Topic: Patina Hyena - 550/650 674cc Hybrid Cafe Build

[DaveBarbier]

Just doing some tests now because I can't wait until tomorrow. First, I had no idea that the plug caps were different in 2-3 and 1-4. But CMSNL confirms it.


Now, Hondaman says that from '76 on for these SOHC4 the caps are all 10k ohm caps. My meter is working correctly (did some tests on a short length of copper wire) but it says the resistance for #1 cap is OL (open loop) #2 cap is 4.74k #3 cap is 6.65k but I measure it again and it says 2M! #4 cap varies from 4.65k to 6.8k to 9M! My
Meter is an Innova and auto sets resistance. I can't choose a value range. Not sure if that matters.

I don't think I can trust my meter, but it's never failed me before. I just want to get new caps to be sure, though. Hondaman says to get the NGK 5k plug caps. Anyone have luck getting these at an auto parts store?

On a side note, the wire for the #4 where the plug cap screws into was a little corroded and green. I cut about 3/16" from each wire. Also, the screws on all plug caps are bright and shiny new looking except the #4 was pretty dull.


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1978 Honda CB550K

[DaveBarbier]

Be happy with that, Dani Pedrosa, especially on a lighter weight middle-weight 550-framed bike.  Every 7 or so lbs lost is the equivalent of a horsepower gained!! 

Haha, Pedrosa, I wish. I'll be done with my dual disc conversion in a week or so...that'll add some weight unfortunately...but add some stopping power. Just hope the 14mm MC will be enough.


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1978 Honda CB550K

You'll have to be the judge as to the adequacy of your MC.  You may end up going with a 16mm or larger. 

How's the dual disc set up coming along? Are you using stock bolts and countersinking/machining the rotor carriers or getting longer rotor bolts?  Did you already modify the carrier for the speedo drive?

Right now I'm just gathering parts. I was planning on just getting longer bolts, I didn't know machining carriers was an option. I haven't yet modified the speedo drive. Plan on doing all that when I have all the parts since I'm still riding. Maybe stupid question, but I was planning on just getting some grade 10.9 bolts from McMaster Carr. Or is there some bolts off a SOHC4 I should be using instead?


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1978 Honda CB550K

I don't think there are any magic bolts. The MC ones should work fine with locktite.

I got my rotors thinned and drilled from Goddfrey and he countersank/milled the carriers so I could use the stock bolts.

Thanks, just shot him an email. I need my second rotor drilled anyway, might as well lighten it. And weirdly, just today I received another one of his phenolic brake caliper pistons in the mail. Good stuff.


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1978 Honda CB550K

[SOHC4 Cafe Racer Fan]

Be happy with that, Dani Pedrosa, especially on a lighter weight middle-weight 550-framed bike.  Every 7 or so lbs lost is the equivalent of a horsepower gained!! 

Haha, Pedrosa, I wish. I'll be done with my dual disc conversion in a week or so...that'll add some weight unfortunately...but add some stopping power. Just hope the 14mm MC will be enough.


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1978 Honda CB550K

You'll have to be the judge as to the adequacy of your MC.  You may end up going with a 16mm or larger. 

How's the dual disc set up coming along? Are you using stock bolts and countersinking/machining the rotor carriers or getting longer rotor bolts?  Did you already modify the carrier for the speedo drive?

Right now I'm just gathering parts. I was planning on just getting longer bolts, I didn't know machining carriers was an option. I haven't yet modified the speedo drive. Plan on doing all that when I have all the parts since I'm still riding. Maybe stupid question, but I was planning on just getting some grade 10.9 bolts from McMaster Carr. Or is there some bolts off a SOHC4 I should be using instead?


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1978 Honda CB550K

I don't think there are any magic bolts. The MC ones should work fine with locktite.

I got my rotors thinned and drilled from Goddfrey and he countersank/milled the carriers so I could use the stock bolts.

Thanks, just shot him an email. I need my second rotor drilled anyway, might as well lighten it. And weirdly, just today I received another one of his phenolic brake caliper pistons in the mail. Good stuff.


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1978 Honda CB550K

Yeah. I did the phenolic pitons on my 750 and 550. Peace of mind avoiding corrosion and lighter.

[RAFster122s]

Your corrosion would cause a lot of reduced spark on 4 and dull surface is just a different oxide, green with copper is indicative of water in the mix.

Using the proper lubes on the piston and backing plates of the calipers is a good idea... hi temp silicone vac grease according to TwoTired is the stuff to use on part of it. Ths assembly lube for brakes is another piece of the puzzle.

David

[flatlander]

I don't think I can trust my meter, but it's never failed me before. I just want to get new caps to be sure, though. Hondaman says to get the NGK 5k plug caps. Anyone have luck getting these at an auto parts store?

i just got them on ebay, wherever i found them cheapest.
get one or two spare ones of each type (they're cheap enough), then measure their resistance and pick the ones that are closest to each other as they seem to vary a bit.

[DaveBarbier]

Your corrosion would cause a lot of reduced spark on 4 and dill surface is just a different oxide, green with copper is indicative of water in the mix.

Using the proper lubes on the piston and backing plates of the calipers is a good idea... hi temp silicone vac grease according to TwoTired is the stuff to use on part of it. Ths assembly lube for brakes is another piece of the puzzle.

David

Yeah, that's why I'm just going to get new ones. And I read what TwoTired wrote when I rebuilt my first caliper so I have all the lube, thanks.


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1978 Honda CB550K

[DaveBarbier]

I don't think I can trust my meter, but it's never failed me before. I just want to get new caps to be sure, though. Hondaman says to get the NGK 5k plug caps. Anyone have luck getting these at an auto parts store?

i just got them on ebay, wherever i found them cheapest.
get one or two spare ones of each type (they're cheap enough), then measure their resistance and pick the ones that are closest to each other as they seem to vary a bit.

Dennis Kirk has the XD05F and VD05F I need for $3.49 each. That is cheap. And thanks for the tip, maybe I'll get 3 of each.


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1978 Honda CB550K

[RAFster122s]

The resistance checks are showing that it is time to change them.  If you meter readszero with tips of leads together on resistance/ohms settings then checking the wires to the coil and other areas by finding where they terminate if they are a point to point setup you can see if they are having any resistance building in the wire. Any signs of oxidation on the crimp and you should replace the terminal end. Vintage connections sells kits.
 Clean the teminals with a good terminal cleaning spray that is plastic safe and connect and disconnect several times. A slight squeeze of the female socket can improve their mechanical connection if at all loose. If it feels loose, replace it. It is a good idea to replace a fee main harness large connectors ad they can develop issues.  Hondaman talks about it but I forgot where it was, probably the FAQ. Add Relays your horn and headlamp and add a ground to the headlamp bucket to  ensure that it has a solid ground path to the battery.
besure your tail-lamps have a good ground so they are bright. If they are weak, then you want to work on that circuit. Clean terminals and connectors pulling them out of their connectorbodies, carefully when in plastic housing,  so you can use a brass brush.
It is time consuming but worth the investment.
A bit of dielectric grease on outside of crimp and female bodies,  thin film, will help protect them but, the rubber sheath needs to be good to keep dirt out.
A good compound ratcheting crimper is worth the investment, buy a good brand not a chinese counterfeit. Keep your tooks clean and lightly oiled and they will last. Dirtand moisture and heat (above 50 F) is the breeding ground for rust and corrosion.
 Good luck, looks good!
David
RAFster

[RAFster122s]

Longer bolts is way to go, just remember that to remove wheel you are going to pull a caliper. So carry tools to do it along with tube and patch kit for tires on roadtrips. Also, pack means of securing caliper still hooked up so you have means to handle that without stressing lines. Having light kit to handle it means you won't need it, but better prepared than stranded.

Did you know that 90% of Harleys are still on the road,  the other 10% are home in their garages.

David

[DaveBarbier]

The resistance checks are showing that it is time to change them.  If you meter readszero with tips of leads together on resistance/ohms settings then checking the wires to the coil and other areas by finding where they terminate if they are a point to point setup you can see if they are having any resistance building in the wire. Any signs of oxidation on the crimp and you should replace the terminal end. Vintage connections sells kits.
 Clean the teminals with a good terminal cleaning spray that is plastic safe and connect and disconnect several times. A slight squeeze of the female socket can improve their mechanical connection if at all loose. If it feels loose, replace it. It is a good idea to replace a fee main harness large connectors ad they can develop issues.  Hondaman talks about it but I forgot where it was, probably the FAQ. Add Relays your horn and headlamp and add a ground to the headlamp bucket to  ensure that it has a solid ground path to the battery.
besure your tail-lamps have a good ground so they are bright. If they are weak, then you want to work on that circuit. Clean terminals and connectors pulling them out of their connectorbodies, carefully when in plastic housing,  so you can use a brass brush.
It is time consuming but worth the investment.
A bit of dielectric grease on outside of crimp and female bodies,  thin film, will help protect them but, the rubber sheath needs to be good to keep dirt out.
A good compound ratcheting crimper is worth the investment, buy a good brand not a chinese counterfeit. Keep your tooks clean and lightly oiled and they will last. Dirtand moisture and heat (above 50 F) is the breeding ground for rust and corrosion.
 Good luck, looks good!
David
RAFster

Already bought the caps, haha. There is a ground in my headlight bucket but I don't have a relay for the headlight, I'll look into that. I do have a key switch saver relay, though. My wiring is pretty good as far as I can tell. I re-wired the rear section when I went the "open triangle" under the seat and got bullet connectors from Cycle Terminal. Also I'm running all LED's except for headlight (debating on changing that too). I went through the headlight bucket and cleaned up all connections a little bit ago. But I'll definitely check the plug wire resistance today. Hopefully that's why my #4 plug is black.

Thanks for the tips!


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1978 Honda CB550K

[RAFster122s]

The led headlamp can be a solution if it is drawing less current than the stock headlamp and is sufficiently bright. Theydo need cooling when pushing high wattage so it could require you to change the bucket to a larger one to get the space needed for other components.  The stock witing often jad a weakness in the ground for the headlamp bucket so additional ground wire was a simple solution for redundancy.  Horn and headlamp relay kits are available from HondaMan with slick compact miniature high amp (30 A) designs with wiring kit for plug and play fun.
The relays use low current on headlamp switch and horn button switches to provide a long lasting switch and put the high current switching on the relay designed to handle it.
Or fabricate your own...

Document what you do in a book/binder, so it is there for future reference.  Take the time, it is important for you and any future owners. It can make the difference in price also as they can appreciate the work and quality of work as it is shown in a volume. Same thing for maintenance records and if there is an insurance company trying to screw you ic you have covered it for what it is worth. Got rear ended in a 66 Volvo 122S  and when I ran through the long list of maintenance And repair investment I had made mechanically they quit trying to slide out that it was a old derelict car that I was running around in. It was becoming a fun little car that was peppy and tossable in corners like it was on rails.

[DaveBarbier]

The led headlamp can be a solution if it is drawing less current than the stock headlamp and is sufficiently bright. Theydo need cooling when pushing high wattage so it could require you to change the bucket to a larger one to get the space needed for other components.  The stock witing often jad a weakness in the ground for the headlamp bucket so additional ground wire was a simple solution for redundancy.  Horn and headlamp relay kits are available from HondaMan with slick compact miniature high amp (30 A) designs with wiring kit for plug and play fun.
The relays use low current on headlamp switch and horn button switches to provide a long lasting switch and put the high current switching on the relay designed to handle it.
Or fabricate your own...

Document what you do in a book/binder, so it is there for future reference.  Take the time, it is important for you and any future owners. It can make the difference in price also as they can appreciate the work and quality of work as it is shown in a volume. Same thing for maintenance records and if there is an insurance company trying to screw you ic you have covered it for what it is worth. Got rear ended in a 66 Volvo 122S  and when I ran through the long list of maintenance And repair investment I had made mechanically they quit trying to slide out that it was a old derelict car that I was running around in. It was becoming a fun little car that was peppy and tossable in corners like it was on rails.

I have a little binder with work that I've done. I like being a little anal about this kind of thing. After a good amount of work I sit down with a beer or 6 and document. Penmanship tends to get a little sloppy towards the end, haha.


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1978 Honda CB550K

[DaveBarbier]

EDIT: Disregard the top part in italics. I had my meter set on continuity and not ohms. It normally gives me ohms readings as well as a beep for continuity but it didn't. Switching it to ohms gave me values.

Ok, been reading the FAQ on testing coils and it's not making sense to me. Should I or should I not have continuity when measuring from the end (where the plug cap screws into) of the #1 wire to the same end on the #4 wire? It doesn't say anything about key on or off or kill switch on or off so I assume that makes no difference. Well, I don't have continuity. But I think the FAQ says I should. Same with 2-3. And this tests the coils and wires, right? It really seems the FAQ isn't clear but it's probably me.

All I want is to test the coils and test the plug wires and make sure they're good.

Here are a few pictures of my tests. Gozinta seem good, but gozouta seem high, no? Edit: No, that's a good value.









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1978 Honda CB550K

[DaveBarbier]

What have I done!?




Uhh, anyone want that tank?

It was kept outside for about 5 years but at least it was sealed up. Headers and carbs on with the plugs and caps still installed. Hopefully it's like a little hermetically sealed chamber in there. Couldn't roll it because the front calipers were stuck to the rotors. A little PB Blaster, ok, a lot of PB Blaster, and I was able to easily remove them. Calipers aren't seized, believe it or not, I could still pump the brake lever and see the pads move. Only thing I'm really scared about is the shift lever won't move, not even a little bit. But I removed the dip stick and everything looked covered in oil and it didn't smell like fuel.

Plan is to drain oil and drop pan and have a look inside. Then loosen what I can on the motor, like rotor nut, side covers, etc. while it's in the frame. Once it's out I'm putting everything I won't be using up for sale. So speaking of that, what should I keep for this swap aside from carbs and motor? Coils?


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1978 Honda CB550K

[SOHC4 Cafe Racer Fan]

Not bad at all for $300.  Titled or non?  Somebody apparently dropped it on the left side (see footpeg).

Keep the coils, motor, carbs, cdi box, tach cable, tach (if you want analog gauges).  You could keep the solid state reg/rectifier unit but you can easily replace it with a new fresh one.

I also have a 1982 motor.

[DaveBarbier]

Not bad at all for $300.  Titled or non?  Somebody apparently dropped it on the left side (see footpeg).

Keep the coils, motor, carbs, cdi box, tach cable, tach (if you want analog gauges).  You could keep the solid state reg/rectifier unit but you can easily replace it with a new fresh one.

I also have a 1982 motor.

Don't need the tach, but I'll have to get a new one to match my speedo from DCC. And I already have a Rick's reg/rec.

Yes, it's titled, but it says the lean holder is a New York Bank from back in '83. Looks like the guy never finished paying it off?

It's a shame this happens. Come to find out it has under 8k miles. I guess sometimes life gets in the way or hard financial times come putting things on the back burner. I want to give this motor the life it deserved!


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1978 Honda CB550K

[Tews19]

Mileage is similar to HellraiseXl"s 650 he picked up last week. When I saw the engine and the inside it looked like brand new. The power plant is ridiculous.

[Stev-o]

Mileage is similar to HellraiseXl"s 650 he picked up last week. When I saw the engine and the inside it looked like brand new. The power plant is ridiculous.

Too bad it's not a 650, then you could have used the cam or the entire motor.

[SOHC4 Cafe Racer Fan]

Mileage is similar to HellraiseXl"s 650 he picked up last week. When I saw the engine and the inside it looked like brand new. The power plant is ridiculous.

Too bad it's not a 650, then you could have used the cam or the entire motor.

I'm pretty sure it IS a 1982 CB650.

[DaveBarbier]

Started taking pieces off. Battery still had .43 volts! Drained the oil, black as can be but I took a magnetic screw driver, dragged it around and it came back spotless.

Right now I'm trying to drop the pan but I have to remove the exhaust...the collar for the #3 header is fused to one of the studs. Not budging even with hitting it with propane and PB Blaster (not at the same time). Any ideas?

Also, not sure why but the #2 collar won't come off. It's hitting the frame. Trying to pry it off lightly to no avail. Is this normal for the 650? Also I think the motor mount in the below picture is bent.





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1978 Honda CB550K

[SOHC4 Cafe Racer Fan]

Started taking pieces off. Battery still had .43 volts! Drained the oil, black as can be but I took a magnetic screw driver, dragged it around and it came back spotless.

Right now I'm trying to drop the pan but I have to remove the exhaust...the collar for the #3 header is fused to one of the studs. Not budging even with hitting it with propane and PB Blaster (not at the same time). Any ideas?

Also, not sure why but the #2 collar won't come off. It's hitting the frame. Trying to pry it off lightly to no avail. Is this normal for the 650? Also I think the motor mount in the below picture is bent.





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1978 Honda CB550K

The exhausts on my 82 came off easy.  One of my rear motormount bolts was stubborn but came off with some heat and PB; the bolt was oxidized.  My oil came out light brown and CLEAN.  Exhaust collars came out effortlessly.  I'm hoping the motor is SANO inside.

[DaveBarbier]

Yeah I'll keep trying on that fused collar. But I now see that 3 motor mount bolts are gone and the motor is slightly tilted to one side. I pried it back and the #2 collar came off easy.

What's SANO?


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1978 Honda CB550K

[SOHC4 Cafe Racer Fan]

Yeah I'll keep trying on that fused collar. But I now see that 3 motor mount bolts are gone and the motor is slightly tilted to one side. I pried it back and the #2 collar came off easy.

What's SANO?


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1978 Honda CB550K

Sanitary.
Looks like that drop on the left side was more significant.

[DaveBarbier]

Yeah I'll keep trying on that fused collar. But I now see that 3 motor mount bolts are gone and the motor is slightly tilted to one side. I pried it back and the #2 collar came off easy.

What's SANO?


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1978 Honda CB550K

Sanitary.
Looks like that drop on the left side was more significant.

Ah, duh. I thought that's what you were getting at. Yeah I'm thinking it was, but no find are broken and I see no cracks in the case. But I'm now thinking the shifter is stuck because of the accident, too. Maybe tranny is bound up. Fun!


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1978 Honda CB550K

[DaveBarbier]

Holy crap, ok got the exhaust off. This collar is really fused. This is what's left of it after some work with a dremel and angle grinder. This is as far as I'm going with it for now. This stud has to come out. Might work on it when the motor is out. On to the pan!

On second thought, the stud may be salvageable. When the motor is out I might try removing as much aluminum collar as I can with angle grinder and files and then just run a die down the stud to clean it up. We'll cross that road another time.







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1978 Honda CB550K