wm style cb450

DenverCB450

New Member
here is my brat style/wrench monkeys inspired build

71' CB450
full engine rebuild (twice...stupid bent valves)
cb360 front end and wheels
cb450 frame
3.5 x 18 Firestones front, 4x18 rear
junk yard handlebars
custom seat and grips made by yours truly
CL headers with some extensions
Taillight bracket by NoSchoolChoppers - Denver
Ebay tank awaiting a coat of paint
all custom electronics

it's a pretty fun bike but i'm still working out the kinks. It pulls good all the way until 5 grand then starts missing but only in 4th and 5th gear. I'm guessing it's starving for fuel but I've rejetted and it runs rich at lower RPMs. Any ideas would be much appreciated.

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and a crazy helmet that i've been rocking

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How's the float height? You're sucking a lot of fuel at the top end of the top gears under load.

Nice bike, and awesome lid!
 
Tim said:
How's the float height? You're sucking a lot of fuel at the top end of the top gears under load.

Nice bike, and awesome lid!

I've checked the float height a few times and it should be set at 20mm but the other day the left side carb flooded after a brief ride. I'll pull the carbs again and check thanks for the help.
 
CV carbs are a pain with pod filters, I imagine that might have something to do with the ridability issues.
The flooding.....sticky float or float valve maybe.

Dig the bike and that bucket is wild!
 
hey man,

like the build, tires are a great choice.
kinda the way i would like to go with mine.
any way, have you ran full throttle and pulled the plugs???
see where they are at in color.
also your prob could be ignition timing??? my 175 did this and it ended up being the ignition timing.
do you have a dyna on it. if not might want to get one, i just picked one up for 130 of e-bay, to my door.
for my cb500.

nice build any way, good luck.
later.
 
supercafe said:
hey man,

like the build, tires are a great choice.
kinda the way i would like to go with mine.
any way, have you ran full throttle and pulled the plugs???
see where they are at in color.
also your prob could be ignition timing??? my 175 did this and it ended up being the ignition timing.
do you have a dyna on it. if not might want to get one, i just picked one up for 130 of e-bay, to my door.
for my cb500.

nice build any way, good luck.
later.

i didn't think they made a dyna aftermarket electronic ignition for this model, if so please enlighten me. Is there a version for another bike that can be modified to fit or is it an ebay hunt for some NOS part? thanks
 
There is indeed one that can be fit to the 450/500t. It's for the GL1000, and takes a very minor amount of tweeking to physically fit in place of the points. The GL is a dual channel lost spark setup and when fitted a 450 based lump you get a nice clean reliable pulse to the coils.

Another and less invasive way to get GOOD spark out of that ignition is to use the stock points to trigger Dyna's CDI booster. It's a little black box that's wired between the points and the coils, it's used to supply a beefed up pulse to the coil. If you use the stock points to trigger it, all you have to do is set them so they open. That's it. They pass so little curretn that they basically never (for all intents and purposed) wear out. If your charging system is nice and strong.....few are on these unfortunately....you could also run Dyna's 3ohm coils for a bit hotter spark. I imagine at minimum you'd have to convert your lighting to LED and perhaps HID headlight driver as well to offset the current drain from the beefy coils.

Were it mine, I'd start with the booster, some fresh wires and caps and good plugs.
 
Swagger said:
There is indeed one that can be fit to the 450/500t. It's for the GL1000, and takes a very minor amount of tweeking to physically fit in place of the points. The GL is a dual channel lost spark setup and when fitted a 450 based lump you get a nice clean reliable pulse to the coils.

Another and less invasive way to get GOOD spark out of that ignition is to use the stock points to trigger Dyna's CDI booster. It's a little black box that's wired between the points and the coils, it's used to supply a beefed up pulse to the coil. If you use the stock points to trigger it, all you have to do is set them so they open. That's it. They pass so little curretn that they basically never (for all intents and purposed) wear out. If your charging system is nice and strong.....few are on these unfortunately....you could also run Dyna's 3ohm coils for a bit hotter spark. I imagine at minimum you'd have to convert your lighting to LED and perhaps HID headlight driver as well to offset the current drain from the beefy coils.

Were it mine, I'd start with the booster, some fresh wires and caps and good plugs.

does the booster replace the condenser in the stock wiring diagram or does it run in series? I'm running Mike's XS coils and new NGK cables and a smaller 7amp battery with no electric start. For regulating the voltage I have a ford 12v solid state regulator but I think I fried it the other day so it's just running off the rectifier. So far I haven't had any issues with charging but it's only been on the road for few weeks. I'll look into that CDI booster it seems like a nice addition regardless of the running condition.
 
http://www.dynaonline.com/skins/products/accessories/Dyna_Boosters/

You'll want to get that regulator taken care of sooner rather than later but I'm sure you already know that one.
The booster is essentially in series, run between the points and the coil(s).
 
Thanks for all the kind words, I finally got the lil' beast running right. I had to replace/clean the spark advancer unit and reset the ignition timing. The bike will pull all the way till the redline without missing now. I'm probably going to drop some more cash and go with the Dyna Ignition and some reverse megaphones to really finish it off.

Then the new projects start:
1. CR450 replica
2. 70's style cb500 chopper ;D
 
from a fellow colorado rider, sweet bike and that helmet doesnt fit your bike, but it doesnt matter kuz its awsome!
 
Hot Rod Troy said:
Denver your bike looks awsome, glad to hear it's running right. How do those tires handle?

Tires are ok, I wouldn't put them on anything you want to drag a knee with, but they get me back and forth to work fine. I definitely avoid grooved highways with those Firestones because they like to walk pretty bad. I built the bike to bomb around Denver and as a fun daily commuter so I'm not to worried about the tire performance.
 
earner99 said:
how did you do those grips. Those are awesome.

The grips were actually really easy, all I did was epoxy some thin foam around the bars and wrap it with some thin leather cording I found at Tandy Leather. The cording is held down with some more epoxy and has held up extremely well. I stole the idea from Brooks -->

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those grips retail for $60 or so and I figure I have about $6 of material in my design. The only crappy thing is that I have to cut them off but I could redesign it to make them slip off.
 
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