At age 21, the Prospect Vale father-of-three bought the motorcycle off Pat Haar.

After a few years of unlicensed joy rides, the bike sat in Mr Cuthbertson's garage for 30 years until one day in 2006.

"I got one for something to get around on but I never had a licence or anything, and we got away with it," Mr Cuthbertson, 61, said.

"We spent a lot of time down at Bridgenorth with Malcolm Campbell and played football down there as well so I thought I'd better get a little bike to try and be with them, but you couldn't keep up with them.

"It sat in the shed for 30-odd years and a bloke knew that I had it and came up in 2006 and said that he would buy it off me for what I paid for it.

"I thought 'I don't think so, the bike must be worth something, I reckon'.

"So I rang up Ian Tilley straight away and told him to come and get it and do it up.

"I gave it to Ian Tilley and in six weeks' time, he had done a complete restoration.

"It wasn't so much damaged, it just had sat in work sheds and it was deteriorating with a bit of surface rust.

"It was all reupholstered, repainted, rechromed and it got new lights.

"When Ian had finished with it, he took it down to the Ross Motorcycle Rally and it won the Best Japanese Bike award.

"They have got a picture of it in Yamaha head office in Sydney as they are now scarce as hen's teeth because they were basically a throwaway bike.

"They used to race them ... but they would just end up in the tip.

"They were like the posties', basically, every man and his dog grabbed one because they were cheap, reasonable and fun.

"We weren't sure what it was worth so I took it out to Shannons and said that I wanted to get it insured . . . and they insured it for $10,000.

"It has got to be a nice day for me to get it out and I normally go around the country of Bishopsbourne because top speed is only something like 50 miles an hour with a tailwind.

"I just like the fact that it's survived."