Hello everyone!
Long time lurker first time poster here. I wanted to start a thread about my 1973 CB350F. I want to use this as a place to post the progress of changes to my bike and get some feedback from everyone and maybe some new ideas.
So a little about me quickly. My name is Mike and I'm currently in Raleigh, NC. I am an Infrastructure Specialist for a large global IT company. IT is my main love in life but bikes/cars are a very close second. I have always been an amateur mechanic since I was old enough to drive. However, I always had to work on my cars out of necessity and never for fun. So I'm really excited to start putting some work into my bike.
So on to the bike, this is why you guys probably clicked on this thread in the first place, right? Well it's a 1973 CB350F that has been in my family for the past 37 plus years. One of my dad's buddies bought it new back in 73 and made some modifications to it right from the start, you'll see what I mean when you look at the pictures. After a year or two my dad wanted a bike and my dad's buddy needed a car... so they traded. Since then my dad has had this bike for decades and sometimes it was his only mode of transportation. It has a little over 50k miles on it at this point. He gave it to me about 5 years ago and since then not much has changed until now. I didn't ride much and maybe only put about 1000 miles on it myself. But this summer I got the itch to start riding again but before I do I wanted to clean it up, do some minor restoration and make some changes.
So the reason I gave a little history about the bike is because what I plan to do with the bike is not crazy. I had thought about taking the cafe racer route but decided against it because this bike is basically a family heirloom to me and I don't want to get so crazy with any mods that it's not recognizable anymore as the bike I grew up riding on with my dad every summer.
Currently the motor runs strong. My dad and I cleaned the carbs real good a few weekends ago and afterwards the bike fired right up. We had to clean them because it sat for about 2 years without me firing it up or riding it at all so the carbs were definitely gummed up. I was uneducated enough at the time to not drain the gas before letting it sit. It runs really well for the age and mileage in my opinion. My dad kept up on the maintenance and knows this bike in and out after 50k miles of riding and maintenance over a few decades. So essentially the motor needs little to nothing at the moment. I plan to do a complete rebuild of the carbs at some point but it’s not at the top of the list since the bike runs so well currently.
The first things to go were the forks. As you can probably tell the front forks we're not stock length. They we're about 10 inches over the stock length to give it a sort of chopper look. This was a problem for me though since I am a measly 5'6". I honestly could barely touch the ground when sitting on the bike and had to tip-toe to keep it upright. That was a little scary for me out on public roads. I just didn't feel very stable. Plus I think the longer forks impacted the handling negatively. So I put on a set of stock length CB400F forks and immediately the bike was lowered a bit from its former state and felt way more comfortable to me. It's still a bit tall for my height to be honest, but 10 times better than before.
Future plans include but are definitely not limited to the following:
- Replacing most of the cables. The front brake hoses and speedometer cable for example are way too long after dropping the front end back down.
- Replacing the clutch springs (EBC or Barnett, haven't decided yet). The clutch feels like there is a bit of slippage under load and my dad had already put shims under the springs which are still the original springs from 73.
- Replacing the seat and removing the sissy bar. I actually like the look of the seat / sissy bar on this bike, but the seat has seen better days and I like the look of some of the cafe style seats available out there. I don't like the look of the stock seats so much though.
- Replace the handlebars. I love the buckhorn style bars that are on there now. They are very comfortable and give it a unique look. However, I want to try some bars that are slightly more stock in look and feel. I have already started on the bars and will have a follow-up post about that shortly.
So those are some of the changes planned so far in addition to replacing a ton of little pieces here and there (clutch and brake levers, rear fender, nuts / bolts, new front tire, etc...).
I'm going to try and keep this post up to date as I make changes and replace things. I'd love to know what you think of the bike in its previous form and any ideas for future upgrades or tweaks. I’m open to any questions or comments.
Lastly, I'd like to say that this forum is amazing! There is far more interest and activity regarding these Fours than I thought I would find. I had searched the internet for quite a while, looking for resources and help with regards to my 350 and came up short for a while. When I found this site / forum I stopped looking. I've been browsing this site for almost a year now just reading and getting excited to work on my bike but rarely ever felt the need to create a new post since almost every question I had was already answered by searching the forums.
Thanks guys and see you around the forums!
