Hey just a comment about bending the rim with pry-bars - WTF are you doing, taking that tire off in one piece?
I've re-cycled some good alloy rims, and 16" rear "chopper" style wheels at that, so we're talking about tires in the 130/90-16 size range, and all crusty as get out, 'cause first of all they were run 'til bald, then sat around for thirty-odd years 'cause nobody else WANTED 'em!
They're for my "KZ440LOL" project, where I've got the 3.00x16" Borrani alloy rim stretched around the Suzuki GT750J 4LS drum hub - 36-spoke rims of course, sourced from XS650 chopper-ized rear wheels. I suppose there are 2.50x16" rims speaking of XS650, but I wanted to go with as fat of a tire as is possible here, talking about low-profile 110/70-16 front and 140/70-16 MAXI-SCOOTER tires, basically scaled down crotch-rocket stuff. Radials are available, a dual-compound rear WAS available - ANYWAY yeah I'm not actually building a CHOPPER just to be clear! The 'LTD was a "Chopper-ette" and a "Lady-Bike" of the first order - and so I'm trying to UN-#&%$ the thing in so far as I can....
Whatever - the point being, I've had to tear apart some old wheels for this project and there's one thing that I figured out after doing it a couple times, and that's where you wanna be CAREFUL with them tire irons around an alloy rim! So you wanna use some good rim protectors and plastic coated levers wherever and whenever you can.
The NEXT thing I figured out was that them crusty old tires weren't gonna wind up on another bike! They all go to the dump, or are ground up into pellets and recycled as a portion of the new cushy black-top asphalt. Or maybe they'll be baked into a cake, I dunno. The ONE thing for sure is they're not gonna wind up on another rim and another bike!
So while it's all well and good to use a good set of levers and rim protectors when you're INSTALLING a tire, a nice stretchy soft rubbery new tire. A NEW tire I stress this. Unless you're some type of twit who's changing over to rain slicks vs dry slicks - only without the benefit of a 2nd set of wheels?
When you're taking a crusty old piece of #$%* OFF of the wheel - it's less important that it wind up in one piece. Right?
What really pissed me off, was dealing with eBay sellers who wouldn't take a damn tire off, to where I'm paying a good $50 shipping at LEAST for the extra weight, the extra inches of box size, etc. But even when I'd offer to PAY that extra $50 to the lazy bike-WRECKER himself - and I'm talking here about the guys who are tearing down perfectly decent project bikes which would be better off LEFT ALONE for a few more years until some young kid comes along and wants to fix it - but who know so little about putting bikes TOGETHER that they barely know how to tear 'em apart ... with the socket set and claw hammer that they've got in their garage. And by garage I mean where they park their car and bring home local bikes from the bargain-finder papers to tear apart & make a quick buck. Make no mistake, there are plenty of people doing just that! Going around low-balling people on slightly broken-down bikes that really only need a couple hundred bucks invested in 'em to get back on the road, need the love of an enthusiastic budding young bike nut to throw his or her lawn-mowing dollars at the thing. But instead these #$%*-heads go around low-balling and hovering all the decent 2nd-hand bikes out of their local area ... usually while they're out looking for OTHER scrap metal to cash in for a quicker meth purchase ... only to sell off the handful of decent parts on the bike for a grossly inflated price, then leaving the stripped carcass of a bike for eventual crushing, that is when somebody ELSE gets around to cleaning up the mess they leave behind. AND THEY DUNNO HOW TO TAKE A FRIGGIN' TIRE OFF.
Argh. I say just leave the damn bikes in the "barn" or wherever they're waiting, leave 'em waiting a couple more years until they're needed!
SO YEAH - WHEELS!
I just wanted to say, before all else - consider if you will, the "Shark Bite" technique:
Take a STEAK KNIFE anything serrated & sharp with a quick-turning point to it, ie not a bread-knife - GINSU is preferable but don't get into the rim itself with that Ginsu blade 'cause it'll cut through the alloy like a damn hacksaw.
CUT a huge "bite" out of the rubber, and it's important that you do so with a curve, as you're gonna want a nice thin section where there's nothing left of the tire but the BEAD itself and as little rubber as possible cut right close to the wires inside the tire bead. With a broad swath of that bead-wire or close to it, you could even get in there and work with a utility knife or Xacto-blade.
With that sharper razor blade etc, cut away even more rubber, cut slits parallel to the bead so as to open up the rubber in such a way that the wire itself could pull free of the rubber if it wants to.
THEN you get in there with the needle-nose pliers and wire-clippers get the clippers in there deep enough to cut the first wire then pull the free ends of that cut wire outward so as to clear the way to cut deeper. You might even wanna stretch 'em out so as to cut out as much length as possible, then the ends won't poke you while you're working on the others.
The more wires you cut, the easier it will be to stretch the bead away from the rim itself. It's sometimes helpful to use a thick plastic rim guard even a bit of rubber hose or what I like to use is the flat sides cut out from bottles of laundry detergent -
I keep a whole STACK of these on hand for when I'm gonna muck about with tires. They work pretty good especially when you layer 'em so they'll slide against each other. Just don't leave 'em INSIDE the tire! Ha-ha. Make sure to cut the corners of 'em very round, almost like triangular ovals, such that the corners don't poke your hands or worse the inner tube!
ANYWAY yeah use a rim-guard a good thick one, maybe even a hunk of the tire where it isn't cut away, and use that to lever your needle-nose pliers so as to get wire clear enough to snip with the wire clippers.
Once you've done the one side, flip the tire around and cut the other bead. NOW if you wanna get really good at it, you'll be really careful that while the tire's pulling away from the rim, that none of the sharp cut wires scratch against the wheel anyplace. If you've cut a big enough "shark bite" the tire should just fall away no problem. Another thing, if you've managed to "break" the bead away from the rim,
Which is far far easier to do on an older wheel where they don't HAVE the "bead retention ridges" which are necessary for tubeless tires and are nowadays built into even the wire-spoke rims - such that you can seal your wheels up with silicone and run 'em tubeless and save all that weight!!! Ah, but the most of my proper VINTAGE rims don't have that. Like these here 3.00x16" Borrani & 3.50x16" Super-Akront alloy rims.
COUGH - yeah if you've managed to "break" the bead, then cutting the wire will be a lot easier. But it's still the preferred method. 'Cause this isn't about saving yourself the TROUBLE of playing around with the tire levers & #$%* - it's about preserving your alloy rims and keeping them from getting all GOUGED UP and DENTED sometimes even BENT in the case of the really light-weight thin-walled rims.
It isn't about the effort at all, in fact you might even find this to be the more difficult method, at least until you've done it once or twice.
Sure if you've got some rare old OEM tires and you know of somebody who'd buy 'em for a static museum display, heck GO FOR IT, take 'em off the old fashioned way so as to preserve the rubber. Just don't whinge about it when your RIMS are all screwed up!
As for a rim that's bent out of round by a good sixteenth-inch or eighth-inch, that might be from residual tension of a bend which was kept straight while the wheel was laced up before, or possibly from when the wheel was taken apart, if the spokes were cut with bolt-cutters instead of spokes loosened gradually and evenly - But it doesn't sound like too much. Hoops can be straightened out by spoke tension - but I wouldn't just tighten it to the point where it's compliant, as you can wind up with uneven spoke tension in the wheel, to the point where some spokes could loosen and/or break, or the shape of the wheel could change further on as the wheel racks up the miles. So if the hoop is substantially out of round, I'd lace it up under tension then take it apart and see if it's changed very much, re-orient the hub and rim to one another then lace it back up and true it. SOUNDS paranoid I'm sure - but I did this on a couple of wheels I built ages and ages ago, and in the end I wound up with a true wheel that rang out more or less the same note when the spokes were tapped with a drum-stick. The first time 'round I got the wheel true but the tension seemed to have a lot of variance, when I tapped the spokes it made different notes. But it wasn't music. Ha-ha. I don't know whether that's the standard protocol to follow, but it's something I gleaned from rebuilding a handful of skinny 17"/18"/19" scooter and dirt-bike wheels back in the '90s (SL100, CB100, C70 Passport) Nothing wider than 1.85" WM2 mind you. MIGHT have been a WM3 2.15"x17" in there somewhere. And ALL of 'em chromed-steel rims more to the point.
However I wonder how much of that is gonna translate over to these here 3.00x16" & 4.25x18" alloy rims!
These big assed fat/wide things ain't gonna twist as easy. MIGHT bend a lil' bit from the spoke tension - but I fully expect that if there's an out-of-round point on the rim, it'll be from whacking a curb or something, and that the outer edges of the rims are gonna be an unreliable point to measure from. So I expect I'll have to use the bead itself as my reference line - the inside surface of the side-wall, and the circumferential run-out will come from the point of nominal-diameter, where the tire itself is sitting. Maybe even a little closer to the center for another reference point.
But yeah I think there's a lot to consider with respect to materials and rim widths vs diameters. The steel rim - this just makes sense to ME so correct me if I'm wrong - the steel's less likely to absorb a bump locally, and so might translate that bump into a twist or turn a circle into an oval - whereas the alloy being softer seems more likely to bend a lip in a localized area. IMHO - I'm certainly seeing stuff in these USED alloy rims I'm re-purposing, that I didn't see in any of the chromed-steel rims with the rolled-over edges/lips etc.
I think I should point out too, that I've bought more used alloy rims than I'll be able to use. Mostly because of the drilling pattern vs the hubs I've selected to use.
More to the point, once I'd ACQUIRED those rims I needed for the bike - a site which I'd been in contact with for a loooong time began to list the 3.00x16" & 3.00x18" Borrani rims again! They didn't list the 36-hole version of the 3.00x16" but I enquired about it immediately and was told I could order 'em.
http://www.motocicliveloci.it/inglese/catalogue/cerchiborrani_uk.htmNow the FIRST of these rims I'd bought were NOS from an old ware-house clean out over in Italy, both the Borrani 3.00x16" along with the Super-Akront 3.50x16" - which is the lighter of the two, it's important to note if you're considering using one or the other - not to mention it's a very beautiful rim IMHO, however a very delicate rim, and if I find one for a front wheel on my CB900F "CB900K0 Bol Bomber", I expect to need a new wheel every time I whack the front end into a curb! This is why I'm using flanged/shouldered rims up front even a 3.00x18" to go with the 4.25x18" - just a 110/80-18 or the 120/70-18 tires which have superseded them (it's a nominal thing, they're supposedly still 110mm width in many cases) Not really going FAT tire here, just straighter side-walls on some RADIAL type of stuff. If you consider my bike's P.O. left a 140/80-18 Bias tire on my bike's OEM 2.50x18" rear wheel - and that I'd stuff that same tire comfortably on a Super-Akront 3.50x18" I've got for my "skinny" wheel-set - The extra 20mm of tire isn't really all that much to squeeze out of a rim that's so much wider and more to the point heavier - It's entirely feasible to squeeze a 150/70-18 Bias tire onto EITHER of these two rims! 160/60-18 Bias-Ply as well as 110/80-18 Bias-Ply are available for these same rims I've got, and I guess they'd squeeze that front 2.50x18" for the "skinny" wheel set (incidentally the same sizes as you'd find on the CB1100R '82 & '83 models, with the rare & elusive 3.50x18" rear Boomerang Comstar wheel! Oh, that's my OTHER love, is I loves me a good pair of COMSTAR rims, especially if they're rebuilt, like rear rims on front cores, an Akront "Nervi" or weld-widened rear wheel - the dream would be an XBR500 Boomerang or CB400T rear Silver Comstar wheel with their tiny little DRUM hubs either replaced with a carved up lump of Billet OR using an old '69-'74 era CB750K style insert-type rear disc conversion! Talking like a light-weight rim set on par with the original RCB/RS1000.....)
Ooh speaking of which, if you've got a bike with Comstars on it and you THINK that's uncool? You've gotta check THIS out:
https://www.facebook.com/TeamRCBCaillouBedier?fref=tsAwesome stuff!
Oh and hey - something I'm picking up on here as I lace this here wheel - Initially I thought I was gonna have trouble putting the side of the rim with the stamped lettering on the right side of the bike, as is the standard - but it's not even that, as it's switchable left to right - HOWEVER, the rim that I've got is drilled such that the direction of each set of ten spokes is reversed! I ASSUME this is because the wheel is a REBUILD, and they recommend that you pivot your spokes in the other direction when you rebuild it - ME I'd just spin the hub one hole so that the inner and outer spokes are reversed in the holes, and the lacing is the same. But yeah, this rim is drilled for the spokes reversed, in the same holes in the same direction etc, clockwise instead of counter-clockwise.
THAT was why the diagrams and pictures wouldn't work with my wheel! Nothing to do with turning the wheel left to right, just the way it was done when the rim was ordered.
BAH - it's not gonna look like a bone-stock bike anyway, being a CB900F with CB1100R tank Ducati 900SS Bevel fairing, DIY seat pan & side-covers with CB750K0 Sand-Cast "Duck-tail" seat cover, rear-sets constructed from parts of several other Hondas, GL1000 front hub CB750F1 rear hub and two sets of rims 3.00x18" & 4.25x18" OR 2.50x18" Harley-Borrani with 3.50x18" Super-Akront..... But I did sooo much want to follow the original practices in all of the little details, I wanted things to be as though Honda DID build this bike, in an alternative universe.... Well perhaps that's why the spokes run the other way and the clocks spin backwards wherever the heck this bike came from!
Kinda up in the air as to what I'll be able to do with these hubs and brakes etc. Will probably run the exact same rear hubs in these two versions of wheels, but then I've got ANOTHER 4.25x18" rim drilled for Harley, which I assume I'll have to do "the front hub trick" in that one, or I've got this funny little rear hub from a Honda 125cc racer early '80s stuff I think it's an MT125 or something like that - no cush-drive, really not all that much bigger than a front hub, but I think it'll work - and it WOULD be a period-correct part to use. Cheaper than a TZ750 rear hub that's for sure. Gotta be some other options. Or maybe it could even be re-drilled for the KZ750B/KZ1000A conical rear hub, which would be my first choice. Maybe there's something else intermediary between the front and rear hubs, like about the size of a CB250 rear drum - but converted to disc-brake. Ah and with 40-spokes, and a 20mm axle. Nothing I can think of, that's for sure. The whole damn thing would have to be carved from scratch! I'm loathe to build it with any non-Japanese parts, but I suppose it might be worth looking into just when the Harley rear hubs switched to Aluminum. Maybe a Harley Aluminum hub, the "modern" cush-drive type, could be modified to look like a vintage Superbike part - like a TZ750 rear hub or thereabouts. "The Front Hub Trick" is definitely "period correct" and all, it's just not so much an OEM thing. Honda themselves had some very special wheel parts on their race-bikes, but none of 'em were HOKEY or weak! Just gotta find one that's smaller, with bearings able to scale up to a 20mm axle, with 40-holes, and a disc-brake. Not a tall order at ALL....
There's still a possibility that the rim could be re-drilled. I wanna use way thicker spokes anyhow, so it should be possible to drill 'em out that much if it means the spoke nipples are gonna be a whole lot fatter. I mean a WHOLE lot fatter. Even if I wind up going to a Harley rear hub, I know the Harley hubs are offered some VERY fat spokes. Like gauge FIVE type of stuff. Most heavy rear wheel spokes are a gauge seven at the bend and eight at the nipple end. Where Honda front wheels are something like a nine at the bend and ten at the distal end? Is that correct? Just for reference - a gauge FIVE spoke is crazy thick. I don't want it to look like one of those Harley "Fat Spoke" wheels, but I DO want a very stiff rigid wheel on par with a cast/mag wheel. So if the spoke gauge will help with THAT, I'll sacrifice the extra weight. I only HOPE that's how it actually works! Meanwhile this here Honda-laced rim, I'm looking for some extra-heavy-duty spokes for it as well. Gonna have to ream out the holes for the bigger nipples my own self, for which I'll be looking for a precision drill-bit OR perhaps a conical bit and test-fit each and every nipple so as to get 'em fit tight enough. But yeah as heavy of a gauge as I can order for this hub - I'll have the hub's holes reamed out as well, if I can get some even thicker gauge spokes for it. The 3.50x18" Super-Akront I'm not so sure about - I mean yeah it's gonna be used just as hard as the other wheels, and the front wheel that goes with it will have Harley rear wheel drilling so at the very least some over-sized nipples - it would be best to fit the rear wheel with a heavier set than the front, just so it LOOKS right. But I'd like to keep that one wheel as light as possible.
I picture that 3.50x18" going onto a DRUM hub, for a light-weight CB750C/CB750Kzabc DOHC single-seat racer type of deal. For my kid when she out-grows her "KZ440LOL" ... which was yesterday. But yeah with a DRUM it could be a super light-weight rear brake, sans rotor sans caliper etc. IDEALLY it would use a smaller drum too, CB500 type of thing, with an off-set rear sprocket or a dished spoke lacing....
I've got a crap-load of rims to use. I've scored some 40-hole 4.25x17" & 5.00x17" alloy rims from eBay - $39.99ea I couldn't pass that up - again they were drilled for Harley rear hubs, so not so popular an item not in those sizes. But yeah I've got a BUNCH of extra rims.
So for SPARES I was thinking I could build the following - a pair of 2.50x18 front with 4.25x17" rear for a CB750Kzabc DOHC or GL1000 perhaps. A pair with that 4.25x18" rear paired with a 3.00x16" front for a VF750F style pair, 'cause I wanna build a VF based replica of the CZ type 860 the grand prix racer from the '60s - if you've never heard of it you should look it up it's awesome.
I picture a tube-frame VF so Magna, Sabre, or VF400F - the smaller 400cc & V30 500cc are chain-drive I'd rather build one of THEM with skinnier lighter wheels like on par with the original VF750F Comstar rims so while I don't HAVE this size of rim I figure 2.15x16" WM3 with a chopper type "spool" front hub and perimeter discs bolted to the rim flanges - OR a CBX550F fake drum brake up front, with a 3.00x18" rim in the back, with a smaller drum back there just to shed some weight. OR a petite disc hub I suppose. The V30 & VF400F both used a drum, so it would be appropriate to stick with a drum. The VF750S Sabre and VF750C Magna both used a smaller rear drum too, like 140mm-ish.
The spare 4.25x18" could pair up with a 3.50x16' Akront rim I've got. THAT would be a cool set-up for either a VF like I was saying, or a Freddie Spencer replica version of my current CB900F - I'd rather see it on the big VF, but to play around with the idea, the "KZ440LOL" I'm building has a GT750J 4LS drum in a Borrani 3.00x16" rim - I just got it back from 'em and it's beautiful. It's only loose-laced and it's gotta swap out the current plain 4LS hub for one I've tinkered with and hopefully improved, ventilation holes etc. But yeah, I think I'll try it up front on the Honda just to get a feel for riding with a 16" front wheel. Won't have a tire rated for the weight, won't have a BRAKE rated for the bike, but I could glean some sense of how the steering would feel. Seeing as it's being built into a spare 39mm fork from CB900F, it should fit.
So on top of THOSE, I'll still have the 5.00x17" which would pair up well with a 3.00x16" for some type of "Nighthawk-S" wheels, suitable for the likes of a CB600F Hornet, smaller cousin to the 919 - I'm not saying I'd wanna BUILD a bike like that, only that I'd play around with wheels that size on my CB900F or a CB750F etc. Would make for a hella cool BOBBER using radial tires etc. I wanna build a 2nd DOHC Honda but with all DRUM brakes this time, so instead of converting the rear hub to a disc or the front hub to a dual-disc, I'd wanna save up some scratch and throw a 4LS drum hub at the front end. For a DOHC CB750K I picture a 250mm Fontana 4LS drum. Expensive kit, for sure. I'd have to sell off practically everything else to buy it. Still it would be awesome on one of these bikes. I've got the spare Suzuki 4LS drum but that strikes me as far too small. Now this 200mm 4LS is tight in this Borrani rim, but I've SEEN pics of a bigger like 230mm laced into a Firestone type ie Harley style, drop-center chromed-steel 3.00x16" rim - I think it was actually a 2.50x16" - on a Ducati twin built as a replica to the Apollo V4 - another bike you should look up if you've never heard of it. This Duck bevel-head 900 was "sporting" huge fat BALLOON tires. It looked hella cool though. "Only" a Ducati L-twin square-case, but it's the closest thing to a Ducati V-4 Apollo than most people are ever gonna own! Maybe a replica based around the Desmosedicci??? Personally, I dig the CZ Type 860 better, and I figure the Honda is probably the hottest bike of the whole lot, it just needs help with the COSMETICS.
What would be better than a 4LS drum of ANY sort - though a "fake" isn't always better, and there are reasons to use a drum like for simplicity's sake for instance
I wanna make a fake drum, sorta like the CBX550F front internal-disc system which people convert to wire-spokes, only I want one BIGGER - built from a PC800 Pacific Coast front wheel and the GL1500 Goldwing fork. 'Cause the Goldwing fork not only looks exactly like the works racer forks from Freddie Spencer's '82 Daytona winning 1032cc "CB750F" - it's a 41mm TRAC anti-dive fork with a 20mm axle and integral fork-brace, and 286mm rotors with twin-pot floating type Nissin calipers. VERY good upgrade.
Right now I've got the 296mm rotors on the Comstar wheel, the same type as fitted to the CB1100R '82 & '83 models, as well as the GL1100A Aspencade or CBX pro-link models. That's ten mm's larger than the GL1500/PC800 brake - AND I've got a Telefix Aluminum fork brace clamped onto my 39mm fork. But this only has the 15mm axle. And no anti-dive.
I still figure it'd be an awesome upgrade. Especially when the shrouded rotors could be replaced with some cast-Iron water-jet cut plate. Better for the friction coefficient. Of course the rotor shrouds would "NEED" to be replaced 'cause the OEM Honda stuff is just plain old BUTT FUGLY - and there's the aftermarket shrouds with the lights all over 'em and the CBX550F style air scoops. But I'd want some plain smooth covers tight inside of the fork tubes just skinned over the rotors, maybe with an air-scoop up front, but as small and tight as would fit in there.
It would be an awesome alternative to the real drums, 'cause I don't think even the Fontana 250mm (which is wider than the 260mm Yamaha and supposedly stronger than the Munch 270mm 2LS or Kawasaki H1R 270mm 4LS drums) - NONE of the actual drum-brakes would be adequate for a tuned-up Honda CB900F, CB985F, CB1100F etc. You SEE the YouTube vids with the CBX six-cylinder based RC-166 Hailwood Replica racers running this same little Suzuki 200mm 4LS drum - I think people who do this #$%* are CRAZY I mean honestly. That's like building the CB750F with a Suzuki T500 Titan 2LS drum - the 2LS is the same as the 4LS only it's 80% of the width. In other words, the 4LS is 125% of the little 2LS - which was suitable for a 500cc twin back in 1968 or 1967 whenever they built the thing. It's the same size of drum they put on the CB72 Hawk back in ... what, 1963? 1959? LOOONG time ago, either way. And a much smaller bike!
I suppose you could compare it to brakes used on the Vincent Black-Shadow, or Norton Commando, etc. However these big Honda DOHC fours are the far heavier bikes, while both faster and more powerful as well. There's no comparison. I'd THINK about using the most powerful racing 4LS drum the Fontana, on the most de-tuned and smallest displacement of all DOHC-4 Hondas, the CB750C or CB750Kzabc - but that's a total stretch. The KZ440LOL seems like an irresponsible thing to do with a bike for my teenaged Ex-Daughter too.
So yeah for the CURRENT brake system on the DOHC Honda, while there are some great 300mm-ish floating rotors from CBR900RR (mid '90s the 2nd of three versions, is supposed to bolt straight up to the GL1000/CB750K-SOHC front hub!) I would PREFER to use a period-correct brake on it.
But I wanna upgrade it all the same. So originally I wanted to fit these CB1100R rotors, 296mm with 11mm thick double-layered/vented discs - rebuilt/riveted to the GL1000/SOHC type central carriers. All of these Honda Composite rotors use nine rivets and at the same diameter, so they SHOULD swap back and forth. However it occurs to me that the REAR discs from GL1000 & CB750F1 are ALSO 296mm, but they're thinner and hence lighter. So I wanna use a pair of THEM, cross-drilled all to hell, and riveted to the six-bolt carriers for the GL1000 front hub. Well actually I've got a CB750K8 front hub which is a little different, but yeah same deal. THESE with the CBX pro-link caliper hangers, the 39mm CB900F fork, the clamp-on Telefix fork-brace, it's all period-correct stuff bit it should work.
If and when I get my hands on the 41mm fork I want, from the GL1500 - I wanna get some custom caliper hangers to utilize these same 296mm rotors - instead of the 286mm stuff from the Gl1500 - I dunno whether that means swivelling the pivots out a little more and using a longer connector to the TRAC anti-dive unit, or what. I've seen some folks build 'em out of steel plate with some little Delrin or high-density Polyethylene bushes spacing the calipers to the right width. There's also a kit from "Webike" in Japan, which upgrades the existing CB900F2 or CB1100F type TRAC forks to the bigger rotors. SHOULD work with the GL1500 I guess I should look into it. Worse come to worse, a custom milled billet hanger. Kinda like the plate steel version better. They look really cool. Maybe at some point I could get the PC800 hub laced up, and use that with the 39mm fork for starters. There are SEVERAL different combinations of caliper hangers and forks which leave different off-sets for other sizes of rotors, I'm sure there's one that'll work with the 286mm discs. If the 296mm versions apparently work with 310mm discs, I'd bet the 276mm version could be fudged into working with the 286mm rotors....
Now there were ALSO some rotor shrouds built for the GL1000 GL1100 & GL1200 which used forks and brakes and even wheels identical to that fitted to the CB900F, so a person could try THAT with a PC800 "Hub" - maybe some of the other rotors would fit these hubs too, some of the VF750F type of stuff.
Another tricky one is I'm trying to figure out an alternative rear rotor. Am looking at the CB350F/CB400F front disc with it's four bolts and six rivets. Much smaller than the others. I've also figured out the rear disc from early DOHC the single-piece solid-steel "dinner-plate" rotor will fit the CB750F1 rear hub, it's just five hole on a six hole hub - however the center lines up and one bolt hole lines up. The front Comstar discs fit the KZ750B/KZ1000A rear hub, again five bolts on a four-hole hub. They can be made to work. At least the one version would work with the regular caliper and hanger. I'd prefer the CB350F rotor with a special caliper hanger and the CB350F front caliper itself. The front rotor from the earliest Comstar the '77 CB750F is smaller, and it has the same bolt-pattern as the later front rotors so that's an option though again it means a special caliper hanger. Ideally I'll find one that can be cut down to the same size as the modern CBR rotors which I don't wanna use - 'Cause I want it all period-correct. As for whether I'd use a CBR caliper and hanger, or the smaller Honda front caliper and custom hanger I don't know. There are obvious ways of doing it, which would be pretty cheap - but I'm eager to use all period-correct stuff back there. If a later caliper can look just like the front CB350F one I might be persuaded to cheat.
There were some pretty special rear brakes on the likes of the '76 RCB1000 as well as the '83-'84 VF750F-based racers. Compact light-weight hubs, smaller rotors. The latter using the six-point Comstar wheels with a very small rear hub.
I figured out an alternative rotor for the rear COMSTAR, from a ZRX1100 Kawasaki rear brake. But I still haven't found one to suit the six-bolt rear hub from the earlier SOHC bike. I keep looking for something in the 250mm-260mm range, ideally smaller - so yeah if ANYBODY knows of something to use back there? I'd love to hear about it. I wish to hell I'd gone with a DRUM back there.....
-Sigh.
