'73 CL350 Cafe... in 11 days.

My uncle picked up this bike last summer and he gave it to me as payment for the work I do around his shop for him. The bike was 350.00 and is complete but in very rough shape. I spent my nights after work getting the thing running and waiting on parts to make it ridable, then winter hit and it sat for a few months. Now I'm on spring break and the weather is getting nice so this is what I'm doing with my time off.

It has been a major pain getting the Keihin carbs dialed in so I finally said forget it and ordered a Mikuni conversion kit off eBay. The auction said 3 day USPS priority mail but they shipped it UPS ground. Apparently when they said 3 day shipping they meant 7. Normally I would not care but that means the carbs won't arrive until after break ends, not much I can do about it now.

My inspiration here has been from Chris' bike. I have never liked all the extra shit people tack on to their bikes (luggage racks, fairings, blinkers, fenders, etc.) so just cutting it all off seems like the sensible thing to do. The main goal in this project is to do as much of the work myself as I possibly can. Anyone can go buy a bike and ride it but I want to be able to say I made the bike myself.

With the build it myself plan in mind I started thinking about how I could get this done. My uncle is an experienced machinist, as is my grandfather, they are always willing to help with projects so any major fabrication would be no problem with their help. I decided I wanted to make my own seat, my mom and sister are really into crafts and have been very helpful there. My mom has volunteered to help make the seat cover and my sister has made a mold of the seat we can use to lay fiberglass. It became clear pretty fast that I had all the resources I needed to get this done so I skipped the last two days of class and came home early to start the project.

I am now 4 days in and have the bike completely torn down. Today I pulled the engine out of the bike and pulled the front end apart with the help of my sisters boyfriend. I talked to the high school machine shop instructor and he will build me a starter cover and any other small parts I need. If I can find a good headlight I will have him make brackets for it. I am also going to draw up some plans for clip ons and have him fabricate those as well. I wish I had the resources to make them myself but I don't. Since I don't have a set of clip ons or clubmans I cut the crossbar off my existing bars and flipped them over. They fit surprisingly well but there are holes on the (now) top which I need to fill in.

Tomorrow will be spent mostly on cleaning the frame and engine and prepping the frame for paint. I have the tank nearly stripped with just some small spots to finish, then I can start paint on that as well. Hopefully by tomorrow night my frame and tank will be painted. I also need to extend my pipes a bit, I got a bit trigger happy with the hacksaw on them and need to extend one so they are roughly the same length. Then black paint and exhaust wrap will finish those off.

I don't have tons of pictures but there are some decent before shots of the bike.

Here is the before shot


This is the bike 2 days later


And this is the bike (frame) today


Here are the rearsets in progress


The fork tubes are in really rough shape, hopefully I can clean them up, otherwise I will be robbing parts from my uncle.


So there it is so far. I gave myself 11 days to get this done and after 4 I am up to my eyeballs in it. I think I will be able to finish this in time actually but the carbs will arrive late. Hopefully by this time next week I will be riding. So what do you think, am I crazy or is it possible to build a cafe racer in 11 days?

Cool project!
I think you can do a lot in 11 days. A complete teardown is def a challenge! Good to know your family has your back!

I think your fork tubes are bent though... Might want to go rob that uncle now.

I checked the tubes and I think they are ok. Must be some kind of illusion with the camera because they look bent in the picture but not in reality. I will clean them up a bit and put a straight edge to them to make sure.

Yeah, its nice having all the help around, I'm just happy my dad hasn't booted me out of the shop for making a mess yet.

Nice project. The fork tubes aren't chromed above the bottom tree so the rust is normal. You can sand it down and just paint it black.

Yeah, you'll be able to do it. Keep it simple and don't don't let yourself get caught ip in the details. Those foot controls look great.

Also, I have a set of CB350 handlebars that will look OK upside down. They are yours for the cost of shipping, but that won't be cheap either ($10-$15?). Email me and let me know.

--Chris

Also, build what you have with the carbs you have. Those are easy to pull later. You can update them once you get back to school. Just a suggestion.

--Chris

11 days is pretty short, but you've got youth and a desire to finish. that's all you need.

Made some progress today, not much to show for it but things are coming together. I stopped by the high school machine shop, they are making me a starter cover and clip ons. I had to supply the material myself but the labor is free. I picked up this piece of 1.5" thick aluminum for 9 bucks, should be more than enough to get the stuff I need made. Downside is they will not be done until next week. I will have to get by with my inverted bars until then.

I picked up the ends for my rear sets and drilled the arms to fit. The machine shop is going to make some knurled rod for the pegs as well.

I set up a paint booth in the garage and painted my pipes black. I wrapped the pipes in exhaust wrap and there is only a few inches of black pipe that will be visible.


The biggest thing I got done today was to put in the races for my tapered steering bearings. Honda put ball bearings in fro the factory and those were trashed. These tapered rollers will stay tight and work way better than the stock stuff. The top race sticks out of the frame a bit but I'm not concerned about it.


I have to work tomorrow but I will be off in the afternoon. I want to get started on paint but I keep getting sidetracked. When I get off I will either get started on the seat or on paint. The frame still needs to be stripped as well. Hopefully I have everything I need, I still need to sort out a headlight and tail light, that will have to be a Friday project.

I cleaned up the forks today enough to make them go together easy. They are still really ugly and the steering stop is broken off on one side of my triple clamp. I can make this work but I would like to replace it with something better. I have heard that CB500F front forks and triple clamps fit the CL350 frame. Does anyone have experience with this? The idea is to get a triple clamp that fits the CL350 frame but has forks more than 33mm diameter and bigger clamps.

I havn't posted in a few days but I have been busy. I got the seat started, I think I will end up putting another layer of fiberglass on it and then sanding/painting it.


I have a ton of little things to do but the bike is really close to ready. I have to go back to school/work at the end of the week but I have this weekend free to finish the project up. The carbs arrived today and I really want to hear how it sounds. Maybe tomorrow I can fire it up finally.

11 days? wow! Good Luck and hope the cafe god's are with you!

-benjie

Starfire said:

I havn't posted in a few days but I have been busy.

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If you're going to be finishing up your project in 11 days, you don't have time to post!


Lookin good so far.

Crunch time! You got to get to work ;D



Can't wait to see the finished bike.....

What you do in days takes me weeks,,,but I'm older than you :....excellent job!!!!!!!!! the best swap is a cb 450 front,,but there hard to find,next best is a cb500(damper rod), or cb 550f,,,,,,cb 750's will fit as well but the stanction tubes are rather long above the top triple clamp,,,keep the pic's coming!!

Thanks for the tips buzz, I'll start looking for those parts. I am back at school now so I can't finish the bike yet. I will be going home again for easter this weekend and hopefully I can finish it then. I got everything put together and checked to make sure I have spark and I know how to rewire the headlight/brake light so those work with all the factory switches gone. Theoretically if I put gas in the carbs the bike will run.

I still have some work to do on the seat and I need to paint the tank and seat then the build will be done. All that is left at that point is to dial in the carbs and ride. I'm over 11 days but I think the bike will be done in the next week. My clipons and headlight mounts are supposed to be done next week but I don't need them to ride.

I don't have any new pictures since theres nothing really visible that I have done in the last couple days. The carbs are on and the bike is assembled, it just needs a seat and tank. I have class tomorrow and Friday then I will be back home to finish it up. Look for more pictures on Saturday.

So it turns out my uncle picked up an '80 CB750F for 50 bucks. It has no title but the bike is all there, I'm gonna offer him what he paid plus half whatever I can part it out for after I cannibalize it for CL upgrades. I measured it up and it looks like the fork/triple clamps will fit onto my CL although they are a bit long. Is there any way to shorten the fork tubes? I have never taken them apart so I don't know if its possible to cut them down.

I also took a look at the rear brake assembly and I don't think it would be very hard to adapt to the CL swing arm. Problem is that the rear wheel and disc brake on the 750 are about an inch wider than the CL swing arm. It might be possible to shave off some of the brace on the side of the disc brake mount for the 750 and narrow it up that way but it also needs to stay centered. Alternately I could try and figure out a way to widen the CL swing arm to accept the larger rear axle but then I have the problem of shock mounts on the frame.

Does anyone have experience adapting CB750 parts onto CL/B350s? Everything looks very similar but there are some important differences (everything on the 750 is about an inch longer.)

If you really want to do this conversion you'll be in for a lot of trial and error with a bunch of frustration thrown in. Save yourself the pain and forget the idea. The stock drum brake has enough grab to lock up your back wheel at speed.

DrJ said:

If you really want to do this conversion you'll be in for a lot of trial and error with a bunch of frustration thrown in. Save yourself the pain and forget the idea. The stock drum brake has enough grab to lock up your back wheel at speed.

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I agree,
Keep the CL wheels, forks, stock, it's part of the vintage aspect of the bike.
You can always build the 750 when the 350 is finished.
and have 2 bikes...2 bikes are better than one, just like girls!
joking... ;D

So what's the result?

--Chris

chrisf said:

So what's the result?

--Chris

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The bike is really close but I have very little time to work on it with school/work. I got a lot of work done over break and then its been snowing for a week or two so I'm not really even in that big of a rush. Highest temperature here this week is like 56f

Right now I need to:

Finish painting the tank, this takes a ton of time.
Do a little more fiberglass work on the seat, maybe 2 hours of actual work.
Make a pad/cover for seat.
Put on the headlight mounts and clip ons, this is taking a long time because I'm having them made at the high school machine shop so they only have about 1 hr/day to work. This week is their spring break so it will probably be two weekends from now before those are ready.
Make a tail light bracket.
Assemble the rear brake linkage.
Rewire the headlight/tail light to be on with the key (removed stock controls).

Thats about it, not really very much work although some of it is time consuming. Problem is I don't have any time to work on it. I am moving into a house off campus for the summer and with any luck I can use the (huge) garage for my project(s). If that works out I will have a lot more time to finish this up in about a month which with this weather is about the earliest I can ride it anyway.