"Hot Henkie" in the workshop

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Purchasing classics there

Promoting a motorcycle as 'the ideal platform for your smartphone'. A tester who reports with dry eyes that a motor with an output of about 200 (!) HP, thanks to a lot of electronics, simply blows away without wheelspin and wheelie if you simply let go of the clutch lever at full throttle in his one ...

To drive away smoothly without the engine 'climbing in the chain' - good Dutch from the time of the Kawasaki 500 cc three-cylinder, when the idea of ​​a 'wheely' was not yet born - you don't need any baking power. With a Honda C90S out, grab it from 1965, it works fine too.

If you have your recent BMW serviced at a BMW dealer, it will cost you around € 100 ex VAT. And that price can also be defended. If you only look at an expensive building at an A1 location, the required investment in electronic measurement tests and the training days of the engineers.

That used to be .... Different

I used to live in the same village where Henk van der Wal did his blessed work. Henk was in his mid-XNUMXs, a talented motorcycle mechanic. RECOVERY: Henk was a municipal official who had settled comfortably into the sickness law since time immemorial. Around five o'clock, after dinner and after no more GAK inspectors were on the road, his incredibly heavy back problems and he dived into his spacious key room. The local motorcycle heroes and some dreamy moped riders of about sixteen-seventeen years old gathered there. These days, such a location would be called a "mancave." But that bad term did not yet exist. Henk worked on all brands. He just gave turns, but also did serious repair and overhaul work. Henk was a somewhat short, fat man. And he was completely sexually obsessed. He was the only person I ever experienced who thought of sex in everything he did. And he happily shared his thoughts with his audience. He was married to a small, set, always angry-looking woman.

Hot Henkie

When the conversation got him going, he got sweat on his forehead and said: "Uncle Henk has to go away now". But he did a good job at a competitive rate. Behind the shed were a couple of motorcycles that had never been collected for some reason. A Simsom BMW clone and a Norton 88. The Norton owner couldn't afford the last repair because he had to get married. Marriage had to do with sex, so the Norton - "What's the deal between a Norton and a woman?" "You keep riding it!" - stood there without papers and without an address. My grandmother had two cops in the room. And because life was still clear at the time, one of those officers checked the license plate of the Norton for me. The owner lived with his mother. In a desolate working-class neighborhood. His wife and baby also lived there. I bought the Norton papers for 25 guilders. And the Norton for 75 guilders.

In the meantime, a smart younger customer had discovered that Henks already got sharp pricing even sharper when he once took his girlfriend to the key loft.

It was at the time that mini skirts were still very fashionable. A heated Henk dropped a spanner and said: “If you pick up that key, it costs the turn Triumph nothing." He choked on the idea of ​​'a turn'. But he had made a mistake. The wrench lay on the floor between them. Henk had dreamed otherwise, but the young lady leaned smoothly from her waist, took the key and handed it to a bewildered Henk, who so missed his dream view.

The two motorcyclists who stood behind the girl kindly alerted him and shouted, "She's not wearing a slip!"

Henk furiously threw the open-ended key at the reporter of that message and was literally shivering with frustration. “View it all but your rotten talk and rotten motorcycles! Lazer up! I will stop! ”He switched off the garage lighting and went inside steamingly. We turned on the light again and decided that the five of us were able to put the primary chain guard back on Triumph to put. The Triumph owner and his briefly smoked girlfriend got out and drove away. The rest of the club decided to have a beer with Ome Harry. It all worked out well. But Henk remained incorrigible. When a female customer had driven into the Vecht with her Honda, he received the drowning man for repair. While the engine was put back in order, Henk could not figure out how 'wet' his driver must have been.

In the meantime, as classic enthusiasts, we still do things outside of the apparently current modern garage rate. In our circles, for things that we cannot charge ourselves, we charge between twenty and forty euros per hour. But it is amazing what you can do yourself with the help of your comrades and YouTube.

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3 comments

  1. Dolf, you have forgotten a ZERO in the part that costs a turn at BMW
    "Then it will cost you about € 1000 ex VAT"

    And that is only the service turn, because there is always some electronics broken somewhere, such as a tire pressure sensor for € 400 (from experience).

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