Maybe a new ride?

[bosco659]

I went to see a Suzuki Titan 500 today. It was t in as good of shape as I’d hoped it would be (from pictures) but it looked like it had potential as a fixer upper. Motor wasn’t running but turned over easily. Surface rust on exhaust and other chrome bits. Paint was 5/10 at best.
Anyone here have experience owning one of these? Thought it may be a good winter project.
I’ll try to get some pics up.

Warning: these are glamour shots. Looks much more weathered in real life. But has potential….

 

[Jim]

Never owned one, but back in my RD days I had a buddy that did. We swapped rides a fair bit. The general consensus between us was the RD was a hooligan and the Titan was a gentleman. If you look at the numbers on the speed page, they were within a cats whisker of each other. The RD could scare the bejesus out of you, the 500 was more stately about it all. I thoroughly enjoyed his ride though. If I ever run across a good one, I'll grab it.

'Cept I want to cafe one....

 

[Jim]

Forgot to add... the Titan is somewhere in the top ten of best lookin' retro's out there in my book.

 

[bosco659]

Forgot to add... the Titan is somewhere in the top ten of best lookin' retro's out there in my book.

It’s rumoured the motor was rebuilt but I’m waiting to get confirmation of this. The current owner reports it was not easy to start if at all. On the aesthetics I can clean up a lot of it but the paint work looks poor. The left side cover is broken but I’m sure I could find one of those. I should know by the end of the weekend if I’ll be buying it. The tank is heavily faded and beyond polishing back to life. The inside of the tank is squeaky clean. Many spokes are rusted, rims looked ok.

 

[DogBunny]

Do you mind sharing what the asking price is?
The T500 is a bike that I've had my eye on for maybe 15 years. They are pretty rare, and command about twice the price that a comparable condition XS650 would get.
I don't know a lot about them. What I am really interested in is the front wheel and front end. I think it is the best-looking front wheel I have ever seen, and the forks and fender are good-looking too.


This is the bike that turned me on to the T500 front end. A purpose-built, strict budget drag bike. One of the many show bikes by Chris Kelland, a local legitimate XS650 master guru.

A couple more front end pics of that bike, and a pic of the Hollywood side of a restored T500 front wheel, showing the "meat grinder" hub.

 

[bosco659]

Do you mind sharing what the asking price is?
The T500 is a bike that I've had my eye on for maybe 15 years. They are pretty rare, and command about twice the price that a comparable condition XS650 would get.
I don't know a lot about them. What I am really interested in is the front wheel and front end. I think it is the best-looking front wheel I have ever seen, and the forks and fender are good-looking too.

View attachment 374440
This is the bike that turned me on to the T500 front end. A purpose-built, strict budget drag bike. One of the many show bikes by Chris Kelland, a local legitimate XS650 master guru.

A couple more front end pics of that bike, and a pic of the Hollywood side of a restored T500 front wheel, showing the "meat grinder" hub.
View attachment 374438 View attachment 374439 View attachment 374441

No price asked. Open for offers. The invoices for rebuild turned out to be not so useful plus they were dated 10 years ago. I just looked for carb rebuild parts and floats were $70 each and needle valves were $100 each plus shipping and taxes. Mind you this was from a European supplier where I bought most of my water Buffalo parts from.
Are you familiar with the internal damping system on these forks? When I did the bounce test on the front it felt like it was just springs only without oil.

 

[Wagner73]

The T500 is a bike that I've had my eye on for maybe 15 years. They are pretty rare, and command about twice the price that a comparable condition XS650 would get.
I don't know a lot about them.

∆∆∆∆ Ditto, I agree. I don't know jack about them but I have always been interested to find one that I could restore. And I agree as well, they are not very common.

When I was in school (my T100C ownership days), my dorm's RA had one...first one I had ever seen.

Edit - And yes, when I looked at typical part's cost, most were pricey, I assume due to scarcity.

 

[bosco659]

I made an offer. I’ll wait to see if it’s accepted. I looked further into parts cost and availability. Looks like cost is a secondary concern - availability doesn’t look good. Maybe I’ll be lucky and my offer won’t be accepted. lol.

 

[Jim]

Just took a look at CMSNL. I was actually surprised at the number of parts in stock for the Titan.... pistons, rings, gaskets, forks seals... quiet a bit more than I was expecting.

https://www.cmsnl.com/suzuki-t500-1971-1972-1973-1974-1975-r-j-k-l-m-usa-e03_model16265/partslist/

 

[Wagner73]

Just took a look at CMSNL. I was actually surprised at the number of parts in stock for the Titan.... pistons, rings, gaskets, forks seals... quiet a bit more than I was expecting.

IDK, but I seem to remember hearing somewhere that the T500 was significantly more popular in EU than in NA(?).

 

[DogBunny]

Are you familiar with the internal damping system on these forks? When I did the bounce test on the front it felt like it was just springs only without oil.

Don't know, except that the design appears to be identical to the 1970 Yamaha XS1. I base this on the parts diagram and the outwards appearance.
If true, the damper is not a separate, or serviceable, or even accessible part (not that there's much that can go wrong with it). It is fixed to the bottom of the fork lower. It surely should have oil in it.

 

[Jim]

It surely should have oil in it.

Never underestimate the dreaded PO...

 

[bosco659]

Never underestimate the dreaded PO...

Agreed! I bought my GT750 water buffalo from a mechanic who repaired, restored and sold bikes. I asked him about recent service and he told me everything had been replaced and properly adjusted. Well the bike ended up running like crap, burning way too much oil. I began looking at the basics and found old plugs; old points covered with a tar like substance and numerous issues with the oiling system. I called him asking about the points and his reply was- dunno, never ever looked at them since the bike ran well. S

The moral of the story is never trust the po unless of course the po is me. lol. On a serious note I go overboard fixing things and making them right so there will be no disappointments and come backs.

 

[bosco659]

Well my offer was accepted and I just need to figure out when to pick it up. It’s intended to be a winter project but something tells me I won’t be able to keep my hands off of it. Lol.

 

[Mailman]

Well my offer was accepted and I just need to figure out when to pick it up. It’s intended to be a winter project but something tells me I won’t be able to keep my hands off of it. Lol.

Please do start a thread on this bike. I’m sure I’m not alone in saying I find this bike to be very interesting. The Suzuki triples got the most attention, but I always felt this bike kinda flew under the radar, it was probably the easiest to work on and the best everyday rider of the bunch ( in my humble opinion )
Good luck with your new project, I hope to see it up and running soon…..ish.

 

[bosco659]

Please do start a thread on this bike. I’m sure I’m not alone in saying I find this bike to be very interesting. The Suzuki triples got the most attention, but I always felt this bike kinda flew under the radar, it was probably the easiest to work on and the best everyday rider of the bunch ( in my humble opinion )
Good luck with your new project, I hope to see it up and running soon…..ish.

Thanks Bob. I promise it will be running or sold quicker than the beetle project!

 

[Wagner73]

IDK, but I seem to remember hearing somewhere that the T500 was significantly more popular in EU than in NA(?).

As @Jim stated, cmsnl seems to have a surprising number of T500 parts, whereas a search on Partszilla for example comes up pretty sparse.

There are also a couple of vintage Suzuki sites out there that might have parts?

 

[bosco659]

Picking up the bike this Thursday. Getting the garage ready for its new occupant.

 

[Wagner73]

Funny, but now that your new project has further sensitized me to the T500, they seem to be popping up everywhere. Visited a vintage shop in Xenia OH the day before AMA Vintage Days and they must've had four or five.

Then, at the event, I must've seen another 4 or 5 at least, including two or three very nice examples. One shown in my 2026 Vintage Days thread. Saw more T500's than XS650's!?!

https://www.xs650.com/threads/2026-ama-mid-ohio-vintage-days.70210/

Best of luck with this new project; I will follow with much interest.

 

[bosco659]

Funny, but now that your new project has further sensitized me to the T500, they seem to be popping up everywhere. Visited a vintage shop in Xenia OH the day before AMA Vintage Days and they must've had four or five.

Then, at the event, I must've seen another 4 or 5 at least, including two or three very nice examples. One shown in my 2026 Vintage Days thread. Saw more T500's than XS650's!?!

https://www.xs650.com/threads/2026-ama-mid-ohio-vintage-days.70210/

Best of luck with this new project; I will follow with much interest.

Thx. I will start a separate thread once I get working on the bike. If I can discipline myself there won’t be a lot done to it until the winter. I’m hoping most of the winter work will be cosmetic enhancements. I might spend a bit of time getting it to run before the cold weather sets in