Topic: Terry's NEW Redneck CB750 rebuild. The "Swamp Rat". Too soon? Nah..........

[Terry in Australia]

Well I've been away for most of the week, so needless to say, I'm happy that we're having a 3 day "Long Weekend" so I can catch up on some much needed Swamp Rat time. While it was a great day today weather wise, it was still cold first up this morning, so I made myself an egg, bacon and cheese muffin, and Felix, my big black cat, kept me warm until I plucked up the courage to go outside.

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 1 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Okay, so I've got two good wheels with nice new Stinko's fitted, so I thought I'd whip the back wheel off, and install a new one.

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 2 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

There was no point keeping the wheel, it's rim was well and truly fcucked, so I got out the bolt cutters, and gave it a haircut.

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 3 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

The hub will be handy for a future project. 

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 9b by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 4 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I was hoping that the swingarm bushes were gonna be OK, but of course that wasn't gonna happen, they were screwed. Now if there's one job I hate, it's removing the swingarm bushes. I first tried cutting thru the old ones with a hacksaw, heating the swingarm with a gas torch, and finally, I ground some flats on 5 1mm thick washers, and lowered them thru the top bush with a cable tie, which was great for moving the washers into place, then I Used a long screwdriver to bash them out.

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 5 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 7 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 6 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Once the old bushes were out, I decided to give the swingarm a birthday. The paint was stuffed, and there was plenty of rust bubbling up, so I first tried using my blowtorch and wire brush to strip the swingarm, but the paint was too thick, so I got my big sander with it's nylon "strip disc" out, and after 30 minutes or so, I had an almost highly polished swingarm, ready for paint.

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 8 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

The wife had gone out and there were no clothes on the clothes line, so I hung the swingarm and found a 2 year old can of "Rustoleum" gloss black paint and gave the swingarm a nice thick coat. It was a lovely day, but the sun was going down and it was quite cool, so I transferred it into my pre-heated industrial oven to dry overnight.

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 9 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Swamp rat Saturday 8 Jun 2019 9a by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr   

Tomorrow (hopefully) I'll find some new bronze swingarm bushes and re-install the rear end. Probably..........

[RAFster122s]

New paint!  Eekk, there goes the swamp rat street cred...
Haha
David

[Terry in Australia]

Yeah I know David, and it does trouble me, now I've started painting stuff, should I pull the engine out and paint the frame, or just build a bike around what I've got? Sure, new paint is nice, but then you start looking at all the parts you were gonna install, and suddenly they don't look good enough for your shiny ass bike, and before you know it, you've put in another $2000 order at Yamiya?

Whoa, that was enough to bring me back to my senses, tomorrow that shiny ass swingarm is going back into the rat frame! Thank you David, for waking me up to the error I was about to make........... !

[Gurp]

Terry hit it with a coat of flat before you install it so it doesnt stand out on the bike!!

[Terry in Australia]

Terry hit it with a coat of flat before you install it so it doesnt stand out on the bike!!

Thanks mate, that makes good sense, but I won't worry too much, I might even touch up the frame so it doesn't look too bad, but I'm getting ahead of myself. I need to pressure wash the engine and see if I can't make it look a tad nicer, because it does look pretty "ratty" at the moment. I'm happy for it to be another "patina" bike, but even rats have some pride...........

[Gurp]

If only you where doing this build a few years ago. Rat bikes and cafe bikes were IN. Hipsters would have been sissy slapping in street for a chance to over pay for it.
Still could be a cool rat cafe build.

[PeWe]

Let the frame taste some black paint too. Anti rust. Bike will become dusty and dirty by use anyway.

[CB_Jeff]

I agree on painting the frame.  A clean frame will always be a selling point.  Imho the patina concept doesn't necessarily carry through to the frame - I am struggling with this same dilemma on a K8 that I am working on - front of the frame is cruddy and will need some paint.

[Terry in Australia]

Thanks guys, I don't need to restore this bike, I'm only building it to raise cash for my other projects, the "Mad Max" Kawasaki Z1000 and the "Redneck RC51", both of which are waiting patiently for me to turn my attention their way. So many projects, so little time.......

I have a potential buyer for the Swamp Rat, so no need for me to rub it with $100 notes to make it sellable, the potential buyer wants the "As dragged out of a shed" look, and that will save me some time and effort. As long as it goes and stops and isn't dangerous he'll be happy, and I can move onto something more interesting.  

[Terry in Australia]

Well another day, another day closer to getting it done. I decided to pressure wash the crud off it. I only use my pressure washer once in a blue moon (last time probably 2017?) so it took a little while to get it running, but that was OK, as it gave me time to fire up the rat and get the cases warm, and spray some degreaser on the lower halves of the engine, the cylinder block and head were pretty clean after I did the top end rebuild, so it only needed a little cleaning above the carbs.

Swamp Rat Sunday tinkering 1 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

As soon as I'd washed all the goop off and the engine dried, I realised just how much furry white corrosion there was. I decided that there was nothing for it, but to get out the acid. Phosphoric acid, that is, this stuff is great for removing rust, and furry corrosion from aluminium. I just brushed some on with a paint brush, while the phosphoric acid is a liquid, it's a bit "clingy", like a thin gel, so it sat on the alloy cases and ate all the furry white corrosion.

Swamp Rat Sunday tinkering 4 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

After a little while I washed it off with the hose. It removed about 75% of the corrosion, which was good. I forgot to take a pic when I was done, but it looked pretty good, so I farted around for around 10 minutes trying to get it going again. This entailed using compressed air to blow all the water off the points, the coils, the plugs, the carbs, etc. This allowed me to get the occasional "Pop" using the kicker, so I decided to use the electric starter, which gave me a lot more pops, until I decided to use some "starter spray", courtesy of a can of air freshener I had sitting around. Not only did it look nice, it smelled mighty nice too!

Swamp Rat Sunday tinkering 6 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I found some new bronze swingarm bushes. I've had these for years, but every time I go to install them, I can't remember where I put them, so I machine up a set in my lathe. A few days after I installed the home made bushes in the red "Bitsa", I found 3 sets of bronze bushes! Anyhoo, I found them again, but decided to freeze them overnight before I try to install them, to save me some hard work tomorrow.

Swamp Rat Sunday tinkering 7 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I degreased the swingarm bolt and pivot tube, and was happy to see that they were both in really good condition. Most of the external bolts, nuts and washers were pretty badly rusted, so I dropped them in a little bucket of phosphoric acid and I'll leave them overnight and see if I can save any of them, or whether I'll find some half decent replacements in one of my stashes tomorrow. I think this brake arm is too far gone sadly though.

Swamp Rat Sunday tinkering 5 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

The jury is still out on what I can salvage from these shocks, as much as I want to keep this bike essentially stock, I might have to put some old Street strokers on it.

Swamp Rat Sunday tinkering 8 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I had to move the "Redneck RC51" out of the garage to get the pressure washer out. I took a peek at that beautiful HRC built V twin engine tucked in under a warm blanket, and promised myself I'll be riding it soon, well, as soon as I get the Swamp Rat done.

Swamp Rat Sunday tinkering 2 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Of course that's not gonna happen for a little while longer, you guys piss me off but you're right, I do need to pull the engine and repaint the frame. Oh well, so much for me riding it by the end of June, maybe July? We'll see.
     

[Gurp]

Sounds likebthe swamp rat is just going to get nicer and nicer. Those shocks are rough only thing i can see using them for is either mock ups or making a set of struts

[PeWe]

Terry, you must have better and safer shocks in a box or on a shelf somewhere, right?

[Terry in Australia]

Thanks guys, Per I think I've got another set of OEM shocks somewhere that might be better, if not I'm sure I've got better springs, but if it all turns to poop I've got a couple of pairs of after market shocks that will look OK with a clean up.

Well the weather is a bit tricky, rained all night but looks like it's fining up outside, so once I finish my coffee I'll head outside and start pulling stuff apart. More later.  

[PeWe]

Terry, I'll get a new set of Ikons this week to replace the new and bumpy CB750 replica shocks on my K2.

If we should live closer these might have been something for the swamp rat, shiny replica shocks!

[spotty]

I put a pair of brand new street strokers on my old 'Onda years ago and was highly impressed until they sh1t themselves by the end of the week

The redneck RC51 should really be called the redback RC51 given its BLK/red colour scheme from the factory

[Terry in Australia]

That's a good idea Spotty, I'll call it the redneck Redback RC51, perhaps? And thanks Per, those shocks would be good, but I think I might have enough bits to cobble together a set of half decent shocks. That's an interesting story about your Street Strokers Spotty, a friend of mine had a set of those French Fournales air shocks, the ones designed by the makers of the Concorde? They blew their seals very early in life, and as they don't have a spring, his bike looked like a Labrador dragging it's arse.

Anyhoo, I think I had a pretty good day today. I've had a nagging concern the last few weeks since I put it back together, it has been spitting fuel out of carb #1. Now that could have been a carb problem, and I did take these carbs off my bitsa bike for some reason that I really can't remember, but the most likely reason for fuel spitting out the back of just one carb, is due to an inlet valve not sealing, and the compression from the rising piston pushing the fuel/air mix back out. I found a compression gauge and shoved the rubber tip in the plug hole, and sure enough, the best I could get out of it was around 50 psi.

Hmmnn, when I cleaned up the head after replacing the two sleeves and pistons, I remember filling each of the combustion chambers with degreaser, and they both held fine, with no leaks? Maybe I over-tightened the inlet valve when I did the clearances? I wound the engine around to the "T" mark for 1/4, and sure enough, it was way too tight. I didn't bother with feeler gauges, I just backed the screw off until I could move the rocker up and down for that "Tack Tack" noise, and spun the engine again with the compression gauge in place, and I immediately got around 120 psi, so I called it good.

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Ok, so time to take the engine out. Wasn't too difficult with only the footpeg bolt, the rear mounting bolt and the front right hand side bolts in place. I quickly removed the carbs, coils, drained oil tank and sump, dropped the oil filter, and jacked up the engine to separate it from the frame.  I had thought about laying the frame over and pulling the frame off the engine, but Tim had gone out and I would have needed him to help manhandle it over on the trailer, so instead I got my "patient lifter" and I was happy to be able to pull the engine out without any issues. Chopping that section out for my home made "Frame Kit" really helped too, nothing for the top breather cover to snag on, easy peasy!

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 4 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 5 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I wheeled the engine straight into my garage and due to the (very) limited space, nestled it in with my RC51 engine. Two beautiful Honda engines, both fairly unique, with 30 years difference in technology. The RC51 engine is definitely lighter than the CB750 lump!

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 9 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

So, back to the frame. Take a look at this top triple clamp, this is what happens when people who shouldn't be allowed to have tools decide to "customise" their bikes. I assume to move the ignition key up to the top triple?

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 9a by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I tried to seperate the fork tubes from the lower triple clamp, but in the end I just pulled the whole assembly out, what a freaking nightmare, everything was so rusty! I sure am glad that I've got a stash of parts in my garage, I think all I'll be able to use from the original swamp rat is the frame and engine, everything else (not that there was much to start with) is just too far gone..........

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 9b by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

No biggie, I finally freed up the frame from it's rusty neighbours!

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 9c by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

So next job was to start stripping the frame. I like automotive paint stripper, it beats the sh1t out of the hardware store stuff, and a few years ago I'd spent 50 bucks on this can of auto paint stripper.

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 9d by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Sadly, the years of sitting in my garage had changed the chemical composition, and instead of coming out a brownish gel, it came out in black blobs? Bummer! I still slopped it on, and it did bubble up one or two layers of paint, but as you can see, it was a bit patchy, at best.

Swamp Rat Engine removal Monday 10 June 2019 9e by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

While I'm at work tomorrow I'll work on a game plan to get it stripped back to bare metal so I can then de-rust the surface rust on some tubes, and give it a coat of paint, as the colder, wetter weather is on it's way, and if I wait too long, I'm gonna be in trouble. Wish me luck!  

[RAFster122s]

Good luck Terry! Congrats on the progress.
David

[Terry in Australia]

Thanks David, I somehow managed to pinch a nerve in my back, so I've woken up stiff and sore this morning. All going well I'll be right to go for some more paint stripping when I get home from work today, I need to also remember to weld the "Ears" back on for the air box, so, knowing that it's going to rain tomorrow, time is of the essence! (Whatever that means......)

[spotty]

hey terry, did you know that the aussie importer of fournales shocks , bertrand cadhart, was also the guy who did all the paint and fairings for mad max 1 ( la parissiene fairings ) and went on the be mayor of sunny bicheno in tassie where he was the first tasmanian mayor to have a mayoral scooter instead of a car

i'm just a font of knowledge some days ( and full of sh1t the rest of the time)

[BPellerine]

Thanks David, I somehow managed to pinch a nerve in my back, so I've woken up stiff and sore this morning. All going well I'll be right to go for some more paint stripping when I get home from work today, I need to also remember to weld the "Ears" back on for the air box, so, knowing that it's going to rain tomorrow, time is of the essence! (Whatever that means......)
[/quote
did you mark where the ears go before you took the engine out?

[754]

The old weld and nubs are still there..
 We bend those up 90 degrees to mount Webers.

[Terry in Australia]

hey terry, did you know that the aussie importer of fournales shocks , bertrand cadhart, was also the guy who did all the paint and fairings for mad max 1 ( la parissiene fairings ) and went on the be mayor of sunny bicheno in tassie where he was the first tasmanian mayor to have a mayoral scooter instead of a car

i'm just a font of knowledge some days ( and full of sh1t the rest of the time)

Thanks Spotty, yeah I did know that, I did some Army work in a training area in Tassie, near the town where Bertrand was mayor. I watched a doco on the making of Mad Max, the guy who built the bikes with Bertrand for Mad Max said that they "borrowed" 10 Z1000's from Kawasaki Australia for the movie, but by the time they'd finished with them, only 2 were still rideable, and Kawasaki was pissed.

Apparently Kawasaki offered to sell them all 10 bikes for $5000 and they discussed it, but as they were only paid 5000 bucks to build all the bikes for the movie, they really couldn't afford to, and they thought, "Who'd want to buy those bikes after they'd been flogged in a low budget Australian movie, anyway?"      

[Terry in Australia]

Ooher, and it's now a shiny black frame! I came home a bit early from work, so spent 3 or 4 hours with my electric drill and a nylon strip disc removing layer upon layer of old paint, seriously, this thing must have been painted 10 times! All black thank God, at least I didn't have to worry about some of the colours that hipsters are painting our old rockets nowadays.

There was a fair amount of surface rust under the paint too, so the strip disc removed around 50% paint, and 50% rust. Nothing serious though, so that was good. By the time I'd painted it (and myself, black enamel paint had misted over my hands, my face, my glasses etc) the battery on my iphone had gone flat, so I'll take a pic of it in all it's shiny glory tomorrow. Here's one I took when it was just about ready for paint.

Naked swamp rat 11 June 2019 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

More tomorrow!

[spotty]

hey terry, did you know that the aussie importer of fournales shocks , bertrand cadhart, was also the guy who did all the paint and fairings for mad max 1 ( la parissiene fairings ) and went on the be mayor of sunny bicheno in tassie where he was the first tasmanian mayor to have a mayoral scooter instead of a car

i'm just a font of knowledge some days ( and full of sh1t the rest of the time)

Thanks Spotty, yeah I did know that, I did some Army work in a training area in Tassie, near the town where Bertrand was mayor. I watched a doco on the making of Mad Max, the guy who built the bikes with Bertrand for Mad Max said that they "borrowed" 10 Z1000's from Kawasaki Australia for the movie, but by the time they'd finished with them, only 2 were still rideable, and Kawasaki was pissed.

Apparently Kawasaki offered to sell them all 10 bikes for $5000 and they discussed it, but as they were only paid 5000 bucks to build all the bikes for the movie, they really couldn't afford to, and they thought, "Who'd want to buy those bikes after they'd been flogged in a low budget Australian movie, anyway?"    

and now if you could find one of those bikes they'd be worth a fortune, loads of copies over the years though

[Terry in Australia]

Yep, back in the 90's there were some bikes for sale at the Bendigo Swap Meet that were used in Mad Max, including a CB750 engine in an English (Triumph? BSA?) frame going cheap, but back then CB750's were a dime a dozen, so I couldn't see any reason to pay extra for a bike that I would most likely have stripped for parts anyway.