Freezing Hello from Finland

[Ice Suzuki]

and hello to everybody here. well,as you surely know winter is loooong here in scandinavia,summer short IF it comes every year but the main difference is much more light and not snow.. so then some of us drive motorcycles,newer plastic or older shiny ones.
I have old, nice restored Suzuki Gt380J,that early drum brake model,and its very original(but with accent ignition) and its also in very good condition (overbored+gone total engine repair job) . its originally sold new here in Finland.
Red/white(new good paint) with original type pipes(ex owner has bought NOS about 15years ago when they still sold those) whitch looks nice,good chrome and not bad scraches..but...rusty inside of course,pieces off and baffles..well..hard to install anymore right and sounds quite loud. This week i got big packet from Higgspeed and when EU and UK still looking agreement thats not looking very good "The End" so i ordered those before taxes comes because i need somekind of pipes in future and maybe one day send those original pipes to UK to restore...£££
Box included polished later style regular upswept pipes that fit to early J,K models.
Originals NOS or very good used ones (outside/inside) impossible to find and there are no new aftermarket pipes like originals so i ordered second best choice to my eys:Higgspeeds,i like those look,like early days aftermarket pipes, but dont know if they are VERY noisy,lets see when spring come....Photo of my Gt,taken last summer. Ill be back,sorry about my little rusty english and this first short story but ask if you want to know something more.

[Alan H]

Welcome to the forum.
Nice intro, good story and great picture - we like all those, especially as the weather gets colder and we don't ride much.

[Ice Suzuki]

Thanks Alan H Yes,its mid winter here ,well maybe winter weather is soon like you have there in northern UK ,Scotland or N Ireland etc ,rain rain and if its snowing one day it melting next day but of course you have more sun,lucky you.
When i was young winters were cold,lots of minus degrees(-20 to -30) ,not anymore lower than-10c max.

I found my Gt about 6 years ago,it was totally restored ,every place+piece checked and museum registered but before i bought it there was one "not so handy"man bought it from restorer and just
drove and if he "fix" something things only get worse .
That"s why those then new NOS mufflers falling to rusty pieces inside in his time,he never opened or cleaned baffles,lots of like petroleum jelly mixed with black water and pieces of rusty metal inside.
Ignition and points gap,clutch...or oil pump adjust etc...totally wrong.
Very hard to get starting when i bought it "cheap"and sure got red face+sweat t-shirt before you get it running.
I have fixed many places,lots of service to get it run like i want and added accent ignition,electronic regulator,new coils,repair kits to carbs+new original Suzuki rubber boots(much better than Ebay aftermarket crap from Japan (cruzinimage) ,yes i know because i have bought those ,not real rubber,some kind of cheap plastic that last 1 summer), new retro saddle top etc in my time.
Bad oil leaks fixed from gear shift(gasket) ,ex owner did not care why his garages floor was so oily but was happy because it has stopped one day itself ..yes..there was only 1 spoonful oil left in transmission but lucky me ,no damage.
why someone buy vintage nice restored motorbike,even 2t triple and just like drive it to junk as soon as possible and sell it when it is too hard to get starting?
There are lots of modern all kind of bikes just for driving!
This bikes save was that he couldnt drive it anymore to get it totally wrack,it was too hard to get running with no electric start and too much things fixed wrong.