In the realm of vintage motorcycles that have seen better days, most of the vehicles can be placed into one of two primary categories. You might locate a machine that has been carefully maintained during its whole existence if you’re lucky.
You know, the kind of place where the paint hasn’t been faded by the sun, the windshield isn’t covered in scratches and hasn’t turned yellow, the seat cushion isn’t falling apart, and the bodywork, if there is any, isn’t about to shatter into bits if you look at it the wrong way.
The second category, of course, is made up of all the brilliant but foul-tempered basketcases that you have ever come across in your life. This category is a natural progression from the first.
These are the motorcycles about which you have persuaded yourself that you can envision their potential, provided that you are able to patch or otherwise fix all the gaping, rusty holes that stand between you and the accomplishment of your project goals.
If cost were no object, it would seem to reason that the former motorcycles would give you the least amount of trouble. To make matters worse for the vast majority of us, money is almost always an object of some type.
What many of us in the motorcycling community lack in financial resources, we make up for in enthusiasm, and many of us have the mentality that if we don’t go into a project with specific skills, we’re brave enough to work them out along the road.
Having said all of that, if you fall into the second category of people then you are in for a real treat.
The story follows the ups and downs experienced by a man named Ronald Finger, who occasionally enlists the assistance of his loved ones and friends, but for the most part, takes on enormous labors of love in the form of automobile projects all by himself.
If you’re a lover of Pontiac Fieros, you should know that this is perhaps the series that brought him the most fame on the internet. Nevertheless, he also works on motorcycles, and for more than a year now, he has been steadily bringing a 1986 Kawasaki GPZ1000RX back to life through his efforts.
If you are the kind of person who gets a certain degree of spectator satisfaction from seeing someone rescue a completely destroyed piece of ancient machinery, then you will want to watch this series from the very first episode all the way through to the very last episode.
Finger’s sense of humor, editing talents, ways of dealing with the challenges he comes across, and general attitude are all quite realistic, and it’s also extremely enjoyable to watch him in action.
It is also entertaining to watch him work on an antique motorcycle like this one with the assistance of modern tools that a mechanic working in 1986 couldn’t have even dreamed of having, such as 3D printing a tank mount that is hard to find and is missing.
This particular video shows Finger’s first ride on his 1986 Kawasaki GPZ1000RX after he finished the mechanical work on it; nonetheless, as he mentions multiple times, the bike is not particularly attractive from an aesthetic standpoint.
Throughout the course of the series, he has indicated that his goal was not to perform a comprehensive and laborious cosmetic repair but rather to merely make it rideable so that he could enjoy riding it.
But, by the time we reach the conclusion of this video, he does appear to be suggesting that it may be possible to at least prepare it for some fundamental painting. He is currently going about his business with a primer gray tank mounted on a basically stock red motorcycle.
To tell you the truth, I really like the priming tank, especially considering how it contrasts with the red. The fact that it wouldn’t be anywhere close to roadworthy today without the work of one determined bike nut makes it significant and admirable in its own right, despite the fact that it doesn’t seem particularly gorgeous to the naked eye.
Will the GPZ1000RX continue to play a significant role in the future? There is reason to believe that this might be the case; but, given that Finger does have a life outside of YouTube, it is possible that this won’t happen for some time.
In spite of this, we will be looking forward to it as well as any other bicycle-related initiatives that he wishes to reveal to the public.