1965 Honda Superhawk Restoration

Another bike
More money



I traded this bike for a powdercoating oven. I was told it was restored several years ago. I would guess maybe 5ish years and then it sat neglected. The previous owner drained all the fluids of the bike while it sat in his " makeshift garage " it's obvious that moisture was dripping on the bike and all over the raw polished aluminum.

I plan on restoring this bike better then new. I want to have the chrome restored on the side of the tank. It looks good in pictures, however in person it shows it's 50 year old age with some dings, and some pitting.

The paint on the bike looks like it was restored to " factoryish " condition with the matte silver on the fenders and the air filter covers. However I will be changing that.

My plan is paint the bike gloss black, chrome and gold plated accents.

Such as the headlight bezel will be gold plated etc.

First things first, some of the mechanics of the bike will need to be addressed.

This weekend, I plan on giving her a big cleaning , new points , and tightening & adjusting of the cables etc

Dig these bikes (and want one); I'm in.

Had on of these at the shop this week! He had broken the Kick start pawl (cow kicking it). Had it out for a spin before he took it home...what a sweet little machine! Congratulations on getting it, you're gonna love it...everybody should have at least one!

That's a nice clean very late model with alloy fork sliders and seat with a bump at the front. It even has the right Euro bars and mirrors and the lift handle. Great find. My first resto was a CB77 way back in the seventies and have done a few of them. Last one was a 260cc CB72. Great little bikes.

Will be money well spent....or just clean it up and ride it a bit before you start the better than new restore.

Thanks guys.

Well I gave her a nice once over this weekend.

Took the headlamp bucket apart to correct some wiring.

I followed the diagram to the tee, and found that I was missing a ground... The speedocable, and tach cable are metal... Without them installed none of the lights work lol. Funny how the wiring diagram I found on Honda305 doesn't mention that nor could I find any literature on it, but regardless I think I'm going to add another ground. The Speedo and Headlight ground to each other, and then ground against the frame. So all the wiring is now fixed in there, the harness is completely original had lots of repairs on it... I traced to weak old repairs and spliced in new repairs and extended the wiring a tad.

I took apart the throttle cable, and fixed the upper part. Soldered in a new tip, adjusted it, and works perfectly... Took a stroll over to my local bike shop, asked for air filters.. He actually had NOS HONDA air filters still in the box. He also gave me some tank badges he had in his collection.





So that saved me from buying aftermarket ones online.





I started to clean up the bike little by little... Mostly was concerned with the wiring didn't really spend much time cleaning but... You can see from the previous restoration the bike had, someone polished all the fins on the bike... So I plan to clean those up again, and repolish them. This side is the dirty bad side... This muffler has some bad rust pitting, and yellowing... The other side however is gorgeous.


This side cleaned up very nice with just some never dull.

You can see the pegs that were sandblasted, and looks like they were never powdercoated, or painted? So I plan to coat them so they don't look like crap like they currently do.



Things planned for next weekend are the following.

Carb Rebuild + Gaskets + O rings.
Petcock Rebuild
New Tach Cable
New Speedo Cable.
New Cluster gasket.
New Neutral Switch , old one is rusted, and finicky only works sometimes.
New polish case screws and hardware.
BIG CLEAN, the front of the exhaust has a tiny bit of surface rust on it, I can't wait to clean it up. It's really bugging me.
I'm sure there's other things, I just spent 230 dollars at classichondarestoration.com lol

I'm still looking for a chromer.. I want to have the gas tank trim rechromed, and the left side muffler... As it has some bad pitting on it these are original to the bike. So I kind of don't want to put reproduction pipes on it. Anyone have any recommendations for a chromer? Thank you

Footpegs and mounting bolts were originally Zinc plated (or maybe they were cadmium ?). They are easy to re-plate and not too expensive. I get it done locally in Illinois. You probably have a local plater that can do it.

Yeah I might just powdercoat them or paint them gloss black. IMO I think they might look better that way.

Trying to find the paint code for the Silver now.

Cool bike.
I have always wanted one.

Forgot to update this...

I started repolishing the stator cover

It looks okay, not as good as I had hoped, there's faint tiny scratches still in it. I might 400 , 600 , 800 and 1,000 it.



You can see the fins will polish up really nice on the motor, I started polishing them with a little dremel wheel after I took this picture.


I wanted to at least get the carbs cleaned and painted, but progress is progress.

Also looking for a Silver that matches to what is on this bike currently. I might just respray all the silver trim, base/clear.

On a positive note took my Scirocco out for a ride on Sunday to a local carshow.


My Scirocco on the left, and a Henry J on the right

*Yesterday*









Painted & Rebuilt the carbs

Sandblasted, and refinished the kickstart cover as well as the right side starter cover.

Refinished the footpegs in gloss black.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to two tone the engine. Bottom gloss black with polished fins.



I'm sure you guys have seen this bike, but I love it. I love the motor and front wheels. Where can I find them?


Condition of my current exhaust.
My debate now.
Rechrome? 125 + shipping so prob 225ish
Thai replicas ?
Or Emgo dunstalls?

That super hawk belongs to member Vince Lupo. Shoot him a PM.

Vince posts regularly over on the 305 site.

I believe those "bacon slicer" front brake scoops are hyper rare and impossible to find. Pretty cool, though, but probably not much function to them.

The Taiwanese replicas are pretty decent for the price..if you fit Dunstalls you will need to wear earplugs; they don't do much for muffling a Japanese bike.

Thanks for the responses guys, I was able to get in touch with Vince. He says his exhausts are unbearable for everyone else who rides behind him.

I've got a local bike shop he's an older dude in his 70s. I'm going to stop in there tomorrow when he's open, and see if he has anything.

Waiting for the neutral switch to ship.

Been trying to find a reasonable priced CYP seat, but I've been eyeballing this seat from dimecity.



So waiting for my tank chromes to come back from the chromers.
and Still deciding what to do for exhausts, and maybe changing the seat.

I REALLY want to paint the fenders and side covers gloss black with a gold pinstripe... I might save that for my R60/5 project.

Those little Helix universal mufflers might make a good choice?

http://www.bikebandit.com/aftermarket-parts/motorcycle-engine-and-exhaust/exhaust-accessories-universal/helix-universal-muffler?m=151929

Well bikes in pieces

I wasn't to fond of this finish, the poor rattle can job was starting to show. Not going to fly with me.





Everything was sand blasted, stripped completely of all material that was on them. I then blew then clean, scuffed with a scuff pad to take the excess media off the parts. Then cleaned them very well with prepsol.


After they were cleaned, they were coated with two coats of PPG Epoxy primer. Then there's a few minor dents I'll then correct, and then prime with high build grey primer.




Installed the kickstart cover, adjusted the clutch cable. Pretty happy with how that came out.

I'm pretty sure now after this weekend I've decided to go with the reproduction CYP racing seat not the dime city seat I posted above.


I like these, however I like these better.

Only problem with them is they are 1 3/8 and to make them work I'd need to clamp on top of the header pipe.

Things I need to purchase this week, new brake switch, and a front brake cable the soldered end just fell off. I might just resolder it, I'll look up how much a cable is first and then decide.

Sent my mufflers out to California to get chromed.
In the mean time... Got some things finished on the bike.











Painted the parts couple of tiny dirt knibs I'll polish out, but other then that I'm happy with my color.


Started polishing the hubs, still have a lot of work to do with them.

Nice work!

Thank you

So after a week in transit my exhaust arrived in Cali the chromer, only for him to tell me he can't do them. 110 in shipping :-/ He did say they could strip the chrome, and high polish the steel. Only down side is I would have to ceramic clear it. I'm kind of up in the air on what to do, if I should do that since it's there, or just ship it back and leave it half chrome, half dull yellow rust pitted.