Electrics and Wiring I have always thought that the 6V system on the XT500 was woefully in adequate. Enough to pass an MOT but hopeless on country lanes without street lighting. So I thought I would finally sort out the XT500 wiring and electrics during this restoration, and install a 12V system. I bought a new 12V kit from Rex’s Speed Shop in the UK, I did this well in advance so had it sitting around the garage for months […]
I tried to remove the brackets on the underside of the XT500 seat. I had applied WD40 the night before, but I still managed to break the first bolt, and the second, and well, all of them. They had to be drilled out as the “nuts” are actually small plates moulded into the plastic. After removing the seat cover and the foam, it was obvious that they could never have been unscrewed. They were completely fused to the plates by […]
Rear Foot Pegs While I still waited for some tools to arrive, I continued with removing parts and cleaning them as much as possible ready for painting or plating. I took off the rear foot pegs and discovered a bodge, a quick fix that I made years ago which never got repaired properly. Jamming a bolt in prevented the peg folding downwards when hitting a pothole. Annoying for any passenger, so a weld needed adding to the inside end of […]
First off, I had the incorrect forks for my 1980 XT500 G. They were from an earlier model that had the axle mounted ‘inline’ on the underside of the of the legs (1976-1979). They were also a different length, the earlier type should protrude above the top clamp by 35mm to 55mm. There is not enough space to do this on later models. The 1980 and later had leading axles, i.e. mounted to the front of the leg. The triple […]
I used the OEM rear shock absorbers and springs from the 1U6 doner bike as the ones I had were Hagon. They were rusty as hell but serviceable so the first thing was to dismantle them. One of the tools I don’t have and didn’t buy is a spring compressor. So I used a home made option. First you need to make sure the shocks are adjusted to the lower position. It was much easier dismantling them this way than […]
