This is my first post here in the forums although I've spent a lot of time reading and researching info posted. The info and knowledge has been immensely helpful with the creation of my CB550 cafe, getting my CB500 on its running legs, and with my recent undertaking of a 79 CB750 DOHC cafe project.
My rebuild project this last winter was my 1972 CB500. During the rebuild I setup a webcam to take a snap shoot every 8 seconds and complied all the shots into a video. You can see the results here: youtu.be/7aeY7VEhTQg
This is the first bike I owned and the most neglected mainly due to the cafe bikes and its unbelievable reliability. Since the bike was looking pretty bad, especially in the rear area where the stock exhaust had rotted out completely resulting in exhaust blowing into the bike from both sides, I decided it was time to give it a bit of TLC. With a new to me exhaust purchased off EBay I started to restore it back to base condition as much as possible. You'll note a few differences from stock 1) Paint I do in my tiny garage in the winter so I went with a single color just to keep it simple 2) fork ears were getting rather rotten and those things are just way to expensive new and impossible to find a pair in reasonable condition without cracks or dings.
Total rebuild time was about 11 hrs. I completed it in a 3 hr and 8 hr session. I estimate about 250 hours of prep time over the prior three months, including frame and tank painting, cleaning and painting the engine, polishing aluminum parts, cleaning up the wire harness, etc.
I've yet to take the bike out since the weather has been bouncing around here in Cinti. Also to get it out of the basement I have to go through the garage and the paint area where until last night we were painting a 750 frame. But it will soon come back to life.
