Weather warnings for snow & adverse wintery condition up here early next week.

Only bike I have had that was prone to rain related ignition cutouts was the CB550F1 I bought after I passed my test - a big step up in performance from a CD175 !

I went down to Cambridge shortly after I got it to visit a school friend who was at university there. Weather was dreadful going down on the A1 & the 550 ran variously on 4, 3, 2 or 1 cylinders depending upon the intensity of the downpour. Life was "interesting" when holding full throttle to try to maintain headway on 1 cylinder when it decided to cut in on all 4 ! Under the tank the area around the coils was like Blackpool illuminations.

A filling station purchase of a can of WD40 helped things a bit, but cause problems later. Coming into Cambridge I opened my visor only to have it flip off never to be seen again - Stadium full face helmet with "press stud" visor attachment. I had a pair of goggles in a pannier, but the top had come off the WD 40 can & the goggles were liberally sprayed with the stuff - not great for visiblity and I couldn't clean them up well enough to use. I ended up riding most of the way home without eye protection - bloodshot red eyes on arrival, to accompany the frozen wet hands (and pretty much everything else) due to 1978 standard inadequate gloves and overgear.

Happy days ?

Nigel B.