This is my second bike (my first is a 73 cb350f) and I'm planning on doing a full blown restore back to stock on this. Picked it up for $500 from a guy who thought I would take care of it - I hope he's right! The story he told was that "it ran when I put it away a year ago" and "I was going to cafe it put didn't have the time." The thing had pods on it and the handlebars removed so the evidence at least didn't totally contradict his story. The kick starter worked so at least it wasn't completely stuck. I offered $500 and he accepted.
First thing I wanted to do was just try and get it started. Checked out the bowls and they were completely clean. Check the points and to my surprise there was a Dyna S ignition installed! I could peek under the tank and saw Dyna coils as well. I've always wanted to try those out so I'm kind of excited about having them. After a little tinkering and reassembling I finally got it started. I was really surprised how easy it fired up, too. Literally two presses on the starter for 2 seconds each and it fired right up. Couldn't believe it. It didn't respond well to the throttle and I'm not sure exactly what RPMs were doing because the tach is broke. I assume the pods had something do with the poor performance (nothing against pods but I'm assuming they didn't have the carbs configured properly). I rode it around the block and found first and second gear to be very "sloppy" and neutral was tricky to get into - I had to tap it just right. So between the poor throttle response and sloppy tranny I'm glad I'm tearing it down. Here's the evidence:
"Before" Pictures
Sweet saddle and pipes!
Leaks oil all over the place of course.
Bent and broken clocks, chrome headlight surround and front fender. Dollars adding up in my head...
Looking forward to untangling this mess
Both my ponies in the stable
I bought this shelf to put all pieces on. Hopefully this will hold most of it - the box says it will hold 2500 lbs.
Rusty gunk in the petcock bowl
Petcock looks lovely
Going to need to replace this. Bent and has a crack running vertically as well.
Surprise, surprise
Hello there
How she's sitting now
Carbs look decent
Mystery wire I found in the light bucket
How the shelf looks
This is going to be a long project I'm afraid but I look forward to it. I'm going to need some help, too - so THANKS in advance!