There were a few Ascots on the Indianapolis area Cragislist recently. A really nice black FT500 that was going for $2850. A red FT500 for $1200 that looked really good. Another red FT500 for $800 that was really rough. And a red VT500FT for $1075 that looked really good given the price. I called about the $1200 FT500 and the owner had already arranged for somebody to come look at it. So I called the owner of the VT500FT - long story short. I rode it home.
I owned an '82 FT500 when they first came out. It was my first street bike after a long run of enduros and motocross bikes. Owned it for a year, put a little over 14,000 miles on it and sold it to buy a 1983 Honda VF750F Interceptor. Needless to say, that was quite a change of pace.
Anyway - I don't recall if I'd ever seen the V twin Ascot. Now that I've had a chance to put some miles on it, I have to admit that it's a much better road bike than the thumper. The FT really had to work hard to maintain highway speed. The VT handles it without breaking a sweat.
I didn't bother to try to talk the guy down on the price, it seemed like a fair deal to me. It goes without saying that a grand don't buy perfection. My first impulse it to restore it since it doesn't need much, but I'm sure tempted to go a little custom. I'll probably just do some bolt-on mods and throw the stock parts in a box for the next owner.
The exhaust system is a bit cut up - the muffler and pre-chamber are missing. The right side control cluster is missing. The previous owner jury rigged a big ugly starter button and bypassed the kill switch. The thermostatic switch for the cooling fan is bad so there's a toggle switch for that. And the rear tire is really bald. Aside from that, it's really in pretty good shape.
I won the bid for a complete exhaust system on eBay. That should be here Monday. Picked a few miscellaneous used parts from a local used parts dealer. Should have it up to snuff in a week.
