The story of my bike starts about 10 years ago when I was in high school. I was friends with a kid named Paul who had an awesome dad. What made his dad so awesome? He collected really cool vintage stuff. Jukeboxes, models, car magazines, cars, snowmobiles, etc. Thanks to Paul's Dad, I can say that I've ridden in a Citroen DS19. At one time he had a Jaguar mk IX, triumph TR3, two Porsche 356's, said Citroen, over 50 vintage snowmobiles, and probably more. Cool, right?
Paul's dad also collected bikes. To be honest I never knew how many bikes he had besides the three I had seen in his garage. It turns out he had around a dozen bikes in various states but all needing some work, not to mention plenty of spare parts.
Sadly, Paul's dad had a brain aneurysm while we were in high school. Luckily he survived but will spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair and has cognitive complications from the aneurysm.
A few years ago I was contacted by Paul's Mom through facebook. Apparently she saw that I was into old bikes and was wondering if I would advise her and help her sell her husband's motorcycles. With no agreement as to how I would be payed, I immediately agreed. Who could possibly turn down the chance to play with a bunch of old bikes?
-Sidenote: I soon found out that before I was "hired" to sell the bikes that Paul's mom had already sold a K0 and K1 cb750
I have no idea what shape they were in when sold but she basically said that she sold them for a song. She didn't know what they were worth
Anyway, the collection was scattered about 3 different locations. The first time I saw "my" cb750 was when I went to catalogue the bikes at a warehouse belonging to Paul's Uncle. It was hard to get at because it was sandwiched between a wall and an ambulance that didn't run. I snuck my way in there and took the best pics I could. This was in late fall of 2009.
As you can see she was rough but there was obvious potential. There was no major pitting in the chrome, no gigantic dent in the gas tank (and no rust too!), the motor turned over, and it was very original.
I honestly had no plans at first to acquire the bike because just days before I had arranged to buy this beauty, my first cb750 and also a K6:
Long story short, I got the green bike running on a shoestring budget but I didn't have the money to make it properly streetable and reliable. I ended up selling it to pay off the balance on the engagement ring I later gave to my now wife.
As time passed I began to think of ways I could get enough money to make a proper offer on the red K6 but even if I could get the money ( I couldn't, we were saving for a wedding), I had no place to store the bike since the 350 took up all the extra space in our one car garage. Luckily, one day I was talking to Paul's Mom about how selling the bikes was going and she asked me if I was interested in any of them. I immediately mentioned the 750 and she said I could have it!!!! I still had nowhere to put it but I finally had myself a 750 again.
About a year after she said I could have the bike, my wife and I moved to a place with a slightly larger one car garage. It looked juuuuust big enough to fit one car and two bikes. Meanwhile, Johnie kept bugging about when we were going to go get that K6. A few months after we moved and things seemed to be unpacked and under control I decided it was time to finally get my 750. Arrangements were made and with the help of johnie and his trailer we got the bike out of the building and to it's new home. This was october of last year.
From here on my project thread covers all of the work but the cliffnotes are that I tore the entire bike down, shoved all the parts in the basements, and proceeded to work on the parts over the course of the winter and spring. Everything was cleaned and polished as best as I could get it. It soon became apparent that this bike was going to clean up really well.
With the goal in mind of riding the bike to the AHRMA races at Road America I had to scramble to finish it but it came out great. The bike runs and drives better than it has any right to and I look forward to putting on many more miles!!!
1976 Honda cb750 intro
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