Adam Clarke’s Dunstall Suzuki GT750J

When I was 13, a guy three streets away had a GT550, which I liked the look of. I would always see him coming home from work on it. Four months went by and I stopped seeing the Suzuki. I thought something had happened to it.

One day I heard a wonderful shrieking up the road. It was the guy on the GT550, but he had put a Dunstall fairing on it with a piper three-into-one on it: what a sight and sound! I said to myself that very day that one day I would have one of those! Roll on almost

40 years and it’s May 2015. I was looking on ebay and I spotted a Dunstall Suzuki

GT750 with

Allspeeds on! I had to have it, so I phoned the bloke and without looking at it properly I negotiated a price. He said he had it for 25 years, it ran ok and he’d had just had it re-bored and with new pistons. He would even deliver it to me, although the journey was over four hours each way. We arranged for him to deliver it the following Sunday and the day arrived and he turned up at 9.30pm Sunday nigh. He rolled it off the trailer and started it up; it sounded nice and looked ok. The next day I couldn’t wait to finish work and have a good look around it. I started to have a good look and I thought, ‘Oh dear, what have I purchased?’ The screen was cracked, the left-hand side fairing had been badly repaired, every bolt was rusty, the engine cases badly corroded, there were cracks in the paintwork and the seat was ripped. Over the next few weeks I gave it a clean-up, respraying the wheels and polishing the alloy up as good as I could. I had 12 months MOT, was taxed, so I got it insured, then started riding it. Two weeks later the crank went, so that was it. I decided to do a total strip down and with the help of Philip Jones from Telford doing the engine and brakes, Blue Smoke Baz doing the carbs and Lee Chambers doing the paint work. Three months later it was refurbished. I hope you like it!