Hello again,
Now I know this is going to cause a stir in Germany and most elsewhere.
I had a fairly bad accident on my '85 tenere, the forks and frame were bent and i had them straightened. Now due to the prohibative price of a replacement and the absolute lack of second hand spares in SA i am contemplating using this bike for a tras Africa trip. What are the chances of a repaired frame unrepairing itself in an inconvenient place?
Thanks!
Jim

That's a difficult one to answer Jim.
It all comes down to how competently the repairs were carried out. A frame can be professionally straightened and repaired and be as strong, if not stronger, than the original. Fork legs can be straightened to an acceptable level depending upon the degree of damage. My advice if you are worried about the repairs holding would be to get a second opinion from a cmpetent motorcycle engineer. If you do decide to travel, keep a regular watch on the repaired areas for cracks etc. so you can deal with them immediately. Good Luck.

Jim,

When I was in Cape Town, where you are, I shopped around a bit for XT600 spares and found some good rear rims and a battery. The second hand rims I got from the guy in Muizenberg, he is on the through road on the other side of the booze shop. He is probably the person to sell you second hand fork legs and / or tell you how to source spare parts.
Will, by the way, www.kedo.de and /or www.wunderlich.de not ship to SA? Maybe worth a phonecall to them!
As to spare prices, the originals etc are indeed very expensive, but you can already save a lot by shopping around for seals, O-rings, bearings etc. at specialised hardware stores. You get the same items, without the Yamaha wrapper, for 20% of the price!

Auke