1972 Honda CB450 Cafe/Brat inspired build

Just a little update just to keep a record of the million year rebuild.

Had the motor cases split, checked all the internals and everything looked fine. Blasted the outside of both cases, refinished the matting surfaces, polished the races, reinstalled all the necessary components and put the cases back together with a new cam chain in place. Right now it sits waiting for me to fit the piston rings to the cylinders before reinstalling them and then putting the head back together.



If anyone is actually looking at this anymore, and you verify the following: the manual I have downloaded says the Top Ring (second) gap should be between 0.3-0.5mm and the oil ring should be between 0.2-0.4mm. (My cylinders, pistons, and rings are all 0.75 oversize)

With a complete tear down like I have, what is the next step y'all normally take? Electrical? I feel like my next course of action would be to get the bike put together with just the essentials to test out the motor and make sure that the rebuild was successful.

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In other news, we've added a running (thank god) '73 CB125S to the family for my wife's first bike. I can already tell that this thing is going to be outgrown quickly. Anyone know anything about these and how to get a little more muster out of it? Looks like it tops out around 55 mph right now. Still needs a good bit of work, especially with the throttle and all the cables, but it runs so thats good.

If that is what the "Honda" shop manual says for the ring gap then you are gold, been a long time since I have looked. You still have a long way to go to worry too much about other things. Make sure ALL the cam chain rollers are in good shape because you don't want to build a new engine around crap rollers, they will trash themselves and the chain and the valves. If need be source new or at least good looking used ones. Getting that cam chain together will cause much cussing and swearing to get together. Have some gasket material on hand as well for the cam bearings. Some of the newer gasket kits are too thin and will make it hard to get the correct clearance on the cams. You'll know what I mean when you bolt things together and it won't turn.

As far as what next, get the body work done, get the suspension rebuilt brakes rebuilt if you haven't. Electrical for me is usually the last big project before I tear things back down for paint. You can bench run the engine if you really need to hear it run.

If you want that cb125 to haul ass find a Chinese dirt bike with a 200cc engine and swap it out. Once you have it running well sell the 125 motor and get your money back. Free power

Hello World.

I'm not going to keep making excuses, shit takes time. Moved again and with everything else, the 450 took the back seat.

I started wrenching on the 125 in order to make it reliably ridable, and it's given me a resurgence of need to finish the 450. It's gonna take time, and its gonna take a shitload of money. I plan on making this thing as up to date as I possibly can. M-unit for electronics with an all new electrical harness from scratch, electronic ignition, the whole 9 yards. I'll be updating the thread as I go along, but it's not going to be a quick process. Hell, I started this "build" back in 2013 after all. I am determined not to become another forum poster that started a build and never finished it, just going for that 10 year build process (god I hope not).

P.S. - If any actually sees this, does anyone know an easy way to fix all the photo bucket shenanigans? I'm not paying $399 a year to keep the photos available through third party hosting. Is there an easy fix? Otherwise I'm gonna have to switch everything over to Imgur and that'll take forever as well.