CA95 Vintage Motorcycle Show Winners?
 

Anyone ever enter in one of their Benlys in a vintage motorcycle show? Or any other classic Honda for that matter? I went to the Hanford Vintage motorcycle show and swap meet over the weekend and there weren't near as many entries as I thought there would be. My friend won his class "European Vintage Motorcycle" and I could have EASILY won the Japanese Vintage Motorcycle class with my CA160. My CA95 isn't quite up to par as I didn't do a true to stock restoration on it. What do they call it when someone restores a bike back to good running condition without making it a cherry bike again - sympathetic restoration right?

Here are the judges and Bill West inspecting a Scrambler 305. The bike was fully restored but with aftermarket parts and I swear there were three different shades of red on the bike. :D I don't like it when the bikes are restored with such thick bright paint and super shiny chrome that was way way brighter than it ever was from the factory. There were only THREE bikes in the Japanese vintage class! What the heck! This is supposed to be a large bike show that has been going for 43 years. My dad used to go to this when I was a tiny kid I remember. I was kinda let down by the showing of bikes that actually made it. I guess it's just not close enough to larger cities to draw the bike clubs out for attendance. :confused: The swap meet was the MAJOR draw for the crowds though. The event should have been called VINTAGE SWAP MEET and bike show too. hehe

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Here is my friends Ducati 250 that he restored this past year. He won 1st and was invited to a new Western Region AMA Vintage Bike show that is being composed of the cream of the crop of the western vintage bike scene I guess. This will be out in Las Vegas in October so I'll surely be heading out there.

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There were a lot of dirt bike entries into the 2 stroke class of competition and motorcross class - so a couple people thought they would enter their Bultacos inthe European Motorcycle class! Even the judges were frowning on the practice of them moving their bikes from one class to another just with the hopes of getting a trophy. But they weren't really a threat as my friends Duc is a step above. All in all it was good to have some competition in the class because without them there wouldn't have been any in that class.

Waddya know? A CL350 showed up to play. It was a very nice restoration but there just wasn't enough effort into making it true to factory condition. This was one of the few bikes at the show that could have easily started up and rode all the way home without a problem. :D At least he rode it in and out of the fairgrounds.

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vintage bikes
 

Some nice looking machines there. I thought that restoring to good running condition was called preservation. Im waffling back and forth as to whether to take my 62 completely apart and do a complete restoration. Im thinking that I really dont want a new 50 year old bike. The patina of 50 years of use seems to appeal to me. When one looks at other antiques it it considered sacriledge to refinish etc. Just get it working seems to be the mantra outside of the automotive community. Curt

Ahh I was thinking of some restoration while not trying to hard like tearing it down and making it perfect. Preservation is surely getting it going but not repainting or redoing anything like that. I don't like seeing an old classic bike or car fully restored and looking to be in better condition than it was from the factory. That's why reproduction classic cars don't sell for half of the real deal. I'm in the same boat. I like em old and original. I'll work on the rest of the pictures and post them up later on when I get a chance. I have some pics of the swap meet stuff too. It was hard to get out of the swap meet area once you were in there. Everyone like to talk about stuff and there are tons of tales to be told and heard in that crowd!

Sympathetic restoration...interesting way to turn a phrase. It's kinda like aww poor thing what did they do to you? Well, don't worry daddy will make it better. actually looking at it that way sounds like its your kid, or something perverse with the Mrs'.

I totally didn't need to see that scrambler reminding me of last weeks loss of one exactly like it except with maybe 30 years of garage dust waiting to be wiped off it. It sounds like you had fun.