Armando Barqueiro sent in some cool bikes with some interesting backgrounds.

He wrote in:

Jose Esteves is a Portuguese born Canadian immigrant (like myself) and an absolute motorcycle loon. He loves both 2 and 4 strokes of all kinds but his favorites are 2-stroke cafe or road racers. He road-raced in Angola and South Africa when he was young and continued when he immigrated to Canada. I met him when he stopped beside me while I was riding my cafe RD400 in ’79 and he was on a Honda 750F done up to the max (I later owned that Honda). We started talking and found out that we were both Portuguese and both loved bikes. We both raced here in Quebec, he on an ex Alan Labrosse TZ250 and I on my 77 RD400 and later my ’81 RD350LC.
About a decade later a bunch of us decided to ride on the ice and Jose built a bunch of mini ice bikes for that purpose. Two of those are the yellow mini bikes. The front one is a Kawasaki 65 chassis with a stroked XL125 Honda engine (154cc). I later bought that bike from Jose. The rear one is an XL500 Honda that he minimized by replacing the wheels with 10″ CT70 wheels and a Z50 gas tank as well as a bunch of other changes.
The RD400 was his first race bike in Canada and it then saw a bunch of conversions as he kept modifying it over the years. This picture was its final version.
He had raced a Kawasaki S3 in South Africa and liked it a lot so he bought two H2’s in sad shape here in Montreal and rebuilt them both, one in stock condition and the other as the cafe in the picture. It has cast wheels from a KZ650, Toomey pipes and a bunch of other stuff I don’t even remember. I rode it once and it was very fast. He’s given me permission to post these photos.

Manny ’82 GS1100L/California Sidecar, ’02 GSXR1000, ’86 Fazer, ’92 DR650, ’92 FZR600, ’00 DR400Z, ’00 TTR225

I have an H1 similar to that H2 with the KZ wheels. and that RD is take WAY out there. But those minim ice racers must be a total blast! Thanks for the pics Armando!