike so far: - Front bra...

It’s amazing what you find you follow a link from a website and then follow another link and then another. Don’t ask where I started. But I did end up at this site. http://www.vd-classic.com/EN/index.html VD Classics is a company in France that makes custom Café parts. They can kit out your SR500 or XT500 with some very trick stuff. How about changing the way your Kawasaki W650 looks? The one that sucked me in was the photo of their MuZ Rocket 660. My Traveller is now living in fear that I might strip all her touring bits off and make her into one slick hot rod. Not likely. But the Rocket 660 sure is one sexy single. Here is a photo of the MuZ Rocket 660s as done by VD Classic.

First up I am in no way related to the guy who is selling this bike. Nor do I gain anything from him for posting this to my blog. I found this while surfing eBay and thought it was one very nice SRX and want to share it here. Ok, first you are going to have to read the why’s and wherefor’s as to why I’m selling such a little gem. Purchased in February as a non-runner/basket case, with a view to a quick reassemble, MOT, Tax and flog it to support my biking habit…………that was the plan….until.. #1 Son decided he didn’t want to take his precious Morini 3 ½ Sport to the IOM this year, and wanted to take another bike instead, well, he’s an engineer, and knows his way round bikes, so I said ‘here’s a bike, I’ve got loads of spares, get on with it’. The trouble with letting a ‘proper’ engineer do these things is that everything has to be done ‘correctly’. During March and April I got regular phone calls with shopping lists of parts, to come from my spares, or purchased new from Yamaha, engin...

I asked a question on the MZOG • MZ Owners Group if I should call my bike an MZ or a MuZ. I got some very informative replies. One reply was emailed to me with a link to Wikipedia MZ entry. What really caught my eye on this webpage was this very petite MZ 125 4 stroke water cooled single. This is what was said about this bike… “MZ currently manufactures a line of 125cc 4-stroke motorcycles using a new and powerful engine designed in-house. The current MZ 125 produces 15 crank-horsepower (11 kW) and almost 10 lbf·ft (14 N·m) of torque. It is a liquid-cooled pressure-lubricated dual-overhead-cam design with 4 valves, high-voltage electronic ignition and an 11000 rpm ignition cut-off. This is officially the most powerful 125cc 4-stroke engine mass-manufactured and has also proved highly reliable. This engine is used in 4 models of motorcycle, all of which share a common frame. The frame is a tube-steel backbone with the engine as a stressed bottom member. Changes in the suspension, facia...