1972 ST70

My 1972 UK model ST70.
Last taxed in 1974 with under 1000 miles recorded - even came with owners and service manuals.
Fresh plug, oil and fuel and it fired up with no problems.
I have ordered a new throttle cable (sticking) and new inner tubes (don't trust them 47 tears on) from David Silver
...then I'm going to use it to annoy people in the London ULEZ...

My last bike was a kawa GPZ900R - many many years ago.

Looks to be a good little bike

Now I have the mini bike taxed as a 'Historic Vehicle' (over 2 months of snail mail and phone calls to DVLA & still no V5c back) and insured I took it out for a decent road test.

Here are my observations - I would like to know if anyone else can confirm or deny that the following are normal...

It was a big problem finding the gearbox to be upside down compared to my previous 12 bikes (all Japanese). Once I got used to this I found 1st gear is unusable because it takes two shifts (the second one very heavy) to get into 2nd - by which time all momentum is spent and 1st gear is needed again (if going up hill).

It pulls away fine in 2nd gear considering I am an overweight 6'4", but once in 3rd anything above 20MPH is unpleasant due to engine vibration.

It skids the rear wheel brutally when changing down so using a downshift to increase any engine braking is a no-no. Easing the lever back into 2nd from 3rd when near enough at a standstill isn't too bad (I miss not having any clutch control).

People stick their heads out of car windows and stick their thumbs up in the air (I was expecting abuse and thrown food / drink).

At Tesco's I chained it up next to the biggest Harley Davidson I have ever seen - so at least I know it's not really me having the mid-life crisis.

I had a huge amount of fun riding it around but I don't know if I'd ever take it on busy main roads - which is a bit of a surprise because I used to own a 1981 C90 chicken chaser and that was fine on A roads...

I find my bike loses a bit of momentum shifting from 1st to 2nd gear it's because we're going through nuteral on the way but having the frotl shut right off when changing gear makes for a smooth gear change, I find if I go anywhere on mine I have to have plenty of time on my hands because of the people coming up to me and saying how nice it is or that they had one many years ago ect, it always brings me a smile from ear to ear when ever I ride it

st70 wrote · Thu Jul 18, 2019 10:17 am ↑:...having the frotl shut right off when changing gear makes for a smooth gear change...

I've now got quicker and better at using 1st gear and changing up through neutral into 2nd.
I've noticed an odd thing though...
Riding around just using 2nd and 3rd gear is fine, but if I start using 1st gear (just for the thrill of the impressive acceleration) then any subsequent change from 2nd into 3rd is very difficult - the lever gets stiff.
When i got the bike I noticed the hand throttle did not spring back to closed on its own. I bought and fitted a new Honda cable which made no difference to this. Maybe I need to be more careful closing it completely on changes like you say.

I now can get it up to 30MPH!