Topic: My 1971 Honda CL100 project

[isaac]

I've had my bike for about three weeks now and have been working on it while looking for inspiration online. ffJMoore's posts inspired me to sign up here after being totally burned in the past by other forums where half the people would spend all day insulting other people's projects. This place seemed more open minded, so good job, guys.

Anyway I found a sub-$500 1971 Honda CL100 project on Craigslist and knew I had to have it. I've made cafes and street tracker type bikes for a few years now, but this is by far the tiniest. I have a habit of not doing anything that can't be reversed, out of respect for the bike in case somebody wanted to put it back to original someday with the original parts. That tends to cause some compromises, but I always like the results.

I bought this one stock and not running, and had it running and riding in only about 5 hours. It's amazing how durable and easy to work on these things are. Here it is stock after I reassembled it just so I could ride it a few times:



And with most of the parts stripped off:


Conceptualizing now. Added upside down drag bars ($20 at any motorcycle shop) and will be cutting about 2" off each end of them since they're ridiculous right now.



Stripped all the way down to clean frame and polish the paint on it:


Two coats of primer and three coats of gloss black paint, but I think the wire wheel-only surface prep may come back to haunt me. The spokes were insanely rusty (as was much of the bike):


Engine ready for pressure washing and wire brush:


Regreased head bearings and blacked out triples (top missing):


Put the Michelin Gazelles on myself with just two tire irons and cut up milk jug handle for a wheel saver. This only took about half an hour. Much, much easier than tires I've attempted in the past. The bike still had the original rear tire from 1971. The front was made in 1981. Still rideable that way:


Put the wheels, rebuilt forks (they were insanely rusty before) and tank on to see how it's coming:




I've since cut and drilled some lowering links from plate steel for the speedo to drop it down to above the headlight, which I've also made lowering links for. I like that it gives it more of a rustic, home built look, because I don't buy parts that I can make anyway so that's how it is.

[tenseventythree]

Looks real sharp.


1969 Suzuki M15-2
1971 Honda CB350
1974 Honda CL360
2012 Triumph Bonneville T100

[MoMo]

they were fun little bikes.  Around here (and probably most larger cities) small bikes are starting to command some serious dollars.  You probably tried replacing larger tires in the past, smaller ones are way easier. 

Welcome,  and where in the He!! is Hellish, FL?  or is that your comment on the heat and humidity?  I was stationed at Eglin and all I remember is heat, humidity and dangerous animal species....Larry

[grcamna2]

Nice little project bike 
I remember trying to 'race' my neighbor day after day on my dad's little 71' CT90 against a CL100 that looked exactly like that one you have;we were both flat-out w/ heads down & that CL100 his dad bought him(same color) would just be inching away from me @ maybe 2-3 mph.I was young enough to think "maybe next time I'll beat him"   

[Tugboat]

Nice! I'm about to pull the motor on mine to rebuild the top-end. Got all the parts, just need the time. I've had mine up to 64mph, balls out, on a flat road.