Wayne Rainey was one of Honda's many fabled racers, and along with Bubba Shobert and Fred Merkel netted Honda the AMA Superbike titles from 1984 through 1988. Wayne also rode for Yamaha and Kawasaki and was, in fact, the 500cc World Champion three times (!). But it was the intense track rivalry between Rainey and Kevin Schwantz that made those Superbike races the stuff of legend, and the VFR was the weapon of choice.

Here's an item I don't see come available often. This is a Staintune muffler to fit the 1990-93 VFR750. Staintune is a well-known family-owned brand from Australia that's been in the moto exhaust business for 30 years. Their pipes are manufactured from stainless steel and sure are good-lookin'.

This pipe has been previously used but looks like new. It will bolt right up to the stock system. I don't have any personal experience with the noise level of these pipes, but I'm sure it'll wake up the inner growl of your V4. Hurry, auction ends Wednesday.

Here's a technique I use to help save the upper mounting tabs on the '86-87 side fairings. These two fairings sit below the seat and cover the battery and fuel pump areas. They use two pop-in plastic tabs and a lower Dzus to mount them.

The problem is that the upper tab is always a very tight fit and after 30+ years they will often break off if forced.

Tip: To remove the fairing I always push the tab from behind with a padded tack remover blade levered against the fuel tank while gently pulling from the front side (pictured below, without the tank in place).

My fix is to enlarge the grommet hole, which will allow the grommet to expand, giving a larger space for the tab.

​With the panel removed, I pull out the rubber grommet and use a round file to enlarge the hole by a few millimeters. The round grommet will still fit and the fairing's tab will now slide in and out with much less drama. If it's still tight, I add a bit of grease or greaseless lubricant to the grommets.

(click on an image to enlarge)

I came across this VF750S Sabre build on the interwebs some time ago. I was impressed that someone chose the Sabre platform for this street tracker/cafe racer custom — the bulky V4 with shaft drive can't be easy to convert to a genre that's synonymous with lightness and minimalism, but there's a boatload of CX500 customs out there that belie that point.

I'll have to say our guy pulled it off pretty well. The drivetrain, tank and exhaust are original pieces, but that's about it. Modern upside-down forks, bobbed tail and the change to a proper round headlight are all incorporated pretty well, but the icing on this cake has to be the wire wheels laced up to hubs that were never intended to see spokes. To my eye: The original air shock out back would look better with a traditional coil-over, the kickstand foot should be trimmed, the stock mufflers aren't quite to scale, and I prefer the look of a bobbed front fender, but the great thing about a custom is that there's no rules but your own. Nice work.