1982 CM450e - City Commuter Cafe

DoTheTodd

Been Around the Block
Hi everybody,

I bought a 1982 CM450e back in September of 2012 and I've been slowly getting it to where I want it. The goal of this bike is to make it reliable and decent looking while not breaking the bank. I'm not looking to "Do The Ton" or tear around mountain roads, I just want a bike that I can get me to class, or meet a friend for lunch.

I love working with my hands, so this is my relaxation and escape from the duties of life. I've been building cars and trucks (mainly old American) since I was in the 1st grade, so I'm not afraid to get my hands dirty, but this is my first motorcycle. I've spoken to a few people on here already and they all agree that while the general concepts are similar, you can't apply a lot of the same ideas from cars to bikes. So with that taken as a challenge to learn some new skills, I picked up a wrench and got to work.

This project wont be fast since I have to find time between a 40+ hr/week job, an MBA program and a girlfriend (they take so much time, but I guess they're worth it, haha), but I'll try to keep this posted and current to the best of my abilities. I'm going to make this bike my own since that's the whole point of building something, but if any of you see something that I'm doing terribly wrong or if you have another idea of how it could be done, please speak up. I want to benefit from your collective knowledge.

Thanks in advance for any guidance that you guys will no doubt provide me with during this process.

Todd
 
I bought the bike for $200. Not running, no title, no records, the guy I bought it from found it in a shed on his property that he bought 6 years ago and just now got around to cleaning it out. I didn't want to do any work until I knew that I could keep/use it, so I had a police friend and another DMV friend run the VIN. When both came back clear, I bought the bike and promptly started the paperwork to get it into my name. After sweet talking the lady at the DMV a bit and pleading my case I was able to get everything in my name for a $40 fee.

After that happened, I went to work on getting it running. One battery, a temporary gas tank made out of a metal water bottle, an oil change and new plugs later and it started up and idled pretty dang well. I could rev it and it would settle very smoothly. There was a valve tick, but I wasn't too concerned about that since I was planning on rebuilding the head anyways. I also shifted the bike into first and it moved on it's own power, but I couldn't go any distance since it was only running on the gas tank (water bottle) which I had attached to the wall.

I don't have any pictures on this computer of the bike running, but I assure you, it was running before it got torn apart.

Here is the picture from the ad on Craigslist:




Here it is after I tore it down and labeled everything as best I could. This also includes the 1974 CL350 gas tank and a 1975 18" CL350 rear wheel to replace the stock 16". Got both of those from ebay.


I also bought a KZ900 tail piece from ebay to use as my seat.
 
I forgot to add this in my last post. This is the bike that is basically inspiring my build. I didn't know where I was going to go with this bike until I saw this picture on another user's build thread. Once I saw this picture I fell in love. Obviously there are differences since this is a CB750 and I wont be copying it directly, but this is the main inspiration for my build.




I knew from the start that I would need to change the the frame since it is just so ugly for a cafe. After figuring out a bunch of measurements and planning, I plugged in the tools and got to work. I cut the tail of the frame off:


Then the part that spreads out from the backbone of the frame, I had plans for this piece:


Which left me with:
 
Right about this point is where I SERIOUSLY considered switching to a bobber build. But I carried on with my original idea. Maybe one day I'll build a bobber. I really do love to look of some of them.


I took that old piece of the frame and welded it back into pretty much the same location, but tilted the angle up so the frame is now flat instead of sloped.


I added some slugs and then started adding some new pieces of steel to get a frame in place:








My neighbor (A Harley guy) helping me and messing with camera while I had my back turned:


Lots of grinding to make things fit correctly:


New frame all set up (NOTE: My welds are terrible. They are simply holding the metal in place. I have a friend who owns a third generation family welding shop from the 1950s. They will be doing my welding. I in no way trust my life to my own welds, haha.):




The shocks are not in place so there is a lot of clearance in this picture. There will not be as much clearance in the final stage, but I will definitely make sure the tire wont touch anything at full compression:


And here is how it sits at the end of that weekend:
 
Lookin' good! Have you thought about shortening the kz tail section just a tad since the 350 tank is on the shorter side?
 
FGKouki said:
Lookin' good! Have you thought about shortening the kz tail section just a tad since the 350 tank is on the shorter side?

Yea, I'm planning on messing around with the tail piece when I get to that stage. I haven't quite nailed down how I want it, but it will definitely be shorter.
 
That's looking pretty great so far. With that tank and tail section you've got a great start to a badass flat tracker. Throw some Renthals on that beast and ride it like you stole it!
 
The forks felt pretty spongey and since I didn't know the history, I decided to rebuild them.



I wanted to lower and stiffen the front a bit, so when I rebuilt the forks I chopped a little bit off the spring and added in a spacer.


The spacer is a bit longer than the portion that I cut off of the spring, which according to my research, should stiffen them up a tad. They were a bitch to get the top bolt on like this though.
 
The engine ran pretty well, but I wanted to fix the valve tick and replace the 31 year old gaskets, so while it was out of the bike I tossed it up on the workbench and started the process.


Valve cover off:


Labeling everything and using carboard templates to keep it all organized so there won't be any "Extra bolts" at the end of this.


Everything was cleaned up a bit and then I took the jugs and head to my machine shop to start the rebuild. I don't have the tools to do it properly and I'd really prefer to just do it once and be done with it, so I'm fine spending the extra money and having a shop do this part.


Surprisingly for a 31 year old engine, only one bolt broke in the whole teardown process. Unfortunately, that bolt was a head bolt. So in an attempt not to screw anything up worse than it already is, I gave the block to the machine shop too and asked them to get the broken bolt out.


And that is where I'm at now. Waiting for the machine shop to get my top end finished. I'll be working a bit more on the frame this weekend in an attempt to get that ready for my welder friend to finish that up. Then I can mate the two up and start moving forward. One last shot of where the bike is currently at, including the lowered forks:
 
fresh_c said:
That's looking pretty great so far. With that tank and tail section you've got a great start to a badass flat tracker. Throw some Renthals on that beast and ride it like you stole it!

Much like the idea for building a bobber, I would love to build a tracker as well. I was having a lot of back and forth between a tracker and a cafe when I was planning this build, but like I said, after seeing that inspiration picture of the CB750, I decided to go the cafe route. I love going through tracker builds, and that very well may be my next build.
 
fresh_c said:
That's looking pretty great so far. With that tank and tail section you've got a great start to a badass flat tracker. Throw some Renthals on that beast and ride it like you stole it!

I just checked out your build thread and I didn't realize that you were the one who is building that bike. I've been following your build for quite a while now, I'm glad to be in good company. I really love how the seat came out by the way. Good fiberglass work, and the seat pad I pretty much exactly what I want to do on mine, so I may have some questions for you when I get to that stage.
 
DoTheTodd said:
I just checked out your build thread and I didn't realize that you were the one who is building that bike. I've been following your build for quite a while now, I'm glad to be in good company. I really love how the seat came out by the way. Good fiberglass work, and the seat pad I pretty much exactly what I want to do on mine, so I may have some questions for you when I get to that stage.

Thanks, it is definitely turning out better than I thought it would. I had a some experience with fiberglass from before I started the bike, but I really kinda jumped in on the tail. Only after working with the fiberglass did I realize it was much simpler than trying to use the actual KZ750 tail I had. There is another project that is taking up my garage right now, but once I get to a stopping point with it, I'll finish up my ride. Keep up the good work and keep the pictures coming!
 
fresh_c said:
Thanks, it is definitely turning out better than I thought it would. I had a some experience with fiberglass from before I started the bike, but I really kinda jumped in on the tail. Only after working with the fiberglass did I realize it was much simpler than trying to use the actual KZ750 tail I had. There is another project that is taking up my garage right now, but once I get to a stopping point with it, I'll finish up my ride. Keep up the good work and keep the pictures coming!

Off topic, but is your profile picture a mascot?
 
Like where this one is headed,if you go with pods n a more open exhaust feel free to hit me up if you need help with the tune.
 
Junior Burrell said:
Like where this one is headed,if you go with pods n a more open exhaust feel free to hit me up if you need help with the tune.

I'm planning on going with Unifilters on mikunis and some kind of short exhaust. I'll definitely use your guidance when I get to that stage though. Thanks for the offer.
 
I need an opinion on shock angle. I understand that the shocks need to have vertical travel to work correctly, so you can't have them at too shallow of an angle, but is there an issue with having them straight up and down? When I built the rear of my frame, I changed an angle at the last minute, and it caused my upper shock mounting location to move a little bit backwards, which straightened the angle. Now my shocks are straight up and down and I'd like to know if there will be an issue with this before I get them all welded in and mounted.

Here is the angle that I'm currently working with. (Note: these shocks are the stock 12.5", I will most likely be getting 13.5" shocks to give a little bit more tire clearance, that shouldn't affect the angle much though.)
 
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