Having now stripped 5 ARs (4 for restoration and 1 for spare parts), they all had severe cracking of the frames where the side stand mounting bracket is welded on. It must be due to the height of the seats that they crack, looks like most owners stand on the footrests when kicking them over stressing the sidestands. If you look closely at the assembled bikes they look fine, but as soon as they were stripped and you looked behind the brackets they were badly cracked, the last one that I stripped today is an absolute gem, the bracket is nearly ripped out of the frame, but looked fine at first glance.

They all weld up (after realignment) with the Tig welder before powder coating, but the frame is very thin and corrodes where it is cracked so it makes the job a little more difficult.

For the record not one of the bikes had serviceable steering head, swingarm, suspension lever or wheel bearings, every single bearing was corroded and had to be replaced due to lack of grease, seeing how its such a simple job to grease them all (I reckon an hour maximum for all bearings including steering head) its amazing how they are neglected.

More money must be spent on sticker kits than servicing.........................

You're absolutely right Mark .

Many owners of CRMs don't service them until something serious breaks. They will fit cosmetic things and run sky high replacement shocks with incorrect damping and springing, but they are not aware/too lazy to replace worn suspension bearings etc. This goes back to two types of owners - Old Codgers and Young Turks, as was discussed some years ago. Very many owners fall under the term 'Young Turks' as they want the look and theoretical ability of an 'off roader'. They buy them cheap and don't have the knowledge and/or money to service them properly. To some extent the problem is made worse by CRMs being grey imports and the difficulty of getting hold of parts manuals (unless you use this forum ).

Broken sidestand mounts are just ignorance and laziness..............

I'd best check my mk2 :/