My Youth Revisited!

[Bobby B]

My first bike was a 1989 GS500 EK It was the first year of this generation and employed the the the newest version of the inline twin! It started up everyday regardless of weather it handled like a champ and let me put over 100k on it! I thought it was the cat ass, on this bike even though the bad ass bike at the time was the GSXR 750. But with clip on's and a fresh set of brass balls I kept up with the pack! To me, this was the most perfect bike for me to start on. I will never ever forget the joy it brought me! I wonder to this day will I be one of those old geezers hunting around junk yards for rusty parts to relive my my old GS500E???? Not note the Oakley Helmets!!! and how cool I thought I was!

 

[GNBRETT]

lol awesome bro. that was a kickass bike back then.

 

[TallTom]

I go back to the Kawasaki 2 cycle triples. The 750 Triple was at the time the baddest of the bad.

 

[c10]

The good old days lol . I loved my RD350 .

 

[piratediverjefff]

...I'm way back there,'67 650 BSA hornet in '69.

 

[nosbig]

Great bike. I friend of mine just picked up a nice 83 GS1100E. For its day that bike was a beast and it is still fun to ride.

 

[Bobby B]

...I'm way back there,'67 650 BSA hornet in '69.

Dad traded his 1976 Triumph trident for an older BSA because he always loved them!!!!!!!! Not many people know that those old British bikes were faster then Harley's
Side note when my mom was dating my dad (step dad) I was 4 years old. Guess what! He put a helmet on my head and drove me around everywhere on that triumph! All I had to do was hold on to the belt loops of his jeans!
Fast forward 14 years I buy a bike when I'm eighteen and my mom goes nuts! Oh son you're gonna kill yourself blah blah blah!!! And I'm like "hey! it's dad's fault!!!!! WTF!

 

[oldgixxer]

That '89 GS 500 was an awesome bike back in the day. I had a track-junkie buddy friend who had one,Ohlins suspension&sticky tires was all he needed to destroy just about anything in the mountains where horsepower didnt matter.

Love those Oakleys,growing up in the '80s was the best ever lol

 

[Bobby B]

That '89 GS 500 was an awesome bike back in the day. I had a track-junkie buddy friend who had one,Ohlins suspension&sticky tires was all he needed to destroy just about anything in the mountains where horsepower didnt matter.

Love those Oakleys,growing up in the '80s was the best ever lol

and let's not forget the Mullet hair style FTW!!!!! It all started on our BMX bikes GT's, Powerlights, Mongoose, and Redline's!!! doing table tops and Bunny hops!!!!!!!

 

[oldgixxer]

Dude,I think you are the only person besides me that knows what a PowerLite BMX bike was!!. I had a blue one,with the European bottom bracket,Uni Seat,bear-trap pedals(the ones that cut into your shin if you missed the pedal lol),Tuff Neck,AME grips,Araya 7X wheels,Shimano sprocket,Red Line cranks,Shimano brakes w Tuf pads,etc. I forgot what handle bars I had
Ahhh,the good ole days!!! lol

 

[Bobby B]

Dude,I think you are the only person besides me that knows what a PowerLite BMX bike was!!. I had a blue one,with the European bottom bracket,Uni Seat,bear-trap pedals(the ones that cut into your shin if you missed the pedal lol),Tuff Neck,AME grips,Araya 7X wheels,Shimano sprocket,Red Line cranks,Shimano brakes w Tuf pads,etc. I forgot what handle bars I had
Ahhh,the good ole days!!! lol

My first real BMX home built was a Powerlite Chrome (chromoly Frame), Blue SR alloy cranks, blue Araya rims with Sunshine hubs wrapped in Tioga Comp II's tire's. Blue KKT Lightening pedals! Blue Pro neck II, Chrome CW Pro bars, Basic MX brake blue and a plastic bmx seat! Those Bear traps were shin grinders like the KKT's I still proudly bear the scars on my shins. I would never in my life trade those days of launching off a home made jump without any regards for my safety! God forbid my reputation be blemished!!!!
BTW! I was lucky because Powerlite was built and distributed two blocks from my house by "Pedalpower" in Orange, Ca, so I had to represent! it's what we all rode. For a while they were the pinnacle! Then Gary Turner came along in Santa Ana, CA and started knocking frames together for his kids who raced BMX, then Robinson, Cooks Bros. DG, ect!
I had a sticker on my number plate that read " If you steal this bike it will turn into a Schwinn"!!!! HAHAHAHAHA Oh and God help you if your were on a Huffy or a Team Murray!!!!!!
cheers Gixx

 

[oldgixxer]

My first real BMX home built was a Powerlite Chrome (chromoly Frame), Blue SR alloy cranks, blue Araya rims with Sunshine hubs wrapped in Tioga Comp II's tire's. Blue KKT Lightening pedals! Blue Pro neck II, Chrome CW Pro bars, Basic MX brake blue and a plastic bmx seat! Those Bear traps were shin grinders like the KKT's I still proudly bear the scars on my shins. I would never in my life trade those days of launching off a home made jump without any regards for my safety! God forbid my reputation be blemished!!!!
BTW! I was lucky because Powerlite was built and distributed two blocks from my house by "Pedalpower" in Orange, Ca, so I had to represent! it's what we all rode. For a while they were the pinnacle! Then Gary Turner came along in Santa Ana, CA and started knocking frames together for his kids who raced BMX, then Robinson, Cooks Bros. DG, ect!
I had a sticker on my number plate that read " If you steal this bike it will turn into a Schwinn"!!!! HAHAHAHAHA Oh and God help you if your were on a Huffy or a Team Murray!!!!!!
cheers Gixx

Haha thats excellent! Being in NY,we would scour the BMX magazines every month to see what all you Cali guys were doing with your bikes. All of the groundbreaking products came from California as it was(still is?) the BMX capitol of the world lol. This was serious business when we were 12yrs old,we needed the lightest bikes and all the latest stuff from Cali.
PowerLite was a very obscure name around here,even some of the most hardcore BMX guys never heard of them. A few of us knew though
PK Ripper's,RedLines,Mongoose,Haro and Hutch were very popular here. I was always impressed(even as a kid)by the welds on the S.E bikes like the Ripper. Race INC also built a really nice frame/bike. But only the rich kids had the high end bikes the that and the P.K. Us welfare kids had to dream about them at night lol.

I had two Huffy Pro-Thunder's as a kid. They had different models such as Pro-Thunder 1,Pro-Thunder 2,3,4. But they were crap compared to a Mongoose lol.

I still surf some of the old school BMX sites to look at the pics and remember if I had this or that.
Check em out:
BMX Bikes, BMX Bike, List of Vintage and New BMX Bikes
VintageBMX.com
BMX Society

 

[busafan08]

Way cool nice picture

 

[Bobby B]

Haha thats excellent! Being in NY,we would scour the BMX magazines every month to see what all you Cali guys were doing with your bikes. All of the groundbreaking products came from California as it was(still is?) the BMX capitol of the world lol. This was serious business when we were 12yrs old,we needed the lightest bikes and all the latest stuff from Cali.
PowerLite was a very obscure name around here,even some of the most hardcore BMX guys never heard of them. A few of us knew though
PK Ripper's,RedLines,Mongoose,Haro and Hutch were very popular here. I was always impressed(even as a kid)by the welds on the S.E bikes like the Ripper. Race INC also built a really nice frame/bike. But only the rich kids had the high end bikes the that and the P.K. Us welfare kids had to dream about them at night lol.

I had two Huffy Pro-Thunder's as a kid. They had different models such as Pro-Thunder 1,Pro-Thunder 2,3,4. But they were crap compared to a Mongoose lol.

I still surf some of the old school BMX sites to look at the pics and remember if I had this or that.
Check em out:
BMX Bikes, BMX Bike, List of Vintage and New BMX Bikes
VintageBMX.com
BMX Society

Fun Fact: Perry Kramer is Regional rep for "Giant Bicycles" here in So Cal. I worked at Fullerton bikes for a couple of years and we sold Giant Road and MTB's like hot cakes! Perry is still rides balls to the wall! MTB and road! The Guy who owns FB was a Pro racer too and every six months or so all the old school pro's guys would shop up with ramps after hours for little private pizza and beer parties at the shop. And these old dudes were still chopping fat air's on the 1/4 pipesthe brought with them!!!! Guy's Like Stu Thomsen, Woody Itson, and my idol Eddie Fiola!!! just walking around saying hi among'st the all the new bike in the shop! Heaven for me