Project Aprilia
Uncle Clive has been putting his time into refurbishing a relic: the Aprilia RS250.
Ilove motorbikes. I’m lucky enough to work with them all day, every day, and I wouldn’t change it for the world. Over the years, I’ve had quite a few projects like this RS250 restoration and I have learnt what to look for in a project bike, what works well and what doesn’t. I’ll admit that I do have a soft spot for old two-strokes, but the thing that drew me to this 1997 Aprilia RS250 was actually the fact that everything on it was original.
It was in a pretty ropey condition when I got it – everything was rough, but it was all there, all original and I knew that everything could be cleaned, re-plated and re-painted, so it didn’t matter to me what condition it was in. I know when people are buying modern bikes that they like to see aftermarket performance parts and that quite often increases the value of a bike, but with the older stuff, and classic bikes, people really want to see original parts. The bike came with Tyga exhaust pipes, which actually look great, but included in the sale were the standard pipes. It was originally Chesterfield colours – that’s one of the more popular colour schemes available on this model and, to be honest, it was my favourite, so my plan was to refurbish everything and get it looking just like it did when it was in the showroom. all those
First things first
After doing a few of these restorations, I’ve got a good idea of how to go about them. There is a particular order you need to do things in. Before I even pick up a spanner though, I always take a load of pictures of the bike. It’s mainly so I can see the difference between what I started with and the finished product, but it sometimes helps to have a look back at the pictures you took at the start to see how stuff fixes together when you come to the re-build the bike.
Once I’d got a load of photos of the RS, I completely stripped it and sorted out all the nuts and bolts. I put them in separate buckets, depending on the colour and the coating, so I had a bucket of stuff to be ‘greened’, ‘zinc-ed’, ‘yellowed’ etc. The olive green coating (that you get on Hondas and Yamahas a lot) is a bit special; that coating, its carcinogenic, so not a lot of people like to do that. I send all the stuff off to Allenchrome Electroplating to get all that done. They are chromers, but they do zinc stuff too. It took about a month for that to be done and waiting for that is a bit of a nightmare, as you can’t really do anything without the nuts and bolts, but it’s a good time to start getting stuff really, really clean and it’s easier to
do while it’s all in bits. I thoroughly cleaned the frame, inside and out, and went to town on the standard exhaust pipes. They are all mega clean now and look great. I think a polished frame and shiny exhaust pipes really make the difference to the way a bike looks.
Anyway, once I had got all the nuts and bolts back, I could start to get on with getting stuff blasted and painted. Suspension linkages are bits that normally get overlooked, but I think they make a big difference. They are in the perfect place to get covered in shit and they are moving parts so they do wear, and when they are worn you end up getting loads of play in the suspension system. So I take all that lot to bits and clean it up, re-zinc it all, fit new bushes and have them working like new.
I cleaned and serviced the forks, too. On standard forks, one side does compression damping and the other side does rebound damping. It means that when you take the front wheel out, one fork pushes down and the other ends up working against it, so it can be a bit of a pain – it tries to twist everything. I raced one in the early 2000s and when it was on a paddock stand (the type that lifts the bottom of the forks up) and you knocked the spindle out, the bike used to want to fall onto its side!
There was no pillion seat when I bought the bike but, because I know how important it is to get the thing completely original, I searched high and low for one and eventually managed to find one. It was a bit of a ball-ache as everyone used to get rid of the rear seat and throw the back footpegs away, so you rarely see an RS250 with pillion pegs, seat and a seat converter, together. I’m glad I managed to source one for this, as little bits like that really do make the difference. I even managed to find an original Aprilia toolkit for the bike, so that’s tucked away where it belongs, under the rear seat.
I got a new lock set from Aprilia too, a genuine one, so now the ignition matches the filler cap and seat lock.
The new keys smarten the job up loads and it looks tons better when the same key operates the ignition and filler cap. I put a new side-stand switch on it, as someone had removed the original one and new brake pads as they were worn and I thought about replacing the chain and sprockets too, but they were mint when I got the bike, so I cleaned them up and left them on – they had obviously not done a lot of miles.
I had the wheels blasted and then I re-painted them, so now they look great, and I fitted some new wheel bearings too, as the ones that were in looked like they had been in there a while.
Tidy motor
As far as the engine goes, it was pretty filthy, but actually in really good nick inside. It’s just a totally bog-standard engine with standard-sized pistons (loads of RS250s have been bored out to take larger pistons). I changed all the fluids, cleaned up the air filter (it just had a standard foam air filter) and while the bike was in bits and the engine was out, I gave it a real good clean and a pair of new pistons. I also serviced the powervalves, as they can be a bit faulty in these motors – I’ve known them to have the pins drop out, and they can easily jam if they ever get gunged up.
With the motor re-built and all the bits cleaned and plated, I set about painting the bodywork. Again, to keep it as original as possible, I re-painted it in Chesterfield colours and as I’m a paint sprayer by trade, I’m fairly well set up for that side of it. It’s really simple anyway. I bought the graphics kit, painted the panels black and then applied the vinyl graphics kit – you could teach a monkey to do it. It’s an identical match to the Max Biaggi race replica they did. They did a Loris Reggiani colour scheme too, but the Biaggi one was the most popular.
As far as the bodywork went, the carbon infill bit on the side of the seat proved to be a bit of a bitch. It’s got a few marks on it and I could have had it hydro-dipped, but I thought I’d just try lacquering it instead and I think it looks okay, so I’m glad I didn’t go to the bother (and expense) of getting it dipped. You can see the odd mark on it, but you’d have to be really picky to complain about it. After all, it’s a 20-odd-year-old bike.
Rounding up
I’ve only just got it finished and I’m really happy with it. I love the way it looks and I’ve enjoyed working on it and making it as original as possible. It’s got some tiny signs of age here and there, but it is an old bike, so I think that can be forgiven. The idea was to move it straight on, but I have grown quite fond of it, so I’m really looking forward to taking it out for a ride now. I will put it up for sale eventually, for around the £6000 mark I think – it is easily worth that sort of money because it’s getting harder and harder to find bikes like this that are in reasonable nick, and almost impossible to find ones that are as original as this. The ones that do exist aren’t usually for sale.
The condition I’ve got it in now is almost exactly as you’d have bought it back in the Nineties, with the parts you got when you bought it new. That’s a massive selling point, as I know that is the kind of thing that people will pay for on a bike like this. People like originality with these things. If it came with something, they want it. That’s why I went to the trouble of finding the original toolkit. The more original I can make it, the more people will be interested, if and when I come to sell it. I haven’t got a lot of paperwork with it, but I’m not too bothered about that, as I’m pretty confident it will sell.
Now I’ve got this one done, I’m already on the lookout for my next project, so if anyone has got a stinker of a bike that they want to sell, get in touch with us here at Fast Bikes mag… your old bike could be the star of the show!