Oh – yawn – just another 1970s stroker trail bike you say… wrong! Yes, so it might look like just about any other Suzuki dual-purpose machine of the period, but this one is a little different if you care to delve deeper.
Our bike in camera rather disproves the old adage: if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and moves like a duck it has to be a duck. It may look like a TS185, sound like a TS185, and certainly moves like a TS185, but it isn’t a TS185. Low and behold it’s a TC185! A what? Yes, precisely!
Without doubt much of what’s visible seems to be very much TS sourced but, as is the way of these things, the devil is in the detail. Look carefully at the left-hand side of the pistonported motor and you’ll spot a strange lever arrangement. This has a pair of cleated plates rather like a brake pedal at either end and is attached to a shaft that disappears into the bowels of the engine cases. And, perhaps rather confusingly, there’s an ordinary gear lever just a few inches below it – so what is going on here? Welcome to
