Honda CB350 Road Racer Project
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September 2001 - March 2003
I took the first ride, 30th March 2003!
Progress has been 'on again
off again'. Busy with work and family got in the way of any real
progress.
What has been achieved in the many long months (mostly the last
couple of months)??
Pulled the engine AGAIN, stripped it and cleaned all the paint
off the cases. Painted them again in Silver base and 2 Pack
clear. Put it all back together again. Looks a little too shiny
but at least the petrol will not attack it again.
Have settled on a Ducati 250 solo seat - seat with hump and built
in rear guard, number plate mount and space for a small tail
light. Tail light is an accessory item off a trail bike.
Sanded the tank back to bare
metal and plastic (the tank shape is set using body filler and
the seat is fibreglass). After many unsuccessful attempts at
painting I finally had a good red coat applied.
Before painting the red I applied a silver strip up the centre of
the tank, masked it off and applied the red over the whole tank.
Stuffed it up as the thinners got under the edge of the masking
tape and bled into the silver. Left it to dry before sanding it
back for another go. This time it went on fairly well with only a
little bit of furry edges between the red and silver. Sprayed the
first coat of clear and stuffed it up again. Rubbed it back for
the third time. Silver up the middle and red for the main part.
Pulled the masking tape back - furry edges, but not anywhere near
as bad as the first time but now another problem - I didn't get
the strip between the filler and the front of the tank centred.
Nothing for it now - use the silver striping tape to fix up my
poor preparation. You can see the edge between the red and silver
show through the tape but short of rubbing back again it will
have to stay this way. Put the Honda wing decals on the tank and
sprayed the clear coats on. Last coat and got carried away and
put it on too fast - there is a run just near the Honda wing.
Leave well enough alone and let it dry. I will use some 2000 wet
and dry to fix the run. After it was dry, I wet sanded the run
out of the clear. Used cutting compound to hand rub the paint to
see what it will look like. Should be OK at a distance and a
machine compound will give it a lot more shine. Pity about the
silver strip showing the paint edge though. I can live with it
for a while. Had the tank 'creamed' to seal the inside and remove
any contaminations left in the tank.
Sometime earlier I had changed the front mudguard to an all metal
type (in some early photos it is a plastic guard). Made brackets
for the front brake anchors to fit up to the guard mounts and had
the guard brackets extended to fit to the same mounting holes.
Painted the guard and brackets in silver.
Tyres are Dunlop TT100 K81 410/18's on the alloy rims.
December 2002 - transported the bike to Brisbane to have the exhaust made. Settled on a 2 into 1 with baffled reverse cone megaphone. Transac (Mick 07 3206 8354) have been doing pipe for the last 30 years so figured they were a safe bet. Dropped the bike off one weekend and piked it up the next. Would have taken an extra week for chrome pipes but I wanted black to be more in keeping with the race image. Neat little package - fits in nice and tight and I get to keep the centre stand. I need the centre stand as all the other lugs I could use for a side stand have been removed. Made a small bracket to limit the centre stand return travel but still allows it to stop up high enough to be out of the way on corners. Adjusted the height of the front end so bike just sits on the centre stand and takes the weight on the stand. Legs are about 50mm out of the top clamp.
January 2003 - March 2003 - made various
brackets (to mount the fibreglass seat, speedo and tacho …)
Replaced the front light. The bulb holder was made of rubber and
has disintegrated. Found a 5" chrome unit at a swap complete
with mounts but no front glass. Glass from the other light will
fit with a little work. Made the wiring harness and wired up the
control switch, ignition switch, regulator, lights and battery
eliminator. Without the regulator connected, spinning the engine
over gives 16 volts. Suggests that the regulator will not be
doing much work.
Now have a working speedo and tacho - Uses a Suzuki Speedo (to go with the Suzi 4LS wheel), a little tabbed washer that does the actual rotation of the speedo gearbox salvaged from another old 250 Suzuki wheel and Suzi drive cable. The tacho is a matching Suzi unit coupled to the Honda tacho cable.
30th March 2003. The bike is finished except for working out how to do the rear brake light switch. Limited brake rod travel and not many options for mounting the switch so I will leave this problem for another day. Mounted the tank and seat. Fitted new rubber balance pipe under tank and fuel lines to the carbbies. Put a splash of petrol in the tank to check for leaks. Rubber seal in the petrol tap is not holding. Drained the tank (petrol went everywhere of course) and replaced the tap with my only spare. The spare tank has always had petrol in it and kept the seal wet. Guess the other one has gone hard from being dry. Fuel in again and some ether up the inlet ports, give it a prod and she fires - immediately stops when the ether runs out. Use my hand as the choke to block off the air into the velocity stacks and it fires and runs OK. Had to quickly choke it a couple of times but settles down and will idle evenly. Give it a few blips to clear the excess fuel and see if it will pick up cleanly. Let it fast idle for a while to warm up the engine and set the heatproof paint on the exhaust. Lots of smoke off the pipes but nothing out of the breathers or exhaust. Shutdown and check it over for leaks. Nothing for it but go for a ride. Started on the first kick - this is a good sign that once warm it will be an easy starter. Fair bark from the extractors as I let the clutch out and roll down the driveway toward the road. On the road run up to 4th before turning round to come back. Back to the shed for another check over. All seems well with the world. Very short but that was the first run in about 22 years. Motor seems to pick up and rev well. Quite pleased with the run. Spend the next 15 minutes doing laps round the back yard (it's a big back yard). I had set the tappets a little loose and they are a bit rattly. I will reset them and double check the timing before taking it on a longer ride. The only problems to be sorted are the rear brake light switch and getting past the registration requirements.
Postscript to this update:
It is 2 years since I went to the Wolseley National
(2001) and it is that time again. The car behind the bike is my
Wolseley 4/44. In between doing some work on the Honda, I have
been preparing the car - the rally is about 12 hours driving time
south of my home base. Since Janaury I have run up just over
1,000 miles in the car going to events as well as doing 4 HMCCQ
events on the '33 Matchless. Just to make things hard, the HMCCQ
Bunya Rally is the first weekend in May (a 2 day event) which I
am helping set the short leg (60 mile navigation run) and 2 weeks
later I will be off for the week long Wolseley National. Look for
updates on the HMCCQ page of my site for Bunya Mountains Rally photos
and I will put some of the Wolseley National up as well.
Start
| Feb 2001 | March 2001 | April 2001 | May - September 2001 | September 2001 - March 2003
CB350
Engine specs | Final spec's | Detailed photo collection | CYB350's
Electronic mail address
jmiller@brisnet.org.au
Web addresses
http://www.brisnet.org.au/~jmiller/
http://www.brisnet.org.au/~jmiller/honda
http://www.brisnet.org.au/~jmiller/matchless/
http://www.brisnet.org.au/~jmiller/hmccq/
http://www.brisnet.org.au/~jmiller/wolseley/
http://www.wolseley.asn.au/