Hi all,
I haven't needed to really ask much so far - the resources here are phenomenal. So many of my potential questions have already been answered... But I thought I'd at least "pay" for all the knowledge I'm sucking up by giving you all some pictures.
So here's the story:
An ad on my local Craigslist popped up for "2 1970? Honda 500" with little other information. Upon talking to the guy, he told me he'd inherited the bikes from his father who passed away 10 years ago. His father had them for a long time before that, having brought them home from who knows where. The seller knew little else about them. After I went to look at them, I found them to be 1972 CB500s, both remarkably original/complete. They'd been neglected for a long time, so they have rust and much, if not all, of the chrome is pretty much shot, but he only wanted $300 apiece. So, with keys to one bike, and titles for neither, I bought them both. Here they are loaded into my truck for the trip to their new home:
The tanks, seats, and sidecovers are all intact, and each bike shows only about 3000 total miles on the odometer. One tank has a failing liner, the other has some light rust. Neither throttle will move at all. One has no front caliper at all. One broken front mirror. Otherwise, I can see nothing else major (or minor) they are missing. They both kick over fine. I figure $600 for the pair is a steal.
After some extensive garage rearranging, I get them tucked in and immediately start in on the one that has the front caliper (and that I have a key for) while I order a key for the second bike and get the title application paperwork started. I can't believe this bike still even has the entire original tool kit.
Taking the rack of carbs off is no joke! My other bikes to date are a little kz250, and a Kawasaki 400 triple - nothing that has linked carbs like these. I finally get the carbs out:
A little [c]rusty, but still promisingly complete and unmolested. Slides are frozen in place, though, so they had to come off the rack so I could really get the cleaned up. they were pretty badly gummed up.
But carb dip, lemon juice boil, and carb spray working together, and I was able to get them satisfactorily clean and get the slides moving again. New o-ring kits went in, and all the old brass was removed, cleaned up, and reused. This next picture makes them look better than they do in real life.
They look fine now, but not as shiny as all this....
I also rebuilt the equally gunked up petcock, and de-rusted the gas tank.
Would you believe that was all it took? I was able to jump-start the bike after that. Sure, it was only running on two cylinders, but I just cleaned up the points with a little emery cloth, and had all four cylinders. Now, I have good reason to believe these bikes haven't been run in 34 years:
And I hadn't so much as changed the oil or plugs, but the damned thing ran anyhow.
Obviously I shut the bike down after a couple seconds. Then I got on with changing the oil, and plugs, and putting the stock airbox all back together. It runs very nicely now. I'm still going to pull the tank back off one more time - I'm leaking gas out of [at least] one of the overflows, and I just picked up my angled valve feeler gauges today, so I can get on with the rest of the 3000 mile service. But I am amazed at this bike already...
I just wish it didn't need so much cleaning! And that the chrome were more salvageable. A couple of the exhaust pipes are rusted through in spots - I should have enough to make one complete set, though, at least. The handlebars are junk at this point - the chrome is flaking off from rust. The front brake doesn't offer any resistance - but a new master cylinder rebuild kit is on its way, so hopefully I can fix that this weekend. Other than that, I need titles. Indiana has been good to me for titles for my other two bikes, but so far these two are not looking as good. I somehow got the only person in Indiana's new "Central BMV Title Processing" office who has couldn't buy a clue if she won the lottery.
First she told me my VIN was too short and she needed the 17-digit VIN. Now she tells me that since the frame and engine numbers don't match, these need to count as "built/assembled" bikes, and go through a VIN application process.
Yes. I built these cb500s myself. Nevermind that that are bone stock.
Anyhow, I've talked long enough. Here are a couple more pictures.
Thank you to everyone who has
unwittingly already helped me, to the few folks who
wittingly helped convince me to go for these, and for all of the help I'm sure to keep getting as I sponge up knowledge from this forum! Great bunch of folks here!
