1968 Yamaha DT1 Treasure/Trash?

Found this on Craigslist. Kinda suffering from PMS (Parked Motorcycle Syndrome). Raced a 1969 Suzuki TS250 back in the late '60s.
Moment of weakness and I brought this home...
Plan is to build a period type shorttracker. Keep it as much '60s as possible.




It had been repainted and also had an special shock damper on the kickstart lever for the dreaded kick back..

Someone made sure that the mag cover was on and sealed to keep moisture out...:eek1


More to come...

Not too shabby considering. Tho the mag/points scare me! Good luck!!!!

This will be a real "Old School" shorttracker.
Coils will go away and the point cam will be punched out of the flywheel.
I'm going to do a total loss ignition system where a 12 volt battery, points and ignition coil are all that's there.

The light of day has done nothing for the looks of this one...




Some of the finer points that the light of day revealed...




It has a compression release!! After looking at the head, it seemed different than the DT's I remember from those days. The spark plug threaded into the head from the left side. This one is straight in from the top...
More on this a little later.

Wow you are in for a lot of work! I remember back in the day the hot trick for those old DT1s was to cut the down tubes on the frame and put in a 2" spacer. It lowered the engine and made it handle a lot better.

Starting to get stuff taken off. Getting ready to clean and paint...



Looking at the head and cylinder, there is something different here.
Time to take a look...



Single ring piston...



Looking at the cylinder bore, there are marks on the cylinder wall,
but not normal seizure marks...?? A magnet confirms my hunch.
It's a chrome lined GYT cylinder and GYT head!!

Work.... HA... Yea your right!
I thought about lowering/adding to the frame, but I think I may wait on that at this point. Maybe in the future.

Some degreasing and scrapping to get the heavy crap off the frame.



Simple Green won't even cut some of this stuff, and the pressure washer failed to get the heavy caked on guck.



Time to visit my local sandblaster...



And in keeping with my cheap@$$ motto for this project, I rattlecan it...

Go to YAMAHAENDURO.COM and you'll get all the info you could ever need. Great bunch of guys and a wealth of knowledge on the DT.

Thanks, went there and registered 2 weeks ago... bout time I got the bike/project.

I rode a stock 72 DT-1 back in the day,ill handling would be a polite way to say it. Heavy ft end plowing tank slapping also come to mind.
I used it as a practice bike, when I jumped on my 200 Bultaco off the DT1 it was easy to go fast on the Bul. They do look neat now a days when their all shined up.

The '69 TS250 I rode was about.. no, worse than a DT1 in handling, weight, and power.
If you check my flickr link in my signature, the TS185 I rode gave the 200 Sherpas a bad time back then.. and it handled great!!
Hope to get the DT1 shining soon!

Whatever you do with the bike, its a good deed you're doing by saving it. But, before you get in too deep ,try to find a copy of Little Fauss and Big Halsy. Cool bike movie and you're Yamaha was one of the STARS.

If you remember that movie, you gotta be old..
It was a great promo for Yamaha. They had some roadracers in the movie as well.

That's a nice project you've got going there. In regards to Little Fauss and Big Halsy, a quick Google video search finds the entire film available for free streaming. Quality's a little low, but the Johnny Cash song over the intro is awesome if nothing else... back to the bike, anyways

Well, a little more time on the motor. Turning the crank by hand and checking for any unusual play, water is seen on the crank wheels.
Time to split the cases and see how bad this could be...



There has been water in the bottom end for a a while, but the damage is minimal.



Things are cleaning up nicely. The main bearing is discolored by the moisture, but turns smoothly after a good flushing in the solvent tank. The seals are all wasted and will be replaced.



More cleaning and a little sit-down time to draw up a parts list.

Now that Spring is over this week.... I work in my un-heated garage, so work has halted until the temperature goes up a bit.
Don't give up on me!! It's just that that cement floor really makes my feet cold.
More to come...

It looks remarkably clean on the gearbox side of things! Crank and bearings o.k.? Just how cold is northern Idaho right now?

The rear trans bearing is very rough. All the other bearings feel pretty smooth without any lubrication (my past and current method of testing).
Current temp. @ 3:00pm Pacific time 37F. The garage is like a meatlocker!!