My first Yamaha

[RedBaron]

Some of you may know I'm rebuilding an 82 XZ, but she is not my first Yamaha, she is my third.

My first I owned when I was eight. She was a 250 model, in red plastic and she had chrome plastic side covers and headlight frame and the handlebars turned and the wheels turned also.

My second Yamaha I never owned except in my heart, I fell in love with her the first time I saw her in a Knoxville cycle shop. She was a late 60s or early 70s RD 350, in a redish purple with that blacked in engine and the first disk brake I saw on a motorcycle, she had the words "Yamaha" neatly placed on the caliper; what amazed me was the quality of the parts and paint and the overall "balance" of that bike. She just looked "right". I picked a great second motorcycle love as the RD is still well known as a stand out in motorcycle history.

Now I have my third Yamaha love, the XZ, and even though it is much larger and will be fully functional, I realized while taking her apart in preparation for putting her back together in newly painted and restored parts, that in some way I am again building my beautiful Yamaha 250 model, in sexy red paint and gleaming alloy and a chrome reality that echos the dreams of past great Yamaha machines.


RB  

[George R. Young]

R5, RD350, XZ550