I have the steering damper mount from a member here also. Going to put it on once I figure out which damper I want.
I put a key switch bypass for power to the coils on a '67 CB450 cafe in 2015, is this what you have done?
Not quite: the Keyswitch Saver arrangement uses the keyswitch to turn on a relay, which carries the bike's loads in place of the keyswitch. The [now very common] Chinese-made keyswitches we are seeing are patterened after the similar unit from the CB350 series bikes, which had an 8 amp load. The wires and internal contacts are sized at about 9 amps, and are not silver-plated like Honda's used to be, so the [also undersized] wires get so hot that I have seen several of them melt the Black wire right off the switch - which is exactly what happened to me in traffic one hot day in 2007. The 750 runs 10 amps with the K2 setup, and more with the K3/later versions, and often even more from things like halogen headlights (like mine).
I would be interested in the testing of altered sprockets, As an mechanical engineer I've understood the tooth design of sprockets promoted gradual engagement as the chain progresses into the sprockets, increasing smoothness and reducing noise. It would be interesting to see what testing shows when the tips are removed.
I've run Diamond pre-stretched chains since 1975 when I put one on my 500four. I believe they failed prematurely because I did not fully understand what 3/4" slack in the chain meant back then. I was replacing them every 7 or 8K miles. I had 17,000 miles on the Diamond chain installed in 2008 on this 750. I switched to a X ring chain for this build after reading that they have less friction. Do you believe they are still in business?
Diamond sells the XDL series chains today, in place of the original XD version. Recently I bought 2 NOS XD chains and 2 NOS XDL chains on eBay from a vendor who found them in his inventory. Diamond also offer a slightly less strong version (dual stakes instead of 4), called their Powersport chain, since about 2004 or so, good on smaller bikes like the 500/550. I do see quite a few of these on the 750, too.
The 'magic' of the XD series chains is in their then-original (1969-1970) design: the rollers are hard as nails, and they have 0.004"-0.008" clearance between them and their pins. They are also narrower than the 'normal' rollers by 0.030" in the 530 size so the lube can more easily enter the interface by the sideplates, to the pins. The sideplates are heat-treated and shot-peened on their outer sides with 0.0005" undersized holes for a hot-only press-fit assembly, and then the pins are quad-staked on the outsides of the sideplates (the Powersport has just 2 stakes). The master link must be installed using an extra (and older style, loose masterlink plate is easier) sideplate and often vice-grips at first, as it is the strongest masterlink made and it prefectly matches the link dimensions of the links, which no other chain can claim. So, you cannot 'feel' the masterlink hitting the sprockets, which is always apparent on other chains after 1000 miles or so. After 1000 miles it is possible to reassemble the sideplate using the pliers in the Honda toolkit.
The sprocket details are outlined in my book, if you have a copy: today we can't get the oversized-base-circle sprockets (unless you stumble onto a genuine Honda sprocket from pre-1996 or so) that made such a stunning power and wear improvement, circa 1971 and later. Having its base circle made 0.5mm larger to [greatl] improve the torque transfer, over 120 degrees of the sprocket instead of the usual 60 degrees of the SAE design, made the tooth tips also shortened by that amount - this accomplished multiple things, most important being the 120 degrees of power transfer. By shortening the teeth today by 1mm or so it will greatly reduce the collision of the tooth tip and roller at entry/exit of the chain on the sprockets, particularly if you have the improved loose-roller versions patterned after the XDL. Most of the better chains today use this model, except in the X-ring or O-ring chains: they are still in the Stone Age of Chains as regards this important minor change, and this is partly responsible for their large power loss - not the O-rings as is popularly claimed.
Using the Honda sprockets and the XD and XDL chains, I obtained 40k chain miles (before 1% stretch) and more than 90k rear sprocket miles on my own bike. I run about 10k miles on the front sprocket, then flip it and run that far again before replacing them. That's the kind of difference this pairing makes, so it's worth the effort to chase down the parts, IMHO.
I bet your motor pulls like a Massey Ferguson tractor with those modifications!
It sure runs smoother, cooler, quieter, and pulls harder at higher speeds! After I broke it in I surprised myself one morning at a freeway onramp (the first one I happened to hit after almost 1000 miles of in-town and local putting) when I found myself in triple-digit speeds at what used to be the same throttle grabs-and-shifts into 3rd gear. I almost ran into the back of a car in the process, even though he was doing at least 80 MPH. After that day I went to a 19T front sprocket for a month to tame my 50-year-old '750 reflexes' while I re-learned how to ride my old friend. That made 5th gear into an overdrive, putting me at 70 MPH in 4th before using it. That mod required altering the rubber cushion on the post behind the sprocket (on the sprocket cover) because even with the teeth trimmed a full -1mm, they still hit it.
