Well I'm hoping that we're having an early Spring. Speaking of Spring, being such a beautiful day today, Spotty and I drove over to collect my poor abandoned K0 from the storage place and pull the engine out to fix some oil leaks, and install the Yamiya pipes that I've still got in the unopened box that I've been meaning to install all year. As expected, the bike was covered in dust, and the tyres were pretty low on air, as I haven't ridden it since January(?) last year.
The reason I haven't been riding it is that it started running on two cylinders, and swapping out the electronic ignition made no difference. Anyway, I decided that with Spotty's help, I could get it fixed and running again properly, and install those new pipes. The first problem though, was when I backed my "ute" up to the trailer, only to discover that someone had stolen my towbar! Fcukers! I assume it was the same arseholes who smashed the back window of the wife's Hyundai a few weeks ago and either tried to steal it, or just steal things out of it. I've bought a security camera that I'm going to mount on the front of my house to monitor the sidewalk, so if I hear a noise I can see who's lurking outside, and shoot them with my air rifle. I won't kill them of course, I'll just dissuade them from ever touching my vehicles again..... Anyway, Spotty had a spare, and after drilling new mounting holes for it, we hitched the trailer and drove over to the storage unit to collect the poor old K0.
K0 first ride in 2 years. 11 August 2024. by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr
We took it back to Spotty's place, and I couldn't help but turn the ignition on, to see how the 4 year old Motobatt battery was doing, as it hasn't been near a charger in those 4 years, and after almost two years of sitting, I expected to be flat. Surprisingly the neutral light looked pretty bright and the horn beeped loudly (well, as loud as any CB750 horn) so I opened the gas tank, hoping it wasn't full of rust, but as it was almost full, there was no rust evident. Bonus. I couldn't help myself, I pulled on the choke and gave it 3 kicks, and it fired up, on all 4 cylinders! Amazing!
I let it warm up and then hit the engine with some degreaser and then hit that with the pressure washer, and the engine looked spotless! We stopped for lunch and then I had to pump the tyres up and go for a lap around the block. The bike ran great despite the old fuel in the tank, and while the master cylinder needs rebuilding, the front brake still worked, sort of. I asked Spotty if he'd like to take it for a ride, and he was keen, so I took a short video of his return, his yelling was something to do with the fact that he hasn't ridden a CB750 in awhile, and actually expected the front brake to work, like they do on more modern bikes.
By this stage we (well, me really) decided that it was too late to start pulling the engine out, so we'll do that next weekend, see if there's a loose wire to the coils, replace the cam cover gasket and alternator cover gasket after using the "sandpaper on glass" method of flattening the two cover's gasket surfaces a tad, shove the engine back in, install the new pipes, give it an oil and filter change, and hopefully, go for a decent ride. It'll be nice to have it back as a regular rider, especially on sunny days like today.
K0 first ride in 2 years. 11 August 2024. 2 by
Terry Prendergast, on Flickr