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Should I? (Flip?)
Posted: Wed May 28, 2014 11:30 pm
by melville
http://humboldt.craigslist.org/mcy/4490434801.html
Hard to tell from the text, but there may be a couple hundred bucks of late registration penalties. Beyond that, how wrong could I go?
Re: Should I? (Flip?)
Posted: Thu May 29, 2014 12:08 am
by Major Softie
GRAB THAT THING!
A 1965 K100 is incredibly rare. In fact, it's probably one of a kind!
On a slightly more practical note: what is a "blowhead?" If that means it has a blown head gasket, you're probably looking at $1000 job done at a dealer. I don't know what the parts will cost, but a safe WAG would be a minimum of $250 in seals and gaskets, and it could be a fair bit more since all those hoses are about 30 years old and you may have to have the head milled. If you're confident about doing such work yourself, and if the mileage is reasonable (like well under 100k), then I'd offer him $500. If it's really high mileage (125k+) AND has the blown head gasket, I think his suggestion of using it for parts is a good one. There's too many of these out there with tight motors. With this one, you're completely guessing about what the actual running condition will be after the head gasket job. Plus, there appears to be damage on the left side of the tank, so there's also a certain possibility of other unknown damage from whatever incident damaged the tank.
If the mileage is low, you can get it for close to $500, and there are no unpleasant surprises, then your sweat equity could get you a pretty cool bike on the cheap. Just keep all those risks in mind, because that can very quickly eat up all the "good deal" factor.
P.S. double check that registration issue too: could be as much as $300 with all the penalties if the second year is late enough. That would be another factor taking it towards a tear-down for parts.