BUMP! That's some interesting stuff! Especially now that we see so many 'F-olks rebuilding their own Comstar wheels, perhaps there's some chance of using these little tabs on the BETTER/BEST versions of these wheels?
FRONT:
CB900F dual-disc front hub,
alloy spoke blades/plates off an 1.85x18" front wheel from early CM400
2.50x18" or 2.75x18" or 3.00x18" Akront "NERVI" rim
296mm dished one-piece rotors from CB1100RB (replica from Metalgear Australia)
(OR the 276mm 9-rivet type rotors from CB1100F (Canuck/Euro'-spec) & CX500T/CX650T Turbo etc - rebuilt with 296mm outer rings in 296mm perhaps even larger - There's a guy on eBay doing Cast-Iron for the earlier 9-rivet rotors, but the later type have a larger carrier & hence a narrower ring around the exterior - hence a decent weight savings combined with the cast-Iron coefficient of friction? WOW. Strip 'em in silver & they'll look just like RCB/RS1000 front discs!)
Twin-pot calipers from '81-'82 CBX on 39mm fork, or 41mm TRAC fork from GL1200 or GL1500 with 20mm front axle etc.
(tear the guts out of any speedo drive left/right-hand 15mm-20mm whatever - just thread a magnetic speedo pickup's wire down a hollow cable sheath, then use your PC's office suite pie graph program to calculate intervals on new speedo dial face, stuff electric-analog speedo guts into any old speedo housing - voila!)
REAR:
hub carved out of a later model 5-spoke cast wheel, or perhaps a front wheel hub with a bolt-up cush-drive? OR drill out OEM rear?
alloy spoke plates/blades from a '79 CB750FZ/CB900FZ etc
cut-down rear rotor, 9-rivet type, 276mm max - or 260mm 6-rivet type from CB350F/CB400F front, or 240mm 5-spoke from CX500/CB400N etc on the bolt-up "Front Hub Trick" rear wheel.
IDEALLY, caliper could be early type like '75-'76 opposed-piston type, from CB750F1 or early GL1000 fitted as under-slung when swapped left-to-right - these had an integral hanger arm cast with the main caliper body, which might be welded full in the axle hole and re-drilled, or perhaps even cut down & drilled to bolt onto the fork or some DIY caliper-hanger brackets to pair the SS & 'Wing left/right rear calipers as a pair for up FRONT? Any all such single-puck or opposed-piston single-pair calipers of the early Honda type can also use the new PHENOLIC RESIN PISTONS for even more weight savings plus they'll insulate the hydraulics from the brake's waste heat & protect against fade-inducing steam bubbles. Plus the single-puck calipers would help disguise your 39mm or even 41mm-43mm fork upgrades as a stock 35mm item, especially with the dust boots & fork 'ears' covering the tubes! With the original style of rotors in the 296mm or the 9-rivet composite stretched up around 316mm-330mm and still seeming proportional to the original 9-rivet discs from 1969-1978+, and those single-circle outer faces on the calipers, everything's gonna fly right under the radar as "STEALTH"!
The only question being whether you do it in the "featherweight" version for the standard tuning through 836cc big-bore, or whether you go "whole hog" for a 999cc Japauto with Turbo or DOHC 1123cc tuned by "The Captain" for 160RWHP+ - or better yet this idea I've got for a shaft-to-chain(-to-belt) converted V65 Magna based homage to the Czechoslovakian "CZ Type 860" Grand Prix racers, aka "CZ860K0 Sand-Cast"! There's a way to do these mods and still keep the bike looking very much stock, perhaps even keeping original rim widths to shave maximum weight, AND there's a way to beef up all the chassis & running-gear specifications while avoiding the fugly STARBUCKS RACER type of #$%*e with the USD forks & gold-bedazzled spiderflake rotors, 17" cast wheels, mono-shock conversion etc etc. All of this stuff could sneak in under the radar and still look original!
Especially with these black plastic "HONDA" tabs from the early STEEL-spoke Comstar wheels, glued onto the alloy spoke version from 1979-ish. To preserve the whole "silhouette" & everything. That last feature would be ... "fait accompli" or whatever.
...
Just picture it all done up this way - Oh, by the way the Akront "NERVI" rims didn't just come in sizes all the way up to 6.0x18", they weighed about 45%-50% less than the D.I.D. brand rims which were OEM to Comstar wheels.
Picture a proper track-spec tuned '77-'78 CB750F2, set up with fiberglass replica bodywork (one piece replica seat & tail cowl, fiberglass or alloy OEM style tank etc etc) with those lightweight rims and the dished 296mm rotors which shave off a good 50%-55% over regular 9-rivet composite rotors without even drilling any holes & losing surface area - Well actually, in 276mm it's spot on at 50% but stretch 'em to 296mm where the 9-rivet carrier remains the same size, you'd be talking about more like a 60% weight reduction! Meanwhile my 40-hole Akront TR 4.25x18" weighs up the same as the 2.5x18" hollow-shoulder type rim I've disassembled from an '82 CB750F/CB900F rear wheel. I've got scans of the original Akront profile diagrams in my Botophucket (under the same handle) Even with the addition of the 5mm-7mm thick central flange/spine down the middle, the TR type Akront "NERVI" rims (there were both TR and TC types apparently, with TR being the lighter version with the thinner walls) You can safely bet on that 3.50x18" rear, (period-correct to the late '70s GP races and very likely the same sizes found on the '76 RCB Endurance-Racers) is STILL gonna weigh a fair bit less than the 2.15x18" WM3 rim off your original STEEL-SPOKE '77-'78 CB750F2 etc.
An 'F2 like that could blow away the packs of CR750's ubiquitous to "Formula 750" type racing. Such a wheel-set would be on par with the best lightweight Magnesium or composite racing wheels out there. The rotors would be about the best stuff FOUND on a period-correct racer (Them '81 CB1100RB rotors would still be correct to the whole "Forgotten Era" racing, and besides the 9-rivet Cast-Iron version could be construed as a proper '76 RCB works replica item, and thus correct to ANYTHING the '77-'78 CB750F2 could race in. Remembering those BREMBO rotors from the works-spec Italian bikes were only 285mm and we're talking about 296mm - Between that & the opposed-piston calipers carved from the REAR brakes fitted up front, which is pretty much equivalent to an aftermarket Lockheed/Grimeca/AP-Racing caliper?
I don't care whether we're talking about a '77-'78 CB750F2 or a '78 CBX or a '79 CB900FZ or even an '81 CB1100RB, heck even a lot of the LATER stuff straight through the whole V-four era they'd ALL benefit from the same or similar mods.
Heck, even when we're doing a retro-fry job on a GL1200 or a Benelli Sei re-badged as a "SOHC CBX" - the V65 Magna done up in it's own late-'70s guise, we'd wanna stick them black plastic tabs onto the rims. It's just that last "icing on the cake" as it were, to take what might at first glance appear to be nothing more than a '79 vintage substitution, and bring it right back to 1977 proper. Which in this instance is on the leeward side of the SOHC/DOHC Astrological "Cusp" & hence TRES apropo.
Here I'd thought these things were attached around the sides as well, and as such once they'd been split apart they'd have to be made entirely from scratch, cast out of black silicone or some such. The only question being, where to GET a set of the things, carefully removed and in good less-than-completely-oxidized condition, without having to purchase an entire set of the wheels THEMSELVES? Noting of course that these are the ONLY part of the '77-'78 wheel-set that we'd actually be using in the end....
-Sigh.
