Topic: for forks sake

[Scott]

Hi I have a 73 cb750.
I'm not sure which fork lowers to use. The short or longer ones.
Does it make a difference
Thanks for any help
Scott

[scottly]

Hey Scott, the longer lowers appear to be from a K7-K8, if that helps.

[bjbuchanan]

Longer is better because you can run a fork brace in the future. Longer is post k6

[Terry in Australia]

Yep the longer ones were used on the F/F1, K7 and K8. Rex Wolfendon (TRex Racing) used the later ones on his race bikes as he could install a fork brace, and believed that the longer lowers reduced fork flex. You can use the 1973-on fork tubes and springs etc with them, I had them on my K1 with a fork brace before I swapped them out for GL1000 forks. Cheers, Terry.

[Scott]

Alright sounds good thanks.
Next question is the fork tubes (chrome tube) seem to a different internal diameter, as in the bottom of the fork tube where the dampening thing with the anti bottoming spring goes through.
Is there a better one to use?
If I order new fork tubes I need to order the ones that suit the better type of fork internals as I have both types.
Thanks heaps for any thoughts
Scott

[Terry in Australia]

You might be able to still find OEM tubes, or very close replicas from places like David Silver Spares in Britain or Yamiya in Japan mate, but they're expensive.

I bought some tubes from Cycle X in the US and they worked fine, and were a lot cheaper than OEM, but I can't remember if there were any differences with internal diameters like you've mentioned?

I'm thinking that maybe you've got some "odd" tubes off a different bike, as pretty much any 35mm fork tubes can be made to fit your forks. Be aware that the '69-72 tubes are totally different to yours, and won't work with your alloy lowers. Cheers, Terry.

[Scott]

Thanks Terry
I've got a K2 that I did the forks on a couple of years ago and remember them being different and then confirmed that with Hondamans photos in his book.
I might try ringing Cycle X, they say on the web site they are out of stock at the moment.
I'll pull the insides of my forks out again and put up a photo for interest sake
Scott

[Scott]

Damper rod thing

[Scott]

Chrome fork tube

[Terry in Australia]

Geez that's weird mate, the one on the left with the necked down damper rod looks like a stocker, but that fat one on the right doesn't look like any CB750 damper rod I've seen before. I wonder what it's off? I've had every model CB750 forks in bits at one time or another, but have never seen a damper rod like that before. Cheers, Terry.