Bertie Simmonds hosts an evening with James Whitham, professional motorbike racer and chat about his upbringing, his eccentric father and professional career.

A classic name in two-stroke expansion chamber circles is back in business ALLSPEED EXHAUSTS are a brand that any two-stroke junkie will be well aware of. For many they were the choice of a generation

Mark Haycock and Steve Cooper are here to answer all of you woes! 

Mark Haycock and Steve Cooper are here to answer all of your woes.

Our very own wizened sages, Messrs Mark Haycock and Steve Cooper are here to answer all of your woes, be they mechanical or spiritual.

Our experts Mark Haycock and Steve Cooper are back with all the answers to your questions! 

Our experts Mark Haycock and Steve Cooper are back with all the answers to your questions!

Mark Haycock is back with answers to all of your burning questions, but here are some of his general tips!

Our experts at CMM are back with all the answers to your questions!

We not only love to hear your questions, but we want to hear your own tips and hints too!

Our expert at CMM Steve Cooper gives his Five Minute Fix! 

Our CMM expert Steve Cooper answers YOUR questions!

Q: I’ve got a problem. After a run the bike is going okay, but while parked in the garage for a few days petrol leaked out through the breather pipe on to the floor. It

Q: I am having a bit of trouble with my Honda CB72, 1965 model, and I wonder if you can help. Apart from all the other work I have done for my restoration, I have

Q: I’m a reader of Classic Motorcycle Magazine  and a massive fan of motorbikes. I’ve just turned 16 and got my first bike – a Suzuki TS50X and want more power. I have looked for all the

Our CMM expert Steve Cooper answers YOUR questions!

Little spoils a bike like a graunching throttle. Cables are obvious and easy to lubricate but throttle tubes regularly get ignored. Whether it’s the conventional barrel type or early Japanese straight pull/scroll type the same

Q: My cruiser has recently developed an intermittent engine rattle, on tick-over the engine is okay, it seems to occur as I ride in top gear about 40-50mph, and as I lightly accelerate through the

Our experts at CMM are back with all the answers to your questions! Fill in the form at the bottom of the page to ask your burning questions!

If your bike has grease nipples use them; if it doesn’t, investigate if they can be retro-fitted. Pivot points on suspension systems need a regular supply of fresh, clean grease. Decades of dust, seasons of

Now and then you will find that a nut or bolt simply will not undo. You have tried everything: heat, penetrating oil and even an impact wrench but still the fastener remains resolutely tight. There

Q: I discovered your mag last year and a have been a reader ever since. I’m hoping, with all your years of accumulated experience, you may be able to help. CMM has inspired me to

Q: The headlamp bowl was rusty and my mate gave me a new chrome one. Foolisly, I accepted and removed the headlamp in order to replace it. As you may know, in the shell there

Q: Hi, I am rebuilding a GL1100 GoldWing it has been stood since 1989 and it is fitted with a Pantera fairing, which I would like to keep on for the period look. Would you

Q: I can’t seem to get electric power to my RD. When I turn the key I get no red or green light on the dash. This started after I hooked a charger to the

Q: With a cold engine it doesn’t respond to quick throttle openings. There is a bit of a difference once the engine is warm-though from about 55mph upwards, when the throttle is open to accelerate,

How do you determine the correct angle for the handlebar controls? Sit on the bike, extend your fingers in line with your arms and lower your hands on to the grips. The levers should be

Never, ever, take a brake shoe lining for granted. Almost without exception Japanese shoes are fixed to their alloy carriers by adhesive alone; you rarely see rivets used. Eventually dampness, heat and time can and

Whenever you replace a wheel spindle make sure it’s greased. As Japanese bikes rarely received lubrication to their axles when new they have a real propensity to corrosion weld themselves to the inner bearing race.

Q: Hello, I’d appreciate your opinion on the need for coil replacement on my Z650 F1. I’ve recently fitted a Z750E1 engine into my Z650 frame, The bike is running fine but I’m wondering if

Q: Do you know anyone who can check or test CDI units? And what are the obvious symptoms if a CDI unit is faulty? A: The usual symptom for a faulty CDI unit is no

Q: I am trying to find an aftermarket a 4-into-1 complete exhaust system for my 1100WT with no success. Could you tell me if any other models will bolt straight on, maybe a 1200 Bandit

Aqua blasting is all the rage at the moment. I’ve been doing it for years at home using a cheap B&Q pressure washer (£25) and a sandblaster pick up lance (eBay £9.99). I used to

1 Locking washers were used in the past to stop nuts and bolts from coming undone, but the modern approach is to use a chemical solution: threadlocker. Do be aware of a few things though.

Q:  I’m getting desperate here on the garage floor with my DT400B twin shock. Over the last two years since I bought it, I’ve tried everything I can think of to stop a nasty chugging

Q: I ran across CMM in a forum and like a parent with a poorly child I turn to you in hopes of saving my nearly-new bike. Don’t ignore me just as it’s ‘new’. I

Q: I recently purchased a 1986 GSX R750G. It is a Jap import, but I have read in your magazine that these bike are restricted to 75bhp and it certainly does not feel as quick

1 When separating major engine components, a tap with a soft hammer helps to release the bond between them. If that does not work, don’t automatically use a bigger hammer: you have undone all the

Q: Having followed the manual (or so I thought) to adjust the rear brake on my BMW K1100LT I was left on a dual carriageway with a seized rear brake. At first I felt it

Q: I have two valves out of a classic motorcycle (a Triumph) one and the other are the same size in all respects. The parts book gives a different parts numbers for each valve (inlet

Q: Just to say how much I enjoyed the ‘Why forks fail’, article, but surely the primary cause of forks ending up needing repair work is, in my experience, accidental damage. So, the difficult and

Having owned my RD400F for 12 years I decided it was time to restore the old girl. After spending a lot of time restoring the parts, one area for real concern was to place the

Go to check/replace your front sprocket, grease the clutch push rod, inspect generator wiring etc. and you’re normally faced with something that looks like valve grinding paste lovingly mixed with a cow pat. And that’s

Q: Can anyone help me? Do you know what other starter motor will fit this machine as I cannot get one and I’ve tried everywhere. A: This is a Mitsuba motor, identified as 36496 on

Q: Hello! My son is living in the USA and he is in the middle of fixing up his 1984 ZX750 GPz  A12 American spec. He wants to know the torque setting for the bolts holding

Q: Can you tell me how to tell if a nut or bolt is usable or not.  I think I over-torqued a bolt/acorn nut combination due to using a cheap torque wrench which didn’t click.

Words/Pictures by Steve Cooper Once in a while there’s a need to tight a nut or bolt on something that’s small, fragile or mounted on a surface that’s easily damaged. If you’re not careful the

Q: My bike was involved in a crash and came down on the right hand (timing cover) side. All the electronic ignition pick-ups have been replaced by a previous owner with parts from a GS1000. I

Words/Pictures by Steve Cooper We’ve all been there; the painter or powdercoater forget to mask a thread. Taps and dies are good on smaller threads but what about larger ones? What if you’ve already fitted

Q: My new bike is a Suzuki RV90 running 6v magneto electrics. Needless to say the lights are feeble, the stop lamp glows dismally and indicators don’t. Apart from making sure all connectors and earth

Words/Picture by Steve Cooper Many 60s, 70s and 80s strokers run disc-valve induction systems with the carburettor sitting at the end of the crank. With this type of intake system it’s vital that the chamber

In the October 2015 edition of CMM a chap called Rob Neal wrote about high-temperature paint for his CX500 well, I have a similar vintage CBX1000 and have used VHT silver spray paint to good

In an earlier edition of Q&A Lee was asking how to restore the yellowing plastic of the petrol tank on his TY250. I had a similar issue with the expansion tank on my CX500 restoration.

Q: Hi, great article in a recent mag on the TR1. I own a 1981 model which I rebuilt from a basket case. It’s a lovely bike and as John Nutting says the torque is

Words/Pictures by Steve Cooper Dropping a fixing into a bike is a pain with ages spent crawling around to no avail. Rather than waste time stand back, take a deep breath and then put something

Q: I have installed a racing exhaust on my W650, which is pretty much a set of empty pipes/silencers, but did not re-jet (I wasn’t interested in the supposedly four extra bhp it was said

Q: In a world of no centrestands do you measure chain tension on the sidestand when travelling? Anon A: The obvious answer here is that if the bike was sold when new with only a

Q: I have a 1989 Honda CBR1000F-K and its looks are spoiled by a scuffed round right-hand engine cover. It appears not to have a part number that I can find anywhere, even my Haynes

Q: I’m a long-time reader of your excellent mag and I also suffer from petrol addiction! I have a Moto Morini Corsarino 50cc four-stroke that has started to develop a running issue. After a couple

Q: I have recently got my 1979 Suzuki GS850G fuel meter to work but the wiring is incorrect. I cannot as yet find the live feed from the meter to the tank gauge (due to

Q: Having recently acquired a 1984 TY250 trials for restoration but I find myself with a plastic fuel tank that has a nice yellowy tinge to it. Is there any way of returning this it