Topic: CB550 cafe project

[nbcam]

I have been meaning to start a project trend the past couple of months. I bought this CB550 last summer, long story short the guy I bought it off couldn’t get it running and lost interest.

It’s was not perfect as it’s got a cb650 frame but was worth it for parts alone, got the bike back to garage and started to try and get it running.

The bike has never being running while I had it, when I first got the bike I cranked it over by hand. I checked valve clearance and it was off, I also checked the compression and had very little compression across any of the cylinders.

I pulled the valve cover off and noticed at TF1.4 the key on the cam was off, see pic below of approx location marked in red

I lined the cam up correctly and put the cover back on. Checked the valve clearance again and it measured correct for intake and exhaust on each cylinder.

Cranked it over a few times and was averaging about 90 psi across the cylinders, at this point I had no faith in any of the work that was done prior to me so I pulled the head off the bike and was looking for recommendations on the next step I should take ?

To me the surface of the head seems rough, looks like he took a dermal and went to town on the head.





Dropped the head, jugs and piston off at my local machine shop to get checked it. Couple of weeks passed and the outcome was 2 bent valves, he resurfaced the head, jugs and honed the cylinders. The pistons and cylinders were within spec so I was lucky to get away with new rings.

Life got in the way and finally picked the head up from the machine shops a few weeks ago and started the rebuild process

I decided to go with OEM rings and got new OEM piston pin clips also


Decided to spray the head and jugs in engine primer, one coat of Matte black high heat engine paint and put a final coat of wrinkle paint on to finish
.


I decided to buy as all OEM seals and gaskets (apart from head gasket went with vesrah)








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[nbcam]

Lined the rings up approx 120 deg off and put the jug back on the bike with new head gasket and seals. I also put a new cam chain tensioner as the old one looked badly worn and was starting to show small cracks.










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[nbcam]

I am now putting the cam shaft back on the bike, cam is in place and lined up correctly this time !!

TF 1.4 lines up with the key in cam shaft





I do not have any Honda bond is there any other sealer I can use for the rubber pucks

Also is there any tips or trick to setting cam chain tension ? Is there a certain amount the cam chain tensioner should be tightened. Concerned about the gap between the tensioner and chain highlighted below



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[Scott S]

 Nice work.

 Are you sure the tensioner is seated in the cup in the lower engine case?

 Permatex MotoSeal 1, item #29132 can be used as a non hardening sealant.

[nbcam]

Just popped the cam off and double checked it appears to be seated correctly

Should the bolt highlighted below in red be fully tightened ??




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