XJ's at AMA Vintage Days at Mid-Ohio

I'm just coming back to life after nearly a thousand miles to and from Ohio for this years Vintage Days held in Lexington Ohio.

It was a fantastic trip and I got to see tons of great vintage iron from mostly the 50's, 60's, 70's and 80's. I have no idea how many acres the event is spread across but easily well over 100. The swap meet alone had hundreds of vendors offering everything from whole bikes to parts and pieces for even the most arcane bikes.

This was my second trip out, the first time being in the summer of '09 but this time, I met lots of forum friends from the different forums I belong to.
Everytime someone texted me, it seemed that they were on the other end of the event, nearly a mile away requiring yet another long walk to meet with them.

The lone exception was when Nick from our forum here texted me after riding his turbo all the way to the event and we hung out most of Saturday afternoon. Nick's a great guy and for me it was like meeting an old friend. I introduced him to some of my Kaw triple friends that I had met up with earlier. The conversation never lacked as we walked around the swap meet for a couple of hours. He beared with me as I was searching for a good sidecover for my purple 74 RD350....never did find it but I've been searching for it for two years so I was hopeful but pretty sure that it wasn't going to show up.

I've got to tell you, one of the highlights was watching Nick start his bike. He's redone the whole dash and has his whole bike painted in "black death".....but his engine is NICE!!! Not a bit of the valve clatter that mine has...his engine ran like it was brand new! It's always cool for me to see the mods that other guys do to their bikes and Nicks has made more than a couple. The best being his using a short piece out of the wastegate instead of the long and heavy muffler on the right side.

Thanks for looking me up when you got there Nick, it made the whole trip a little better to meet one of my XJ friends!

jeff

 

Sounds like a great day out! I take it the RD sidecovers on oz/us EBay aren't to your liking?

 

I've been watching ebay for two solid years and have yet to see a really nice, original purple one come up....they are all faded on the top. I have a friend that owns a ebay store and she keeps an eye out too since she's on there all the time and she hasn't seen one either......like hens teeth I tell you!!

lol

jeff

 

Oh ok I did see some but none were purple....obviously painting is not an option for you I guess....

 

Can't paint it and have it be original....so no, it's gotta be non-restored. I've painted several bikes that I've restored and sold over the past couple of years and it wouldn't matter if I was selling it like the one my gf and I semi-restored but several of my bikes are all original and 100% stock and I want to keep this one that way too.

jeff

 

Glad to hear you made it back safe Jeff, that was quite a long ride for you. Yea the sun was brutal that day, got a little sunburn where the sunblock didn't cover. I had a great time talking to ya about bikes, I think your the only other turbo owner I've actually talked to in person. Glad you liked the modified turbo, most turbo owners I think are disgusted at the heavily modified look but like you said if it's a daily rider you need safety and practicality in mind over looking stock. Next year i'm for sure going to "donate" the $10 and give the turbo hell around the course!

Nick

 

Nick, with that engine, and an appropriate amount of boost, I'll bet that thing will FLY on that back straightaway! I can see you now, tiptoeing around turn four only to let all hell break loose as the boot builds.....hmmmm. I don't think that I'll want to miss that! I'll be planning next years ride out there as soon as the tickets go up for sale!

It turned out to be a 985 mile round trip and the ride home sucked since I was a little sun-flushed(feeling sick from too much sun on Saturday) and was dead tired from staying up until the wee hours of the morning hanging out with the UK guys.

jeff

 

I had a fun time @ Mid-O. Busy, being the starter,but had a great time seeing old friends. Only regret was I sold my '75 TM 75.

 

wera90...Western Eastern Racing??

#90? Hmmm, an old guy eh? LOL

Lucky dog being able to start them.....I was THE ONLY guy walking around wearing a Redskins Jersey....#44 Riggins!! I figured that it would make it easy for my friends to find me and it worked.

jeff

 

I saw someone roll by on a Seca Turbo that must have been you Nick.
Someone was trying to sell a POS beaten and abused Seca 750 for $1600! I should have taken a picture.
I was there Saturday, the sun was brutal. It was my first time there. I thought the $35 admission fee was a little steep. That's a lot to just stare at acres and acres of junky bike parts. There were a lot of neat bikes though.

 

I'm definitely going around that track next year Jeff, If your there you'll see me for sure! Durk if the Seca Turbo you seen was all flat black then it probably was me. Jeff and I saw a very low mileage 750 Seca in the swap meet area for $700 I believe, 2k some miles was all she had and didn't look too bad.

Nick

 

Nicks' right Durk...there were some decent deals there is you were looking to buy but you did have to search for them. There's two tme periods to buy....the first is very early in the event before the public really floods the place....the second is right before it ends when guys would rather take next to nothing then to reload it and take it back home. The only turbo we saw was a ragged out, beat to shit machine that was asking 700 but wasn't worth 300.<lol>...how often do you see ME swear?

If you paid your bucks and only did the swap meet, I think that you might have short-changed yourself. The Museum tents had some fantastic iron in them as well as the cafe tents and of course you could hop on a brand new ZX14 if you wanted to for a test ride or a Cam Am....they also held plenty of "how to" lessons, then the racing is always fun for me and being able to walk right into the "pit" areas and talk with the racers makes it even better.

It's a ways for me to get there so I take my gear and camp which gives me some more time. I honestly don't know how much event ticket was but the total including my camping pass was less then 100 for Fri, Sat & Sun....just be willing to ride into town to get food or you'll get hammered!

jeff