Topic: RE: F'nK project bike.

[Don R]

 I hung a set of coils on it, found the peg motor mount bolts, seat hinges and put on the new to it seat. I rolled out the motor. I may seal this snotter up and tow it to the car wash. It had a really leaky top end and a broken spark plug. Now it's got a nice low mile head, new head gasket and nickel washers.
 I already pressure washed that rear hub, the PO must have lubed the chain with tar.
  The 41a carbs were picked out with some help from you guys, they have the screens over the float valves so were the correct carbs. I cleaned them already.

[Don R]

 I went out and soaked it all down with simple green. I need to find the exhaust flanges, there's a box full of old ones under the bed. Hopefully there's a complete set that looks OK. 

[Don R]

 I checked the brakes, Surprisingly the F1 rear disc works good, I cleaned the front (it was sticking) and haven't bled it out yet.  I ordered a new piston seal for each of the 3 F1 type front calipers I have. A valve cover gasket for this beast and a spare.

[Don R]

 Tonight, I had to go out to the shop to turn off the air compressor, so I followed my routine and did one more thing to the F1, I try to do one every day. I hooked up the oil tank, most of the motor mounts put on a points cover that I hammered out on the sandbag. Soon I'm going to buy a battery or two. If I sell a couple of these bikes I'll rotate them and let go of the older ones.

[Don R]

    The disc brake rear wheel was a greasy mess. The PO obviously greased the chain often but never cleaned it. I took it off and put it in a garbage bag, then used a can of spray degreaser on it. That didn't fix the mess, so I soaked the grease with WD40 and took it to the car wash. $5.00 in quarters later and back home I sprayed it with WD40 again. The spokes look nasty too, I'm hoping it's grease and not corrosion. 
    I was pleased to see the tires were bought during this century, most of my project bikes don't sport such modern rubber.  I ended up working on the rear disc brake after all, after a few test uses it got draggy. The pistons aren't too bad, but the pads are another matter, the gl1000 pads I have don't fit either fooey.
  I have FA 32 pads from my gl1000 project and all the ebay ads show FA32 pads fitting so I'll try them and see.
  Edit, I was wrong my pads are Fa29, I oordered a set of 32's.

[Don R]

 I haven't parted out a titled bike before but I'm getting close to killing off at least one of these two. L0L.  I'd prefer to build my turbo bike now and these dogs are eating a lot of hours and parts.
edit:
   I felt better about the F today, I'm robbing parts from my F1 rear disc brake assembly that I was going to use on a triple disc bike.
   I opened the driveline tote and found a nice barely used chain that was exactly for the F length, I could not get a master link in the thing. Then it began to feel familiar, I tried it before and assumed my master link was wrong. Well it is, but only for this chain.
   I think it's some farm grade chain that's for some reason wider. It went in the scrap. I made a new one up. 

[Don R]

 I'm enjoying learning the F0/1 rear disc brake. Once you have the master cylinder dialed in it's easy to pump out both pistons. I just used a vise grip pliers and a piece of gasket to close off the port between the halves.
   I wonder if two piston F0/1 calipers make more stopping power than the F2/3 single piston? 
   The new pads came today so I dropped them in, the quick change feature could be more useful if you used a lot of brake pads or wanted to try different compounds.
   My spare F0 swingarm assembly's caliper is missing its dust cover, I've been through both of the brake totes looking for it. The one that was with it was for a dohc caliper.
 

[seanbarney41]

I have not ridden my F2 in a few years but I never noticed any difference in the rear brake of my F0...if anything maybe just a little less feel with the F0.  I did dump my F2 once when a car in front of me stopped suddenly, I locked the rear, got sideways, and lowsided.  That cost me an original black stator cover, irrepairably cracked.  So, powerful rear brakes are not necessarily a good friend.

[Don R]

 I hear that. When I triple disc'ed my former F1 I scalloped a front tire practicing emergency stops. I hadn't ridden in 20 or so years and was taking it pretty seriously.  Something I should do more of on the K0's and my gl1000 with v65 front brakes.
  That bike sold later at Mecum by another owner, I recognized the drill pattern in the rotor and the off color side covers. (Too gray) They had put the right rotor on the left and kept the left rotor. It looked odd with the spiral backwards.  It still was under 10K miles and brought around $8K.

[Don R]

 I had forgotten to put the dust covers back on, that got done today, it bled easily and the pistons now retract well. I greased the back of the new pads too. Hopefully no squeaks, Next up I spun the rotor and sanded it a little with a scotchbrite pad. The strut bushing got greased and next put on the cotter pins.

[Don R]

 The coil wires suck and all of the old coils around here have at least one bad wire. I'm thinking of getting a set of gl1500 coils, they're cheap come with usable wires and you get 3 of them. 3.3 ohms primary, I run them on my gl1000 with a dyna and no ballast resistor.

[Don R]

 Boy this set look like they lived under water, They came off a Valkyre. nothing like the gl1500 set I got before. Wires are toasty etc.

[Don R]

 I made an easy mount, the valkyre one works better than the gl mount. The wires are workable but the plug wire ends needed cut off due to the boots. I put on an oil filter and housing, 1 and 4 wires and drank beer. I laid out the K0 new rims, hubs and spokes for the diecast bike. n'F  needs a better headlamp ring and hardware. I have 3 or 4 rims to build depending on my tire choices.

[Don R]

  The right control is toast. Not really a big surprise, there is a start button on the left near the side cover. I may use a set of K3 controls that are on a set of tall bars in the shop.

[Don R]

 I found a new looking lower half F1 type start switch and a repro top half with a purple kill button. No idea why I have two good half switches. The meter says the start and headlight circuits are good.
  I'm using 400F bars and the original left control. I removed the front headlight mount and straightened it a bit but might use aftermarket H4 headlight and clamp on ears with small turn signals.
  Advertise it as a cafe racer?

[Don R]

  The PO wired around the broken start button, I'm removing everything non stock and putting it back.
   I put on the 400F bars and didn't shorten the lengthened wires. I'll loop them behind the gauges.
   My aftermarket right control has some non stock wire colors. green and green/red  are normally closed so, must be the headlight and the black/black/red are open except when the button is pushed, must be the start. I did get the headlight to come on before going to my granddaughter's softball game. Starter still not operating though. There is a jumper from the fuse block area to the rear brown to turn on the taillight.

[Don R]

 I cut out the jumper, found some matching color wires and soldered it back like it came. Brown isn't hot yet except a hot brown in the headlight bucket. I have two black wires hot going to the headlight switch, neither the wierd green or green/red have power, I jumpered the 12 volt solenoid wires and it clicked so I'm assuming the two wires going into the right control make a circuit that needs fed with 12V even though one is green as can be and the other is green/red.

[Don R]

 I put the brown wire at the rear back to original and now all of the lights are working.
   The genius at the parts store said he didn't have any flashers for a motorcycle. I told him quiet, they don't know they are going on a motorcycle. He also thought he needed one of them for his hot rod that has new LED's in it and I just bought all of his stock. I told him to get the electronic one that says  "FOR LED's" on the wrapper. Jeesh, what a maroon. 

[Don R]

 I perused the wiring diagrams and believe I have a right control for a 76A on my 76F holy crap, there is a difference.

  I gave up, since the previously tested switch no longer works. I think it would have worked  had it not  displayed it's fault.

[Don R]

  A new K2/K4 reproduction right switch is installed and same result as before. No circuit between the black and brown/white wire when the headlight switch is off or on. The Black feed is hot but no wire returns 12V except black/white.

 The starter circuit blows the main fuse every time I push the button. At least there is a result. I'll swap out the start relay since the wiring appears to be fine. I'm beginning to understand why this thing had a few wire arounds in it. Back to original wasn't as fun as I had hoped, and modified to a K4 switch isn't either.

[seanbarney41]

I think it took me like 3 months to figure out my orange f's wiring.  It still doesn't all work right and does weird stuff.  But the damn thing always runs sooo good.

[Don R]

 Hooray! I ate dinner, went back out, ignored the wiring colors and used the test light and a jumper to see what worked. All of the colors ended up matched except I jumpered red/black to red/black and blue/brown. It's really handy having a sacrificed harness around from a wrecked F to nab some wire colors and ends from. I also bought the proper crimper from vintage connections and it is a delight to use. It made a sweet two wire male end with no trouble at all.
  Now it has the high/low beam, tail, brake, turn with beep and running lights but no blue indicator. I shot some contact cleaner into the key switch and the oil and N lights both began working regularly. Go figure.
 
  Now I need to see why there seems to be an overload in yellow/red to the solenoid. The start relay wires were cut off and it had been jumpered to an aftermarket switch. I assumed it was due to the failed start button switch since the wires were gone.

[Don R]

 I now realize the early wiring has a black to the start relay and the start button makes a ground. To use the early switch on the F it needs a black where the green red is connected. Red/green formerly to the start relay may hang loose as the N light is working and there won't be a clutch switch like my K0-K2 bikes.  Yellow/red will make the starter relay ground when the button is pushed.
 That should make everything work like Mr. Honda intended before the safety folks stuck their noses in.

[Don R]

 I also popped the carbs on.

[Don R]

  The n'F got a new/used clutch cable when I put the new short one on the Hot Rod bike. I finished up the wiring, not sure how that bundle goes back into the little black box. It starts like a k4 now and the headlight has an on/off switch.  I had a left-over wire for the starter safety circuit and removed the clutch switch. The N light works fine so I'll leave the rest alone.
  The gl1500 coils are wired in on the low side now the plug wires need cut and connected.