Hi
I've just started rebuilding my Seeley Honda.
A bit of background: I'd heard of this Seeley sitting the town of Middelburg when I still lived in Cape Town in 1987 - and a year later I found myself being transferred to Middelburg. When I put some feelers out, it was still there, in the backroom of a bike shop, forlorn, dirty, dusty, incomplete and hacked about - so I bought it.
I'd heard about Seeley Hondas and I was interested because I already owned a fairly original CB750 Four (K1) [still do, to this day].
There are three Seeley Honda CB750 Fours known to be in South Africa, of which mine seems to be the youngest - it's the only one built for a rear disc-brake. It is a frame built by Seeley for the 1975/6 CB750F (and later?), the model with the rear disc brake and electrical connection box bolted to a tab on the front left frame downtube.
And just so everyone knows it up front: mine has been hacked by various Previous Owners.
1. The sidestand bracket has been ripped off and been brazed back on***,
2. one of the RHS shock mounting tabs has broken off and been replaced by a suitably-shaped piece of steel***,
3. it seems someone at one stage tried to weld seat mountings (?) to the frame rails*** and
4. someone has cut the hoop off the frame (underneath the bumbox of the seat)***.
Nevertheless, as 60 000 km have taught me, it remains a great bike to ride, one that handles well and runs well.
Along with life happening and another transfer, the get-it-useable project took another 3 years, by which time I had relocated to the bustling metropolis of Ellisras - even further from civilisation.
I rebuilt the Seeley with the remnants of it's original seat. The fuel tank had a big gash in it which needed welding; I then kept the tank polished and clear-coated and fitted a Rickman full fairing. I rebuilt the engine to stock specs but fitted it with a very nice custom-built 4-1 exhaust and pod-filters inside the gutted airbox. I also made contact with Axel Griessman (The Satanic Mechanic) and we exchanged notes vial email & fax & snailmail. Eventually he had a replicas of the original seats made and sold me one - which I kept but didn't use (more on that much later). He also told which Koni shocks to get for the Seeley Honda - the dampers being fairly regular Konis but the springs being lighter than what is normal for 750 Fours.
In this condition I ran the bike for about 60 000 kilometers and about 3 further relocations found me back in Cape Town. Here I suffered the first real failure: one morning while commuting to work on the Seeley the front-end felt dodgy whenever I applied the brakes. a quick roadside check didn't reveal anything significant so I carried on to work slowly and carefully, and in the evening went home equally slowly and carefully.
At home with decent light I found the problem: the front wheel, a cast aftermarket wheel made by Melba of Italy in the mid-1970s, had cracked all it's cast spokes adjacent to the hub. The whole plot was only kept together by the coarseness of the fractures.
I fitted a spare stock Honda (steel) front wheel and used the bike as before - until sometime later it started smoking. This coincided with another relocation, this time to the coastal city of Durban. Life carried on happening... and it's only now some 8 years later that the Gods have smiled on me and suggested that the time for a total rebuild may have come.
Which brings us to October 2014 when I started stripping the bike down and buying engine spares. Yesterday I started the first part of the re-assembly.
*** photos of the damaged areas will be posted as the rebuild progresses.
As I haven't figured out how to place the photos where they are accompanied by the relevant text, here with a quick description:
Photo 1: As I bought the Seeley in about 1987, having brought it home
Photo 2: the way it was when in regular use
Photo 3: a detailed photo of the cracked front wheel
Photo 4: the stripdown starts - Sept/Oct 2014
