Topic: Welcome to the 70's!

[nuwonder]

So here's something funny for you all A 1972 Honda Cb500 Four K2. (or K1, looks like frame is K1 and engine K2)

Three years ago I bought her, looked like a bit of history of chopping and the stance was pretty much what I was after. It had that rake and modified swingarm already back then. I started dismantling, found out the terrible hacksaw+welding job what was done to the rear of the bike and decided to redo it. I stripped all the chemical metal what was covering the neck to see if the raking was as bad as the rear, but fortunately that was solid. I chopped the rear off and made a new king/queen fender rigid enough to hold a passanger. Made a seat which my friend upholstered and made a sissybar for it too.

Then after first winter came lots of other projects and this baby lived in the boxes for two years. I tried to do some stuff every now and then, mainly to the frame, but it looked like a long way to test ride. I did rebuild the engine, it had some issues along the way but nothing major. Most problems came with broken valve guides so I replaced all of them, replaced all valves and got the head planed while at it.

But now that day has come! Well, I hope. This summer I really rushed things 'cos I haven't had a bike to ride for two years and I'm getting depressed about that. There's a lot of things still to do for this bike, thought to update here over the next winter. Mainly controls, brakes, rear wheel hub, clutch needs work, sissybar needs work etc. I have four fishtail pipes I intend to put there but I gotta make extension to the header pipes before that.


The paint is just a rattlecan special I threw on to protect the bike. I'm planning to sodablast the frame at some point and paint it properly. Gonna then get a new tank and properly paint that too. But for now it's a 30€ space-themed paintjob and I'm happy with it

But it really looks like I can test ride her a bit this week. Still don't have front brake so gotta take it easy (PO has snapped a bleeder bolt inside the brake caliper) and my old clutch cable snapped as I was installing it (argh!) so gotta fix/replace that now but anyhow, pretty excited!

Hope you get something out of it, this is how she sits right now :

[nuwonder]

And here's me riding the original thing when I got it 

[Scott S]

 I dig it! Are you going to put the side panels back on?
 Only change I'd suggest is all chrome shocks.

[nuwonder]

No sidepanels for now, I want that area be open. I still have to test how bad the water/gravel/dirt splatter is gonna be under the batterybox, 'cos there's no fender which closes the lower area. Might have to do something about that then.

Chrome shocks are definitely on the list! I actually would like all chrome closed shocks so no spring on the outside But I do like the black ones too, they work with black swingarm and make them blend nicely with the rear wheel.

[bwaller]

No offense, but often it wasn't glamorous! 

[SOHC4 Cafe Racer Fan]

Old School! Wow, what a seat.

[PeWe]

When you have got a chick on the seat, she can't escape

[andy750]

I like it! Looks great would love to see a pic 2 up

[nuwonder]

Man I can tell making that seat took quite an effort  Usually king&queen seat is on normal fender and that would've been probably a good idea to do but as I had done the whole fender in king&queen -shape, I had to match the seat curves pretty damn close with the fender curves. AND make the seat rigid enough when it's off it doesnt bend all over the place! I'm happy how it turned out, it feels good to sit although it's quite thin, and it's perfect for me but anyone who is over 170cm tall is gonna have hard time on it 

I got my clutch cable fixed but still having hard time with the clutch. Seems like when the bike is on gear and I pull the clutch in, it doesnt work. If I push bike forward it's still on gear and the clutch is not disengaging. Oh well, I read that these early 500 clutches are bad news. I had -77 CB500 K3 before which had the CB550 clutch. Much nicer. I miss that now

[greenjeans]

Love it!

[63SSRagtop]

Yeah that's pretty cool.. haven't figured out what I'm going to do with my amen frame in regards to the sissy bar yet but cant wait to get working on the rear end!

[thirsty 1]

Badas$!!! I like it I like it!

[Camrector]

 

[nuwonder]

Damn wish I had one of those Amen frames to work with! I really like them, but finding one here in Finland is impossible and if I got it shipped here, it pretty much has to have a title to get it registered. All bikes are registered by frame in Finland.
I think the cops are gonna give me hard time even with this bike, I haven't actually legalized my work on it yet

Yeah that's pretty cool.. haven't figured out what I'm going to do with my amen frame in regards to the sissy bar yet but cant wait to get working on the rear end!

[nuwonder]

Oh no, don't cry!  If it helps, the bike was already mutilated so I just tried to give it a better life 'cos it was sad little bike

[63SSRagtop]

Yeah, I've got some head scratching to figure out on getting her legal but thing I have a plan... I get pulled over every couple of days on the walking bike so most of the cops know me around here already lol

[nuwonder]

My list for to-do during next winter currently is:

- Change front foot controls back to mid controls. Those front ones just.. besides being ugly as hell, they feel very bad. I will probably want to have some kind of foot rests in the front but I think I can make better than those
- Finish the sissybar. At this point it still is missing one supporting piece and it has to be polished. It also could use some decorating instead of being just piece of (stainless) steel.
- Rear wheel. The final flange carrying the sprocket is worn to the end of it's life. There's a sleeve and a spacer to keep it in bay, but I think it needs replacement and the sprocket stud+nuts have to be replaced as well.
- Exhaust. As I said, I have four fishtail pipes I wanna put on the back of the bike so exhaust needs somekind of middle piece between those and header pipes. I just have to decide do I wanna replace header pipes before that, because these original ones are in pretty sorry shape.
- Clutch. The lifter rod is in two pieces and very worn. The cable holder is mangled. At this point I can't even get the clutch working. It DID work when I bought the bike so there must be a way to make it work again with this setup but it's very suspicious setup so that needs some love too. Found nice post here how to make new clutch rod so that's first on the list 
- Front brake caliper rebuild / replacement. This is in very sorry state, but would probably work ok if dismantled, cleaned, repainted, new pads, new cylinder etc. But maybe full replacement would be just easier and about the same price in the end.
- New front light(s). The current one is LED and not very good. I want two small lights there too instead of one big.
- Polish the engine cases

[nuwonder]

Managed to get a little test ride in today! Man, can't even tell how it feels after three years 

First impressions are: much better ride than I expected. Goes nicely and straight. The 500 is so small and light it's even pretty easy to manouver. Of course it's nothing like the original setup, but that's what choppers usually are: all good original riding attributes are destroyed as the frame geometry takes a smack in the face

Gear lever and linkage are really flimsy, can't really go through gears smoothly but I think I can tinker with it a bit. Gotta make a new piece for the linkage in where it connects to the gear lever shaft. That, or just go to mid-controls immediately, but i'm on a bit of a budget now so let's see.

But I'm pretty happy now! It's a good point to start polishing the build while going for little rides.

[Shtonecb500]

Your bike looks great, I love everything about it and I love the stance. I have a couple 500's and I want to make a bobber out of one of them....this will most likely be an example that I follow.

[nuwonder]

Thank you! Glad you like it

If you wanna ask some more questions about the build when you start your own project, feel free to send PM and I'll be happy to give more detailed info!

Your bike looks great, I love everything about it and I love the stance. I have a couple 500's and I want to make a bobber out of one of them....this will most likely be an example that I follow.

[nuwonder]

Been raining all the time. Pisses me off.

Few more test rides done and clutch needs definitely new cable, new pushrod and probably new adjuster.  It starts slipping real bad when engine gets warm and getting gear into neutral when running is impossible.

Few more pics:

[RAFster122s]

Before 2 up riding can occur he will need to address some foot pegs for the passenger to rest her feet on...
You'll want to add a chain guard to the To-Do list, safety issue really.
Also, do be sure to fully compress the rear suspension to ensure if you hit a big bump you aren't going to have an accident if the tire has no where to go because of the rear wheel well. If you can remove the head and spring cover you can put some bump stops in the shock to limit travel, but then you have limited travel, so it will punish you when you hit full travel, just not as bad as a rigid frame would all the time.
For 2 up you will need to have shocks that have enough pre-load settings to allow you to compensate for the passenger without eating all your shock capacity.  A shock with 5 settings and properly sprung will help a lot. Looks like you have the MDI or similar brand shocks and they are massively oversprung on most every bike they fit...in fact, no clue if they just slapped a pair of heavy springs on them for looks or what.
It is a chopper and its handling is compromised as you have indicated