Hello all,
long time lurker, first time poster.
I am an engineer from Switzerland (not Swaziland), the land of banks, guns and chocolate. Wedged inbetween 'Ze Germans', 'le french', 'gli italiani' and 'Ze Österreicher' (and some Lichtensteinians) we have no sea-shore to ride along, but lots of lakes to ride around and twisty hill roads. Plus, within 2 hours of driving, you find yourself abroad. So road trips into foreign countries can be done on a sunny saturday afternoon...
to enjoy these roads i picked up motorcycling at the age of 12, 'borrowing' the moped from my elder brother. I soon drove all kinds of brands, old Vespas, french Peugeots, Swiss Condors (A580, really cool bike!) but fell in love with a crappy surf bike i encountered on Bali.
That mistreated bike was all hacked up, rusty, and fitted with surf hooks. It used to be a Honda CG125, the Nokia brick phone of bikes. Since i puttered around on that two-wheeled tractor, i did stick with 4-stroke-bikes from Honda (apart from that time i bought a sweet Kawasaki KE125). I cant remember how many small caliber Hondas i owned, but the number must be pushing 30... and i had them all: SL125, CB125 (both single and twin), XL125, TL 125 (and the very swiss-specific IHATOVO-TL125) CL125 and lots of CG125. Plus some trailbikes and Cubs. I have a Honda-wing-shaped hole in my heart, around 124cc big, and it gets bigger and bigger...
So i picked up a CB250G twin project-bike (the CB250G is the european CB360 twin with reduced displacement due to tax reasons) which i brought back to life, no customization, just optimization (Konis, Bronze bushings, tapered bearings etcetc). that thing runs sweet, but with 250cc its way underpowered for its ...girth.
And now, i own a CB550F1 from 1976, which also was 'tinkered on', and a very unsettling rattle that comes from the top end. Luckily it came with a parts bike with no wheels and 80'000 Kilometers on the clock. lets see what i can do with this...
I'm looking forward to contribute to this forum,learn a lot from people with experience and the same passion for Hondas, and i hope i can share some of my 125cc-wisdom that might apply to bigger SOHC4-bikes.
