Practical Sportsbikes

Practical Sportsbikes magazine is about buying, fixing, restoring and riding sportsbikes from the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s. Every issue of PS – the magazine home of new-wave Japanese and Italian classics – is packed with: - The most inspiring and ingenious reader restorations - The most in-depth road tests and buyers’ guides - Unmissable workshop tips and how-to features Practical Sportsbikes gets under the skin of the bikes that really matter to our readers and explains how best to maintain, rebuild and enjoy them. So if you’re in to sportsbikes from the 1970-1990s, PS is essential reading.

Welcome

OUR SINCEREST APOLOGIES • Red swingarm shouldn’t work, but it does (in this instance). Don’t make a habit of it, though. That would be wrong

ps mail • You can’t write a letter to The PS any longer. The magazine does not exist. But, did it ever? That is the question

specials we like • Your final dose of SWL from around the world. Read it and weep

IN YOUR SHED • Part way through a restoration? Just completed a trick special? Don’t send us your pics, and details because this is the last issue of PS

Bike Of The Month • Specials fans will be familiar with the Butchered Classics Facebook page. This turbo Kwak is none other than the creation of the group’s founder

GOODBYE & THANK YOU • PS is over. But here are some memories of its 13 happy years…

JIM MOORE

CHRIS NEWBIGGING • Features ed ‘11-’15, Editor ‘19- ‘23

KAT POWER • A radical, enduring factory look coupled with vast amounts of urge from the aftermarket seldom fails to make the grade. Witness...

Practical sportsbikes

BIG, OLD LUMPS OF IRON... • ...well, steel and alumium alloy, and plastic, some rubber too. Yet your Jotas, CB1100Rs and Katanas still have charm. You just need money to sample it

JOTA 120

CB1100RB/RC AND RD

GSX1000/1100S

THE ONE TO BUY NOW

ON THE BENCH • RIDE IT. BREAK IT. DUMP IT IN A BARN. LOSE INTEREST. BUY A CAR

What’s the problem? • Bike not running right? Our experts have the answers to the toughest questions

Sense of sensors

Wheel deal

OUR EXPERTS

What a bind

Fork oil figures

No hot start

What a scorcher

YAMAHA YZF-R1 4XV • Fast enough to feel modern, simple enough anyone can spanner on them

THE REAL LONG-TERMERS

BARGAINS TO BIMOTA • It’s over. The dream is shattered. The closure of PS has denied Alan his one shot at experiencing long-term Italian exotica ownership. Such is life

GREAT BRITISH GARAGES

ON OUR BENCH • Old Farmer Chris and his agricultural implement, Gary Hurd and his vain attempt to get Alan ‘into the nines’ on an old Suzuki, MG and never-ready Bandit 12, plus an embittered old man and his Yam R7 minitwin

All in the head. And the mind • G and Al prep a cylinder head to take them into the nines. Will they get there? We’ll never know

Won’t be long now... sit tight... • Just when you thought the Bandit might be completed, the magazine finishes instead. Oh...

Waiting for the mad onslaught • Nothing happens, nothing’s ready, and then the insane panic kicks off for the season opener

PROJECT HUNTER