Worst bike you ever bought

Ever made a really bad buying decision and ended up with a bike that really didn’t match up to your requirements, was a right dog, or was simply sub-standard by nature?

We want to hear from you with all the dirt on the nightmare bike you landed yourself with.

See end of the story for details on sending your contributions in. Here’s some examples we’ve already received:

From Tim Saunders: My worst (new) bike was purchased in 1984: a CZ 250 two-stroke twin. It was purchased because I missed two wheels so much (Vespa P200E was written off by a jack-knifing tanker) and it was the cheapest 250 on the market at £199. You pays yer money and yer takes yer choice.

” A friend at work (who had just spent £250 on a Peugeot bicycle) called the CZ a “Wing ding” on the account of it going “Wing ding ding ding” on the over-run. I think it was made from case hardened cheese.

It struggled to get above 35 mph at times, and devoured piston rings. When they broke the engine had to be removed, washed out and upturned to remove the bits. It happened four times before I found out that the pistons were in the wrong bores and the ring ends were catching on the ports – I kid you not!!

” Yet more pistons and rings were fitted and away she flew up to 75 mph. Unfortunately the crank bearings were not up to it and one day when it refused to start I pushed it to a breaker who gave me £30 for it. Fair gleaming it was too!

” I think you may be swamped with bad bikes! ”

David Wilson, New Brunswick, Canada. ” The worst bike I ever bought was a 1974 Suzuki GT 250, a racy looking red and white bike with expansion chambers and a small fairing.

I bought it for $200 canadian, without hearing it run. Big Mistake. When I did get it to run it showed a huge flaw in one of the cylinder heads, a crack that was filled with some kind of puttty that needless to say blew out as soon as it ran.

” I ordered a head from a supplier in California, which was off a ram air 250, mine was a standard head, and promptly put it on. I ran it up the street in first gear, waaaaaahhhhhh, cool runs well for a little bike. Let’s try a blast through the gears, wwwaaaah, waaahhh, zing, zing, zing, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Yep . no 3rd,4th or 5th gear. Bummer.

” I took the tranny apart and yes it was true, the gears were stripped rounder than Jordan’s new boobs in a barely-there bikini.

” I then ordered a used tranny for the bike, and put it in, but then I never ran it again and it sat outside my house for 5 years until a local racer was restoring his factory 500 suzuki racer and needed a transmission for his bike, apparently it was the same or very similar, so I gave it to him just to get it out of my sight.

” Morale- Don’t buy a bike you can’t hear run or ride.

Tell us the bike, when it landed itself on you, how you got shot of it and what made it such a bad choice for you in an e-mail to stefan.bartlett@emap.com with BAD BIKE in the subject line. Include a daytime telephone number, too. We’ll use the best stories in a new feature, coming soon in MCN.