Great start Dave! And yes, another work of art by Lance.

The bike is looking gorgeous! Seriously. If we do up a calendar, that will likely end up somewhere in it

Had to smile at this one. The first real motorcycle I had was a bright red YDS-2. I was never positive whether it was 2 or 3, but the picture in the advertisement is the one. I suspect that the 3 was the scrambler version that I think they called the "Big Bear" Only problem was the bike was too fast and I was too dumb. Wrecked it on a mountain road above Berkley. Thanks for the memories.

Time to make some progress on the Ascot project.....

DVM, myself and Lbrandy helped me breakdown the Ascot to just the frame....as
all the red parts need to go to Lance to be painted with the same red paint Lance used on the gas tank.



and believe it or not we got rain here in So Cal today.....

And yesterday we had cars burning on the interstate !!

Pics of the lovely Yamaha twin motor coming tomorrow...

I am really excited to get this project rolling

now the turbocharged CT is on the backburner for now.

The first one was in 1960 and did come to the U.S. Frank Cooper was bringing them in.
I am restoring one of these now.
That rear fender you have is from a YDS 1 as I think they were the only ones that had the tube fender stays.
I need those stays if you don't use them.
I may have extra kit carbs for your but I will have to look, I thought they were 22mm

1Patk thanks for your post.

I do see the fender rear stays in the ad you posted



I saw a recent photo of a Grand Prix Scrambler it was at Tom White's M/C museum....

I will see if I can locate it.. parts are so scarce for these bikes I am looking for some items maybe you can help?

The rear fender stays will not be going on the Ascot....so I am sure we can work something out?

Send me an email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. and we can discuss our projects further.

More detail of how the Ascot should look.....no rear stays



I am not real knowledgeable on the real early Yamaha's...

Here's the photo I was referring to.....

A 1960 Catalina 250 Scrambler as per the brochure ?


Here's a cool YDS1R ....


It is intersting checking out these old YDS Yamaha's

And a 1960 YDS1 ....similar to what your restoring ?



As per the brochure "Grand Prix Sports Twin"

Here is a yds1 scrambler from the Yamaha literature.
The Cooper ad talks about a magneto ignition which does away with the battery and all the crap under the seat.
Also the Cooper ad says they came with a 19" front wheel.
We don't know if these mods were done at Frank Coopers's request or were running changes by the factory, my bike has both the 19 and the mag.

I would LOVE to find one of those with those mods in place! Seriously cool!