Your guide to...
ANY USED IMPORT IS AN UNKNOWN quantity of variable quality. Some need little more than an oil change, a wipe-down, and a battle with the DVLA to get a registration number. My own BSA Starfire was one of those. It’s broken down many times since then, but that’s more to do with it being a late-1960s BSA than anything a transatlantic owner had inflicted. At the other end of the scale are bikes like a mate’s Kawasaki four, bought unseen from a far-away importer. It became a money pit, resulting in a four-year battle to get it to run properly.
The VT500FT Ascot seen here is clearly one of the former, with the benefit of not being built by horny-handed sons of toil in Small Heath with worn-out tools. With just 14,000 miles on the clock, this flat-track (the FT in the name) wannabe has been broken in but barely worn. It doesn’t appear to have been close to a dirt track, let alone a flat one. It’s original, right down to the tool kit, which has sat in its lockable box behind the engine untouched since the Honda rolled out of a showroom in 1983. This will come in handy for a future owner, as it includes a special box-type plug spanner of the correct dimensions to remove the hidden rear cylinder second plug from its cramped
