I got the FZR after a fair few shocks of quotes for Bandits and the like, turns out a 1988 FZR750 is cheaper to insure than a newish Bandit! Seems ok to me (though a cheapest quote for fully comp was £1500 and I got the bike for £2000... TPF&T here I come), I've had too many claims/convictions to expect a low premium. 

The bike was imported from Japan sometime in the early 90's, it still has the original dealer receipt under the seat (or it could be a sushi receipt for all I know...). It was neglected for a while but the previous owner had bought it and powder coated the wheels, put mirrors on, made up a stainless collector box and fitted an Alpha race pipe. 

The bike goes like stink, much quicker than a foxeye FZR600R I had, I'm sure it must have had a dynojet kit fitted or something but I haven't really had the inclination to check. The pipe is too loud, it attracts far too much attention and it must only be a matter of time before I'm 'forced' to replace it, oh yeah, that and the red sidelights and the small number plate. Really *must* get those fixed. 

The bike handles ok when the tyres have warmed up, you can throw it around surprisingly well. It's pretty heavy shoving it around at slow speed though, it could definitely do to lose a few pounds. In the company of 400's it's not far behind on most cornering but it's definitely harder work! 

Long distance rides aren't much fun, the longest I've done in a day is probably around 500 miles. Sore arse/legs start at about 100 miles though the fairing doesn't deflect all the wind and this takes some weight off the riders arms. The forks have been dropped in the yokes, all this probably means that the pillion gets more of a rough deal than normal. Luckily SWMBO is a short arse so wind draft isn't a problem, though the pillion footpegs are tucked fairly high and even for SWMBO it becomes uncomfortable after a couple of hours. 

I haven't had any problems other than a duff battery. It probably needs a new flasher unit over winter but the rest of it seems in pretty good nick and also fairly resilient to the weather. It's been stored outside all year and will be all winter, so far it's standing up to it very well indeed. 

Current mystery is a bizarre overheating problem which at steady speed regularly every half mile or so causes the temperature to rise then I get a sudden blast of hot air on my leg and the temperature goes down again! 

Overall I'm very happy, it'll keep up with most of the newer stuff on most of the roads round here and I reckon that in smiles per miles I got a bargain. If I do sell it, I'll only get something perhaps a bit more comfortable for longer journeys, maybe a Thundercat.