Thought I would start a thread on my latest NSR. Really liked the look of the mc18 in Terra colours, got to be one of the prettiest NSR's around. I had one of these on my wanted list and was toying with the idea of getting one when I finish the other projects in my garage, when Stephen rc45 put his up for sale in the classifieds for a very reasonable price though it just seemed to good an oportunity to miss so I phoned him up and the deal was done If you go back a page in the members builds section you will find Steve's thread on this bike.

So I have been riding the 18 for a couple of months now and she is a lovely little thing, in fact I think I prefer it to the Pentax at the moment! The bike is in very tidy condition but needed a couple of little jobs doing (all things I was informed of before purchase) the front discs were warped but these were soon changed for a spare set I had lying around. The speedo was working intermitantly I guessed this would be a worn plastic drive that goes over the sprocket, had a new one in the spares draw so this was fitted and the problem cured, replaced the knackered rear tyre and I fitted a spare dry clutch cover I had kicking around.Thats how she was used until last week.

I decided this is going to be a bit of a rolling restoration with parts being repaired, replaced and refurbed as and when I can. Reasons for this are: havent got any room in the garage to strip another bike anyway, its in pretty good nick anyway and I like riding it to much at the moment to take it off the road.

My aim is pretty much the same as Steve's was, to get it looking as mint and original as possible. This isnt going to be a show pony and will be used as Honda intended but I want it to look as mint as possible. It has HRC F3 swinging arm and rear shock, these will stay on as they look standard anyway and being HRC parts are pretty trick. Steve had derestricted it, drilled the airbox and rejetted the carbs, it runs nicely and puts out 61bhp so this set up will remain, although the right hand pipe has a small scuff and dent on the stinger so I would like to source a better one of these. Currently has "r" forks so will need to source some SP forks. Bodywork is in good condition, the upper fairing is mint. this will get some localised repairs and paint as it would be a crime to strip and repaint bodywork in this good original condition.

At some point I will drop the engine for a strip, rebuild and to have the cases vapour blasted but no big rush to do this at the moment.

So last week Chris Newbigging from Practical Sportsbikes posted a request to borrow a mc18 for a 1989 250's group test so I offered him the use of the Terra 18, he snapped my hand off at the offer and mentioned he might even use the 18 for the front cover!

Chris needs the bike next week so this gave me just over a week to do a few little jobs to make her look a bit tidier.

First on the to do list is the left hand lower fairing panel which is plain white and void of all decals. At this point I have to say thanks to Johny Mac who has recently completed his own Terra resto, he has a sticker man who made all the decals for his bike and John had already supplied me with the required SP and Honda decals. John also had his paint man find a colour code for the Terra silver so I could buy an aerosol of the correct paint. Panel was masked, prepped, painted and decals applied!



Next on the list were the front discs, these should have black centres so were removed, masked and painted. Had a nice new set of SP disc bolts and nuts so they were bolted back on with these rather than the corroded originals.



Bike came with a mc21 kickstart fitted which has a different bend to the 18 one and means your foot hits the footrest making it a pain to kickover, once again Johnymac came to the rescue and a deal was done for his spare 18 kickstart. I also swapped the non standard footrests over for a spare pair of oem ones I had kicking around.



Next on the list was the forks, the bottoms were a bit corrode so decided to strip them and have them vapour blasted. If you look at a pair of original fork bottoms they have a grained finish although this doesnt run all the way to the brake lugs and other protrusions that are hard to polish. This is where I went a bit anoraky, masked out the appropiate areas and grained the forks with a scotch brite flapper wheel in a drill and then laquered the fork leg.





The chrome on the fork stanchions was pretty poor with a lot of rust pitting, had a spare pair of 21 sp forks so rebuilt the forks using the 21 stanchions and internals and 18 bottoms. Slipped in some new seals and a blend of 10 & 15 weight oil. Slipped the forks and wheel back in using some of the freshly plated bolts from my track bike, quite pleased with how it came out.



Also painted the top yoke.



Had the silencers vapour blasted to give them an as new finish.



And thats it for the moment, ready to ride down to the Ace cafe tomorrow.

Very nice work. Love the terra sp's as well. The silver and gold magtek's really complement each other. It's really hard to take these bikes off the road. Mine needs rings really soon, going to have to find a free weekend!

Nice job Paul...quite a few spares on hand! Have finished a Seed version with SP suspension as well . Curious as to what Stephen has done to the jetting after the airbox mod, can you remember the main jet/powerjet combination etc?

Top draw detail work Paul. Cracking bike.
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Rich
MC21 Track Bike / RS250 NF5 'Spencer', NX5 'Cadalora' & NXA 'Aoyama' / RS500 / Two Brothers Racing RC30

Good to catch up at the Ace today,the Terra is a very nice honest little bike,and its a good job for you i was on holiday when Stephen rc45 advertised it,its a good unmolested example,Pentax sp always look good even if their filthy [not saying your is],so keep up the good work on them,jonmac.
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John

It was definetely a good buy and a credit to its former owner.

Its all about the detail Rich, I had a good snout at your Spencer rs at Stafford a couple of weeks ago and that is perfection mate!

It always pays to have a few spares tucked away geezgillard no idea what the jetting set up is though, when I get around to taking the carbs off I will check the jetting setup and let you know.

Really nice bike and a impressive work. As paul g says, it's all about the detail !

I have given the Terra a bit of a strip down and refresh recently so Thought I would post up a few pictures.









Had all the nuts and bolts replated. Yolks, clip ons and a few other bits and bobs powder coated. Sourced a standard sp shock and installed that and the stock swinging arm, sourced another right hand exhaust the original had a small scuff on the chrome stinger which annoyed the hell out of me, repaired a few minor bodywork cracks and gave it a damned good clean.

I managed to find an original mint condition Terra tank to replace the repainted one it came with.



I Havent stripped the engine, just gave it a good scrub up.



Its looking pretty good even if I do say so myself, the bodywork isnt perfect but is about as good as you are going to get with 24 year old original bodywork and I would have that over some of the restored stuff certain dealers bikes are wearing any day!

Sadly I might have to sell her! I have another two NSR's to build and I just dont have room for everything so something has got to go.

Nice one Paul, got a soft spot for r5k & r6k,s, probably cause they remind me of early nf5 & nsr racebikes.
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Proud Father of , 05 ktm 400exc supermoto 2018 honda crf rx supermoto