The exotic cars are great , the trips to Monaco are excellent .. but the Dakar bikes and trips to Pyrenees / Morocco/ Spain on bike trails are just in a class of Thier own . Thank you Harry
This was my first "big" bike, coming from a 125cc scooter. Lots of great memories. Same year, same color scheme. It was such a good bike around town, and an even greater bike for touring with bags and a passenger.
Thanks!!! I lived in Bamako, Mali in the early '90's. This was THE bike to have. Great memories - especially trying to max a Yamaha 100 in town, at night. Cheers!
More bike videos please Harry. Loved this series. Fantastic content as always. Recently bought 50 past issues of EVO magazine and love nothing more than reading them!
Here we go!! The first one of these I've actually ridden!! Token sumpguard can be grounded on track, if you're committed enough! 5 valves was a Yamaha thing since the first FZ750s in 85..... The flatspot can be cleaned up relatively easily with a dynojet kit. Brings it alive. More bikes videos please Harry!
I agree …1 million thank you for doing videos of the incredible bikes of PD race. Any off-road Moto-X or Enduro, PD type works Factory made race bikes always fascinated me. I love the smell of Bel-Ray in the morning…. Thanks Harry and please,please, keep the videos coming… we love em’, well done ole’ friend.
I enjoyed this series far more than I ever thought I would. I'm not really into enduro bikes but Harry makes just about everything interesting and entertaining. Hats off Harry.
I have been enjoying the motorcycle videos and would love to see more! I remember one of your first vids on the Kawasaki H2, look forward to the other bikes.
Thankyou for sharing these great bikes. It’s amazing to see how much the bikes transformed in a relatively short time from the XT500 to the S10. This series has been awesome Harry, well all of your videos are. Thankyou again!
Really enjoyed it too. Some of the supercars Harry reviews, most of us couldn’t afford in a million years. These bikes, on the other hand, start at just a few grand. Maybe Harry’s vids will inspire more of us to get into biking.
I had a black and purple trim XTZ that was sadly stolen. Totally agree that they make better road bikes than offroaders. This has been a great series, thank you.
I’m Lucky owner of two Super Ténéré from 89’ The first one is a Chesterfield colored, with Wilbers suspension and 320mm front break Rotors, Chrom steel down pipes and a GPR exhaust, LSL steering bar, Hepco Becker crash bar, Givi luggage rack and Givi Monokey Paniers in red. Second one is blue-with colored with Öhlins Shock absorber and WP progressive springs in the front suspension. They have Ricky cross bar, Givi luggage rack and Givi Monokey Paniers in Blue. Great bike, they give me lot of happiness during my on and off-road Rieds
I owned the XTZ and put up many miles over several years on it in the 90's. It had one major flaw which was those valves. ...they were really prone to burning out the exhaust valves, especially with poor petrol. It drank oil too...more so when the valves stretched. It required regular oil changes...mine was more a total loss system! They were sodium filled valves and had a tendency to stretch meaning to avoid disaster they needed regular checking and the bucket shims doing. Mine burnt out several valves entailing a £900 top end rebuild but you're right about the motor. It felt a lot more powerful than those 69 ponies suggest. Very easy to wheelie and pulled hard. Easy to maintain but cheaply made, heavy and very tall. Chain needed regular adjustment as it was far too weedy for the weight and grunt of the bike and rear brake pads needed regular replacement. Brakes were ok but if not maintained well...calipers seize too readily. The pegs were too short even for my size 9's and gearbox quite clunky. Other than that it was a very capable bike but bettered by the early GS which had true off road potential. I've come full circle after years of sports bikes and now have a 1200 gsa...fab bike in all respects. The Cagiva, Honda and gs were more versatile and really the better bikes. The fact that the yamaha won it says more about the hard as nails riders than the off road capability of the bike. I did run mine quite hard off road and suspension and balance was up to it but it was hard work. The motor was pretty good even by todays standards. I had a custom pipe made for mine after the 1 tonne weight original (!) rotted away...rejetted and mildly tuned the engine to rid it if the low down flat spot and it sounded epic and went ike the clappers...good really for an indicated 125mph. Great fun to ride and good low speed manners around town. Had real presence and drew admiring looks as well as admonishing ones due to that open pipe! :-)
I’ve owned my XT Z for 19 years and love it. Super smooth engine. I have done the Paddy Dakar on it, which is mostly off-road, and it was fantastic. I prefer the engine characteristic on an off-road to the Africa twin, which I have also owned. I will never sell mine and I’m sure it will outlast me.
I have one of those in my garage in Spain, bought for 300 Euros in 2010. Apart from some sun damage to the plastics, its immaculate. The idea was to use it around the campo, but I quickly came to the same conclusion: Its a handful on unmade tracks. My XT660 took over, and the Super Ten was retired to the garage!
I had one of these bikes about ten years ago as my daily transport. After three years of ownership, all I can say about it is that it was very heavy especially that bloody throttle. Top marks to the dudes who man-handled them in off road competitions.
This has been a great series. I never knew much about this era of Dakar. Please keep the bike videos coming along, I spied cool Guzzi in your collection that looks right at home next to these
I remember picking up my XTZ 750 brand new (Red&White) on a rainy evening, it morphed into a Gauloises Blue, stolen, and then repaired for me by Sidecar racer Roy Hanks, Custom painted by Rapier in Hull, Had the front wheel changed to a 19” , Dynojetted, road tyres, and a two into two stainless straight through exhaust by Gazelle, me and my mate went off terrorizing sports bikes in the Peak District (Gearbox was rubbish though ) 😝 Occasionally I was my Hero “Stephan Peterhansel” 😂😂 …😎👌🏻
Rode one of these around Australia for 2 months in the mid 90s, and it was the perfect bike for that, fast enough on the road, and well suited to the endless red dirt roads of the interior. It was also absolutely reliable the whole time, despite being 2nd hand with 40,000km already on the clock. Unlike my one of my mates bike, he picked a Aprilia Pegaso 600, it proved to be a constant source of ball ache and trouble, the other mate we went with bought a Suzuki DR800, which was also almost boringly reliable. But the XTZ was the winner, wish i could find a decent one here in NZ.
I had a Super Ten in the early '90's and loved it. Used to take it between Shrewsbury and Bury St Edmunds every weekend and it had huge road presence in the M6 traffic on a Friday evening! It was super heavy though.
I’ve owned an ‘83 XT600 Tenéré, 2008 XT660 Tenéré and my last bike, a ‘94 XTZ750 Super Tenéré. Loved them all! Just sorry I never got to take any of them to the desert…
Loving watching harry use the bikes as intended. In yams defence on the weight, when they built them, plastic tanks were illegal in the UK so they had to have whacking big metal ones.
As an owner of a modern Africa Twin and a fan of the Dakar it was great to see the series of the “original” Dakar bikes, great collection of “toys”. Love the videos you are doing and it seems strange to be so interested in the extraction of the Countach engine, keep up the good work. Robin White
Great series and.. that is the one bike I could not bring myself to buy, for some of the reasons you mentioned, too much weight, little engine braking and, as a bike from a dealer was more a styling excercise, 900ie or original Africa Twin 650 any day.
Agree this shouldn’t be the last bike video I’ve learnt more about Paris Dakar bikes from Harry than ever before Typically Harry engages you whatever he’s talking about, more clued up about farming than before👍
I despatched in London on a 600 Ténéré in the mid 80's. It was perfect for the job. Left a few good dents in the taxis that try to kill despatchers for stealing their parcel business. Not a scratch on the bike 😁 I did take it green laneing, but only once.
Around that time a friend bought himself a Kawasaki Paris-Dakar style bike, it was a 650 single with amazing torque, and he let me ride it. The darn thing could power mono in third gear. I have a great affection for bikes of this era and style.
I enjoyed that! I'm new to off road bikes,your dakar bike videos inspired me to get one of my own! I picked up a mint one owner 1991 Suzuki DR 650 dakar, fun bike to ride, so light and smooth,kick start only, love it! More bike videos please😀
Hi Harry, I've been watching your videos on an off for sometime now and recently subscribed as I am very impressed with your straight talking and very sensible points of view on the cars and bikes you drive and ride. I've done a bit of off roading in Scotland and 90 off road takes some guts...I don't blame you for not doing a second run. Kind regards Paul
Please don't let this be the last bike video Harry, loving them!! Maybe one of the CBX?
+1 on this, more bikes please Harry!
CBX and Z1300 would be great!
+3 for more bikes please Harry!
Man, look at this ! ua-cam.com/video/oh2E6rf_wpk/v-deo.html
THE GUZZI PLEASE!!!
90mph across a field is seriously committed, lol. Great stuff Harry.
Should have done a ton.
Thanks for watching? No! Thanks to YOU for making them!
The exotic cars are great , the trips to Monaco are excellent .. but the Dakar bikes and trips to Pyrenees / Morocco/ Spain on bike trails are just in a class of Thier own .
Thank you Harry
You could tell the cows were impressed! Really enjoyed this series, so more bike videos would be great.
I thought they were going to revolt like Animal Farm!!!
Very enjoyable, Harry, thank you. More bikes please!
This was my first "big" bike, coming from a 125cc scooter. Lots of great memories. Same year, same color scheme. It was such a good bike around town, and an even greater bike for touring with bags and a passenger.
Love it. Drove the Super Tenere for 6 Years, in blue. A dream.
Was a very popular bike here in France, of course this style was big on the continent before UK & USA etc. Stephane Peterhansel is a legend here.
He's a legend everywhere. So many times competing at Dakar both on bikes and in cars and so many wins with both too!
I sold my bike in Italy before moving to another country, and the buyer drove all the way from france with a trailer to pick it up.
Thanks!!! I lived in Bamako, Mali in the early '90's. This was THE bike to have. Great memories - especially trying to max a Yamaha 100 in town, at night. Cheers!
More bike videos please Harry. Loved this series. Fantastic content as always. Recently bought 50 past issues of EVO magazine and love nothing more than reading them!
A great series on the genre with a perfect balance of tech, history and personal viewpoints! Excellent work, Harry!!
Loved this series! Nice to see a collector who actually rides the stuff!
Thoroughly enjoyed the series Harry! More bike content always welcome :)
I really enjoyed these bike vids .. and look forward to any new ones you make ..
This has been a great series of videos for us bike/Dakar fans...thanks! Steve
Keep the bike vids comin Harry, plenty of bikes in your colection to keep us happy .
I will echo what some of the others have said, if you get chance to do some more bike videos. Please do.
Thank you for taking the time to do these bike videos! They’re great!
The video I feared. Had one. Always regret selling it. It was absolutely mint. Went to Ireland. Gonna watch it then head to classifieds 😀
Tremendous series, Harry - thanks so much for sharing. Looking forward to future videos as always.
Yes, more bike stuff please harry.
Great video Harry. As a born again biker I bought one of these and took it France, Spain , and Norway. Great fun!
Yamaha has a special place in my heart.. Any product that they can create they can do damn well.
Fantastic video - watching this made me buy one. A 1989 just like this one! Took it out for the first time today. What a beast!
Here we go!! The first one of these I've actually ridden!! Token sumpguard can be grounded on track, if you're committed enough! 5 valves was a Yamaha thing since the first FZ750s in 85..... The flatspot can be cleaned up relatively easily with a dynojet kit. Brings it alive. More bikes videos please Harry!
I agree …1 million thank you for doing videos of the incredible bikes of PD race. Any off-road Moto-X or Enduro, PD type works Factory made race bikes always fascinated me. I love the smell of Bel-Ray in the morning…. Thanks Harry and please,please, keep the videos coming… we love em’, well done ole’ friend.
Well done Metcalf. More bike vids please.
Hope there’s more bike videos (and purchases) to come Harry. 👍
I enjoyed this series far more than I ever thought I would. I'm not really into enduro bikes but Harry makes just about everything interesting and entertaining. Hats off Harry.
This series has been the best, Harry. Thank you. Would love to see you on the Suzuki DR650 aka 'bushpig' for all us Aussies!
..and me 😆
Lovely little series that Harry, and a nice collection Look forward to some more bike content!
I love the bike videos too, I've never been interested in bikes however somehow I am with harry! im learning a lot and enjoying it!!
Really enjoyed this series Harry. Thanks for sharing your collection with us 👍
'Here we go'. Epic. We need more bike videos please Harry. This Dakar series has been awesome
Another brilliant vid Harry - hopefully it won't be the end of the bike content.
Enjoyed the series looking forward to the road series.
I have been enjoying the motorcycle videos and would love to see more! I remember one of your first vids on the Kawasaki H2, look forward to the other bikes.
Thankyou for sharing these great bikes. It’s amazing to see how much the bikes transformed in a relatively short time from the XT500 to the S10.
This series has been awesome Harry, well all of your videos are. Thankyou again!
Many thanks for letting us share your Dakar bike passion. Immensely enjoyable videos. Would love to see some more, please.
Harry - I’ve never ridden or owned a bike - but enjoyed watching the series - keep up the good work👍
Really enjoyed it too. Some of the supercars Harry reviews, most of us couldn’t afford in a million years. These bikes, on the other hand, start at just a few grand. Maybe Harry’s vids will inspire more of us to get into biking.
Really enjoyed this series Harry. Another plea here for further bike videos please!
Love the series. Please do more bike videos! On and off road is both fine.
Absolutely loved this series Harry
More pleeeeeeeese 😁
It's great to see a gentleman of Harry's vintage still enjoying these old bikes 👍🏻
I had a black and purple trim XTZ that was sadly stolen. Totally agree that they make better road bikes than offroaders. This has been a great series, thank you.
I’m Lucky owner of two Super Ténéré from 89’
The first one is a Chesterfield colored, with Wilbers suspension and 320mm front break Rotors, Chrom steel down pipes and a GPR exhaust, LSL steering bar, Hepco Becker crash bar, Givi luggage rack and Givi Monokey Paniers in red.
Second one is blue-with colored with Öhlins Shock absorber and WP progressive springs in the front suspension.
They have Ricky cross bar, Givi luggage rack and Givi Monokey Paniers in Blue.
Great bike, they give me lot of happiness during my on and off-road Rieds
Always enjoy the bikes Harry, keep them coming please.
Great series Mr Metcalfe. Really enjoyed every one of these bike videos. Thank you
Love your videos- maybe consider featuring your other bikes as well, buying guide and why they interested you. Keep it going please.
Such a good looking bike, I would love to see some road based bike videos please.
I owned the XTZ and put up many miles over several years on it in the 90's. It had one major flaw which was those valves. ...they were really prone to burning out the exhaust valves, especially with poor petrol. It drank oil too...more so when the valves stretched. It required regular oil changes...mine was more a total loss system!
They were sodium filled valves and had a tendency to stretch meaning to avoid disaster they needed regular checking and the bucket shims doing. Mine burnt out several valves entailing a £900 top end rebuild but you're right about the motor. It felt a lot more powerful than those 69 ponies suggest.
Very easy to wheelie and pulled hard. Easy to maintain but cheaply made, heavy and very tall. Chain needed regular adjustment as it was far too weedy for the weight and grunt of the bike and rear brake pads needed regular replacement. Brakes were ok but if not maintained well...calipers seize too readily.
The pegs were too short even for my size 9's and gearbox quite clunky. Other than that it was a very capable bike but bettered by the early GS which had true off road potential. I've come full circle after years of sports bikes and now have a 1200 gsa...fab bike in all respects.
The Cagiva, Honda and gs were more versatile and really the better bikes. The fact that the yamaha won it says more about the hard as nails riders than the off road capability of the bike. I did run mine quite hard off road and suspension and balance was up to it but it was hard work. The motor was pretty good even by todays standards.
I had a custom pipe made for mine after the 1 tonne weight original (!) rotted away...rejetted and mildly tuned the engine to rid it if the low down flat spot and it sounded epic and went ike the clappers...good really for an indicated 125mph. Great fun to ride and good low speed manners around town. Had real presence and drew admiring looks as well as admonishing ones due to that open pipe! :-)
90 mph across a stoney field 👊👌.... respect to you sir !
Great video, great bike 👍
I’ve owned my XT Z for 19 years and love it. Super smooth engine. I have done the Paddy Dakar on it, which is mostly off-road, and it was fantastic. I prefer the engine characteristic on an off-road to the Africa twin, which I have also owned. I will never sell mine and I’m sure it will outlast me.
Thanks for the series Harry,Love the big Off road bikes,Had a DR750 Malboro replica years ago, Loved it.. Would love one of each, Cheers..
I have one of those in my garage in Spain, bought for 300 Euros in 2010. Apart from some sun damage to the plastics, its immaculate. The idea was to use it around the campo, but I quickly came to the same conclusion: Its a handful on unmade tracks. My XT660 took over, and the Super Ten was retired to the garage!
Thanks for this mini series Harry. Yes let's see more bikes, on or off road! Cheers.
I had one of these bikes about ten years ago as my daily transport. After three years of ownership, all I can say about it is that it was very heavy especially that bloody throttle. Top marks to the dudes who man-handled them in off road competitions.
Love the content, pls more bike reviews, I’m riding a Yamaha xt600
Thanks for sharing your Dakar bikes with us. I enjoyed that very much.
Greatseries, partly because of this series I bought a CRf250L for green laning and loving it. Cheers Harry!!
Love it dude. I am a car snob with a few cars but love the motorcycle videos. Got my first bike on the wall at my staff canteen
This has been a great series. I never knew much about this era of Dakar. Please keep the bike videos coming along, I spied cool Guzzi in your collection that looks right at home next to these
I remember picking up my XTZ 750 brand new (Red&White) on a rainy evening, it morphed into a Gauloises Blue, stolen, and then repaired for me by Sidecar racer Roy Hanks, Custom painted by Rapier in Hull, Had the front wheel changed to a 19” , Dynojetted, road tyres, and a two into two stainless straight through exhaust by Gazelle, me and my mate went off terrorizing sports bikes in the Peak District (Gearbox was rubbish though ) 😝 Occasionally I was my Hero “Stephan Peterhansel” 😂😂 …😎👌🏻
Rode one of these around Australia for 2 months in the mid 90s, and it was the perfect bike for that, fast enough on the road, and well suited to the endless red dirt roads of the interior. It was also absolutely reliable the whole time, despite being 2nd hand with 40,000km already on the clock. Unlike my one of my mates bike, he picked a Aprilia Pegaso 600, it proved to be a constant source of ball ache and trouble, the other mate we went with bought a Suzuki DR800, which was also almost boringly reliable. But the XTZ was the winner, wish i could find a decent one here in NZ.
I had a Super Ten in the early '90's and loved it. Used to take it between Shrewsbury and Bury St Edmunds every weekend and it had huge road presence in the M6 traffic on a Friday evening! It was super heavy though.
I've a XTZ 750 year 1996 color "dark amaranth queen". Great, great bike! A friend of mine has done 245.000 km. without opening the engine.
I’ve owned an ‘83 XT600 Tenéré, 2008 XT660 Tenéré and my last bike, a ‘94 XTZ750 Super Tenéré. Loved them all! Just sorry I never got to take any of them to the desert…
love the content Harry, both the 2 and 4 wheels ...
Loving watching harry use the bikes as intended. In yams defence on the weight, when they built them, plastic tanks were illegal in the UK so they had to have whacking big metal ones.
I am impressed by your bike collection. I would love to come over and ride out there. Thanks so much for sharing.
I own one of this from 1989 with 92k km on odometer. Love this bike.
This is the video I needed after long day at work
A great series of videos Harry… will look forward to more 👍
Harry, more bike reviews please. I’ve been a biker all my life and your reviews are amongst the very best.
Great series Harry. Would love to see you test some other old classic bikes. 90mph on that bike was brave.
*Sir Harry* Cracking fun segment. The new Ténéré T7 2021 is the business for off road riding!
Really enjoyable series of videos; some great bikes from the heyday of the Dakar.
Enjoyed the bike series, my favourite was the GS 800, from a period when bikes were more simple and basic.
No such bike !
Perhaps use its proper name ?
R80 G/S.
An 800cc GS or a
GS 800.
The BMW.
I was present in Luxor when they launched this bike ! What a privilege, the hotel full of Yamaha people and bike journalists.
The usual Harry up-front honesty and presentation
Great series this!!! I could feel how bad this bike was even on video!
Fantastic, thank you for doing this.
As an owner of a modern Africa Twin and a fan of the Dakar it was great to see the series of the “original” Dakar bikes, great collection of “toys”. Love the videos you are doing and it seems strange to be so interested in the extraction of the Countach engine, keep up the good work. Robin White
360 degree parallel twin, same as old Triumph twins, great sound just need to get the jetting sorted with that can on it. Ace!
Ah, so it is a 360°parallel twin! 👍
Excellent series Harry, great bikes, great presentation. Thank you very much
As the owner of a super ten, yours is in far better condition than mine!
Great series, Harry! Keep them bike videos coming!
Yes I've loved this series, more bikes definately please.
Great series and.. that is the one bike I could not bring myself to buy, for some of the reasons you mentioned, too much weight, little engine braking and, as a bike from a dealer was more a styling excercise, 900ie or original Africa Twin 650 any day.
Agree this shouldn’t be the last bike video
I’ve learnt more about Paris Dakar bikes from Harry than ever before
Typically Harry engages you whatever he’s talking about, more clued up about farming than before👍
I enjoyed the series very much, thanks for sharing.
I despatched in London on a 600 Ténéré in the mid 80's.
It was perfect for the job.
Left a few good dents in the taxis that try to kill despatchers for stealing their parcel business. Not a scratch on the bike 😁
I did take it green laneing, but only once.
Really enjoyed this series Harry thanks and as others have said more Bike stuff please.
Thanks for sharing! Thas was an awesome series, comparing all these bikes.
Thank you Harry for this Dakar Bike series.
Around that time a friend bought himself a Kawasaki Paris-Dakar style bike, it was a 650 single with amazing torque, and he let me ride it. The darn thing could power mono in third gear. I have a great affection for bikes of this era and style.
I enjoyed that!
I'm new to off road bikes,your dakar bike videos inspired me to get one of my own!
I picked up a mint one owner 1991 Suzuki DR 650 dakar, fun bike to ride, so light and smooth,kick start only, love it!
More bike videos please😀
Cheers Harry. Farm riding is the best. Love this series 👍
Each one of these videos has been brilliant and I’d like to see some more on the rest of your bike collection please
Hi Harry,
I've been watching your videos on an off for sometime now and recently subscribed as I am very impressed with your straight talking and very sensible points of view on the cars and bikes you drive and ride. I've done a bit of off roading in Scotland and 90 off road takes some guts...I don't blame you for not doing a second run.
Kind regards Paul