Stolen bike :(

Hey guys,
So its been awhile since I've been on here, and even longer since I've been able to ride due to my family growing an extra member, and this may be a long shot but I figured... why not?
So about 2 years ago I took my 650 to a friends house after a ride and I figured since i had no place to store it for the winter that i could store it there instead. He said no problem and i thought everything would be cool so i gave him the key and i left. Now, this is partly my fault as i had to move to the west coast for awhile but since he didn't mind keeping it there i said why not.

Fast forward to a year later, i try to give him a call (it was a good while before i had talked to him) and the number is dead. Maybe he changed his number? Well, after i ask around, I find out he's in jail and he's been there for a long time. I then got in contact with his girlfriend at the time who told she doesn't know what happened to all of his stuff (including my bike) and they broke up before it went down.
So basically, someone got a good deal on my bike and presumably anything else they could grab. I had asked my friend about it and if maybe he sold it needing money or something but he swears he has no idea what happened.

Now i know this is a long shot and its possibly chopped up or a thousand miles away, but if anyone could help me out with advice on the best strategy here or info on a shady craigslist ad, i would be forever grateful.
I've personally checked on my local craigslist for a couple months but haven't found anything and put a word in at the police station. I know its my fault but i really didn't see all of this coming and lost my first bike

Sorry for the novel, but just wanted to give some details and vent a little i guess.
I'm located in the Pittsburgh area so anyone here (or surrounding areas cities/states) please let me know if you see this bike anywhere! I know she was ugly, but she was my first bike and i miss that thing


P.S. a few extra details, As you can see from the photos, there is a large softball sized dent in the gas tank. Also there was a problem with the gear selector, it was loose and sometimes gave me trouble getting it into gear.
Here are some pics of it for the curious:

Like i said any help/advice would be greatly Appreciated ! Thanks guys

 

Sorry i guess i cant post the imgur link..

 

Contact the PD in that town, and your insurance company. Tell them the whole story. Odds are that the bike is in the same town, and in one peice.

 

I'm east of Pitts. try to send some pics someway, i'll keep an eye out, till u send pics, how about a decription, ie...yr. size, color ?

 

k-moe, thanks ill be doing that in the morning. i told my local PD, but that might be a good idea informing the PD of the town it happened in. Maybe they will spot it being driven or something

wagy, do you know the rules on posting a link to imgur here? it keeps booting me when i try to post it...

 

Also, a little about the bike:
Black 1980 XJ650 with the tail sawed off to be a bobber
When i owned it, the gas tank had a softball size dent to the left of the gas lid (which was broken and wouldn't lock)
The seat was a spring seat that was horribly welded to a piece of scrap metal then held securely to the bike via hose clamp

 

looks like there might be a minimum amount of posts before i can post outside links so excuse this one

 

Here are the photos guys:
http://imgur.com/a/PP6II

 

if you report the bike stolen and can supply the vin if it is registered it will turn up.

on the flip side did your friend have all your addresses as you moved?

it may be that he took it it through the abandonment, it was only for the winter or his landlord did in my state if you leave property for 7 days after you move out it belongs to me, some states it is 30 days.

if it was towed away the towing company can claim ownership after a time period of that state.

you may find it but never get it back.

 

well I told to give me a call if there were any problems and since I didn't hear from him I assumed it was all good.
I'm not 100% on this but I believe here in PA, the process for claiming abandoned vehicles takes and extremely long time and its a pretty confusing, complicated process. I tried to do that one time for an old truck I bought without a title but the process was so excruciating that I just gave up and sold it as is

 

Well, it seems like you waited a long time to say anything.... And I still don't get why you didn't report it------but I digress.......

I DO get that you miss the bike, but fwiw, 650 maxims are quite plentiful, and you can easily find a replacement quicker and easier than finding your old bike. You know what you had done to it, so you can re- do it again. Just think......someone else has to deal with all the problems with that bike----all the ones you hadn't fixed yet. Lol

 

hog,
I had reported it, just not in THAT town and haven't heard anything about it since. Just figured I might put it out on here as a hail mary in case someone sees something. Also, I'm looking into buying a 2014 bolt here soon so I guess its just the principle of it. As for the problems, they were my problems to fix. not anyone else!

 

well best of luck and keep looking for it through the Police dept.

my brother had his 67 mustang stolen from his work place car turned up in next state. person had put new rear end in it fantastic stereo jacked it up L60"s on the rear brand new crager ss rims
repainted .
busted at vin check
he got it all when the car was returned
well worth the reporting of a $600 car

 

Oh, ok

 

Hey mano, I get what your saying, yours to fix and just the point of it and just a hail mary attempt. I actually really like the looks of your bobber, usually not my style.
Again you are right about PA being really tough about lost titles, which means your bike is rarely going to be registered again in this state. Sadly that leaves the worth of your bike being a parts bike or here in western PA , maybe a hill climber (LOL) . I had a quad lifted right out of my yard about a yr ago, had the vin and PD report and was gone for good. Now that was a quad, but the point is that you are better off searching the Craig List and Traders Guide papers for parts , I doubt it went too far. I do a lot off horse trading and get around a lot of rural hill billy mechanics, Get me your specific town and I'll keep a eye out for you, best town to look is where his buddies that he was hanging with when he went down. And in more cases than not, his girlfriend knows more than she;s letting on (just saying ? ), Good Luck and let me know

 

wagy
I hear you on that, I had nice utility quad taken from my yard years back and never saw it again. And you're right, in this state, I doubt that anyone would be ballsy enough to attempt to register a (possibly) stolen bike but who knows? I've seen a lot of people driving them around illegally (no title/plates) and somehow never get caught. But yeah it probably got parted or scrapped or something but ill throw out the line anyways
It happened down south of Pittsburgh near Smithfield/Morgantown area, and I'm currently out near the Monroeville area so if you can keep an eye out that would be awesome!
Also, thanks on the compliment! it was definitely a more ratty type bobber than a show piece lol. That temporary seat on there was scary! Cant beat those American made hose clamps!

 

Oh wow, well that's awesome he got it back! Hopefully he was a fan of the free mods ha ha

 

manohman, I'm on Craigslist a lot looking at bikes. I live in Akron, Ohio and there are a lot of bikes on there from the PA. area. Even Pittsburgh. Youngstown Craigslist has a lot of PA. stuff too. And I'm stunned at the amount of bikes for sale with no title. If someone stole the bike they could be parting it out. If you wanted to give out the vin number I could check out some of those untitled bikes when I came across some. Give us a full description of the bike.

I knew a guy who's old Ironhead was stolen many years ago from Akron. About 7 years later he gets a call from the New York City police department saying they found what was left of his old bike. Cops told him it wasn't worth the trip to come get it. He didn't care if it was just the muffler, he wanted what was left, back. When he got there he found someone had custom painted, chromed, extended the forks, forward controls and put ape hangers on it. Not my style but He loved it. He thought it was way better than when it was stolen. Apparently someone in the police department liked it also and wanted him to write it off. Choppers were in back in the 70s. So if you don't find it right away maybe YOU will have a similar happy ending. LOL.

 

CactusJack, ill pm you the vin now.
And I feel the same way, even if the motor is gone, I would love to have whatever is left back

 

OFF Topic..Manohman, when you get that Volt let us know how you liked it. Or me at least. I'm a big Sportster fan myself and that Volt gets the juices flowing. There is only one Yamaha dealer near me and I don't deal with them anymore and never Googled any others to go look at one. I've never seen a Volt up close. My forum etiquette and puter skills are very lacking so if I'm out of line with this reply I apologize to those of class and culture.

 

It used to be in Ohio that you could look up a vehicles VIN in the public records of the BMV in Columbus and find the last known registered owner of your title-less bike. But like everything else in this world when you have a good thing someone takes advantage of it and abuses until it's taken away. After 10 years if a motorcycle wasn't registered the records were tossed. Now with puters they can go all the way back to when a 35 year old bike was purchased new and who every registered owner was after but won't tell you who the last registered owner is or help you contact them to get a new title. Seems to me if they let you do a little investigation you could find out what happened and re-register another vehicle and the state can make more money. But then if you are buying $500 35 year old bikes instead of a new $15 to $20,000 bike the state isn't making as much. Everything is about money.

 

cactus, ill definitely let you know about it when I get it. I have my eye on a couple 2014s and I recently found a youtuber with a bolt who replaced with rear fender with an aftermarket shorty one. it looks awesome so that's probably what ill do first. looks like this for those interested : http://www.starmotorcycles.com/asse...es/botb-west-side_1024_635488924378954000.jpg

 

Hey Cactus, if you offended everyone here without class and culture, you would be posting to yourself (LOL)

 

That's a cool custom Volt, manohman. As much as I like the looks of minimal fenders though, I gotta have real fenders. Except for our last 2 dry summers, Akron isn't know for it's sunny days and I don't wait for them. If I did I wouldn't ride much. A while back it seemed the only time I was riding was when it was raining. It was so bad I went out and bought rain tires.

 

I hear you there. But if you notice the pics of my XJ, there wasn't even a back fender on there. I learned that riding in the rain my back will be soaked. The worst was snow though. That makes for a very, very cold ride. But the cool thing about that fender is that it is a direct bolt on. So basically you unbolt the stock seat and fender, then just bolt the bob seat and shorty fender on. Bam. Best of both worlds!

 

Is that a bike you currently own or is that an old pic of the stolen bike? I like the looks of it but it's not practical for me. I go too far to ride soaked. I'm shivering even thinking about it. And there's no place to put a luggage rack or to throw a set of bags over. But my biggest fear of riding a bike with no rear fender is hitting a bump that knocks me back on the rear tire at 60 mph. The thought of that makes me cringe. Yeah, I'll stay with fenders.

 

That's the stolen one. Also not being able to have any bags on it DID suck. But I mostly used a backpack or something like that and since I never really used it for anything other than my 15 min commute to work, it was all I really needed at the time.
I don't think i'd do it exactly the same if I had to again because when my car broke down during a snow storm, running back and forth to the auto parts store on that thing was a disaster ha ha especially strapping a gas can to your back

 

Oh Man! That sounds miserable. LOL! The way I learned to love fenders was when I was about 17 and had a Kawasaki enduro that I loved the looks of with the fenders off. One morning I jumped up got on the bike and rode up the street to some woods where I used to ride. It was mid autumn, the leaves were turning, the trees were beautiful and lining the very edge of the narrow path. I was in Heaven. I was flying around a corner in the trail, small tree limbs slapping my arms and face shield with bright colored leaves, when I saw a pile of fresh dog crap right smack dab in the middle of my path. I was going too fast to stop in time and there was no room to go around without hitting bigger tree limbs or trees so I tried to straddle the poop by aiming the front tire to the right side of the trail and power sliding the rear tire to the left. I thought I was going to clear it but then I caught the very edge of the pile of dog poop. It was awful. The front wheel flung the poop in a perfectly straight dotted line up the front of my denim jacket to my neck up my chin and over and up my face shield. I had to stare through the dog poop on my way back home. But the worse part of it all was the wheel managed to throw a couple of dollops of dog poop right on my bottom lip. Just a hairs width from where your lips part. All I kept thinking was Don't open your mouth, don't open your mouth. Thank GAWD my mouth was closed when I hit that pile. Plus, the line on my face shield reminded me what exactly was on my bottom lip. As if I needed a reminder. Anyway, I got home, cleaned myself up then the bike. Then I put those fenders right back on and I have loved fenders ever since.

 

That ^^^ was hilarious! Thanks for sharing.

 

LOL, that was good.

 

That was a big dog or that wasn't dog poop.

Gary H.

 

A little dog poop can go a long way.........I have little dogs, I know------

 

Oh, i know too. I was jj. Lol.

Gary H.

 

Thanks man, that poop ride gave me a laugh for the day !

 

Getting shit faced has a whole new meaning. Still want to puke after that one or the other.