An Introduction.

My name isn't important. But I like motorcycles, and that's all you need to know.

I started a fascination of classic motorcycles at a very young age. New motorcycles just don't appeal to me, unless they have a classic look or feel to them. I tend to split motorcycles into several different categories. I won't go too much into that right now; All you need to know is that I love vintage Jap and Euro bikes.

Anyway.

My dad is my motorcycling hero. He has owned and maintained the same Suzuki GT750 since '75 and has ridden it to 48 states, plus Canada and Mexico. As a child, I would join him on his trips and would attend rallies in numerous states. My first long trip was to Nashville and back, from Chicago when I was 10. I spent a week down in Tennessee and experienced high winds, hail, heavy rain, freezing cold- you name it. Did it turn me off to motorcycles? No.

For the next 8 or so years, I joined him on random short trips through Illinois and Iowa. About two years after I got my driver's license, we both decided it was time for me to have my own bike. I took the bars for the first time in the summer of 2007, riding around a local parking lot. I was learning on a 750cc motorcycle- Specifically, that GT (Or "Water Buffalo", as some call it), so it was too big for me to get the feel of anything. A year later I received a 1980 Honda CX500C, which will have it's own story soon. I took and passed the MSF course and got my motorcycle license a week after my 18th birthday.

In October of 2009, I recieved a 1973 Suzuki T500K. This was donated to me by a very kind and generous friend of the family that's been super nice to me every rally I've attended since I was a kid. Oh, the potential this bike has...A story on that bike will come later.

Anyway, I've come here to post my experiences with working on that specific T500. I helped my father rebuild my CX500, but I want to do a lot more of the wrenching on my own, since the T500 is such a simple bike to fix. I'm not a born mechanic. I'm no grease monkey. I don't know how about 75% of my bike works, but I'm learning as I go.