Yamaha RD350 Part 7 Out On The Road

Scoop has finally got the RD MoT’d – but what issues have surfaced now?

- Steve Cooper

If there’s one thing about old motorcycles that continues to impress it’s the very obvious fact that every day has the potential to be a school day.

When the back wheel was out previously I’d removed the shocks and had a good push/twist/pull and it all felt good. Knowing there was no obvious play in the swingarm didn’t necessarily mean that the old bushes were well greased so I called my newly acquired Sealey grease gun into action: which strangely didn’t fit.

Yamahas of this period run parallel bodies, ball topped, grease nipples which allegedly were used for swift greasing on the production floor. Apparently they save milliseconds getting the gun on and off. Not wishing to spend 40 notes on a set of fancy grease gun fittings I blew a whole £2.50 on eBay for conventional nipples that used the same threads. Firing in the grease with the new fitting saw their older counterparts exhibiting age-related incontinence; the internal springs must have died. As I say you never stop learning just because you work on old bikes! Last but by no means least the oil tank was topped up. If you remember the original images of the RD350 there was two-stroke oil all over the guard. The siting of the cap is less than ideal so each and every time the tank is filled I break a rag out. It’s a foible of the RD’s design that makes a simple job frustrating and given how cramped it all is under the seat it makes you wonder what was wrong with the older layouts where the filler neck was actually accessible!