Hi all,
I have been reading along for a while, and decided to make a topic of my own.
I own my 1975 CB500 Four for 3 years now.
It was a genuine barn find, it was in a corner behind tractors and other farmer equipment.
But the nice thing was that it ran !
We hooked up some starer cables, used some startpilot, schortcutted the starting relay and it fired up almost immediately.
This is how i bought it.
I painted the tank, rough polished and painted the engine, painted the wheels black, nounted some new Conti Go tyres and mounted clipons
I do not want the bike to look to "clean" so the polishing is just done with steelbrushes on a hand drilling machine. It should look like it just came from the track, not from the showroom 8)
In my opinion the original tank was to small, and after some time I bought a Suzuki GS850 gastank, painted it matt black and fitted it on the frame.
Also bought a nice handmade aluminium soloseat, mounted an headlight with brick guard from an Yamaha offroad bike.
All parts came from internetshops, e-bay and or smap meets
This is how I have been riding for the first year, I cannot imagine anybody on a new bought bike having more fun than me driving my own build !
In the winter I moved the electra and batterie underneath the seat, and sanded the side off the tank to bare metal.
That summer the engine broke downduring a trip with the misses on her Honda CB-1 so i changed it for another one, and as i was working on it made myself a home made 4 to 2 exhaust with replica short megaton mufflers, and wrapped the exhaust with heatwrap.
As you can see on the pictures all work has to be done outside, or in my small bike shed.......
Got my hands on a complete Ducati goldline frontbrake with adaptors to fit the CB
This really imroved the braking, which is not the best with the original parts....
After that i also needed to impove the front suspension.
I added 2cm bushes on top of the spring and filled the fork with 15W in stead of the original10W oil.
Unfortunately the bike has not ran properly since I have mounted the new engine.
Too bad the guy had already sold the carbs those would have been better I guess.
There is enough compression, the valve clearance looks fine, and the ignition is also spot on.
But still the bike was not running like it should, it wouldn't hit the ton !
That is why this winter a carb revision is planned, together with the mounting of an electronic ignition with Boldor coils for a better spark.
The carbs have been cleaned ultrasonic, and a complete revisionset mounted. Jets, needles, o-rings, all new and fresh
I now first want tof fire it up without the electronic ignition, to see if it runs. ( if not i know where to find the problem )
If she runs, I will mount the new ignition and hope for a better starting bike.
I will keep the topic updated with the improvements made this winter.
Hope you enjoyed the story so far.
Regards from the netherlands
I have been reading along for a while, and decided to make a topic of my own.
I own my 1975 CB500 Four for 3 years now.
It was a genuine barn find, it was in a corner behind tractors and other farmer equipment.
But the nice thing was that it ran !
We hooked up some starer cables, used some startpilot, schortcutted the starting relay and it fired up almost immediately.
This is how i bought it.
I painted the tank, rough polished and painted the engine, painted the wheels black, nounted some new Conti Go tyres and mounted clipons
I do not want the bike to look to "clean" so the polishing is just done with steelbrushes on a hand drilling machine. It should look like it just came from the track, not from the showroom 8)
In my opinion the original tank was to small, and after some time I bought a Suzuki GS850 gastank, painted it matt black and fitted it on the frame.
Also bought a nice handmade aluminium soloseat, mounted an headlight with brick guard from an Yamaha offroad bike.
All parts came from internetshops, e-bay and or smap meets
This is how I have been riding for the first year, I cannot imagine anybody on a new bought bike having more fun than me driving my own build !
In the winter I moved the electra and batterie underneath the seat, and sanded the side off the tank to bare metal.
That summer the engine broke downduring a trip with the misses on her Honda CB-1 so i changed it for another one, and as i was working on it made myself a home made 4 to 2 exhaust with replica short megaton mufflers, and wrapped the exhaust with heatwrap.
As you can see on the pictures all work has to be done outside, or in my small bike shed.......
Got my hands on a complete Ducati goldline frontbrake with adaptors to fit the CB
This really imroved the braking, which is not the best with the original parts....
After that i also needed to impove the front suspension.
I added 2cm bushes on top of the spring and filled the fork with 15W in stead of the original10W oil.
Unfortunately the bike has not ran properly since I have mounted the new engine.
Too bad the guy had already sold the carbs those would have been better I guess.
There is enough compression, the valve clearance looks fine, and the ignition is also spot on.
But still the bike was not running like it should, it wouldn't hit the ton !
That is why this winter a carb revision is planned, together with the mounting of an electronic ignition with Boldor coils for a better spark.
The carbs have been cleaned ultrasonic, and a complete revisionset mounted. Jets, needles, o-rings, all new and fresh
I now first want tof fire it up without the electronic ignition, to see if it runs. ( if not i know where to find the problem )
If she runs, I will mount the new ignition and hope for a better starting bike.
I will keep the topic updated with the improvements made this winter.
Hope you enjoyed the story so far.
Regards from the netherlands