Topic: Honda SOHC Race Bike Gallery

[SoyBoySigh]

BUMP. What a great old thread! I hope that ya'll older four-um members might check & see if you've got dead pic-links in here, & maybe UPDATE 'em?

Well I, for one - am going to download each and every photo link that's still active. There are a few in here that I don't already have - and I've got something like 18,000 bike pics on this PC - the majority of 'em being DOHC & SOHC & mostly endurance & cafe theme stuff at that. Gotta get around to ordering some of those photo CDs sometime, just for the OLD stuff. As for all of the NEW builds made possible by eBay etc, methinks at least another couple of photo CDs are warranted by now.

-Sigh.

[SoyBoySigh]

Mmmm - that CB500 is pretty awesome too. I wonder what all other models this method could work on. The DOHC engines seem to need a rather complex shaped plate, whereas this midi-SOHC plate is simple as all get out. I'd love to see 'em made for every model, even the non-Honda SOHC stuff, like Benelli Sei & the Guzzi 250cc four.

The real trick is the SEAL, I guess. Hey?  Should be feasible to use any of the OEM clutch covers in minimalist ventilated guise, sealing off the crank-case all well and good. But an oil-tight seal that would run the shaft at those RPM's? And I'd bet the crank-case vents, getting rid of blow-by gas, is probably of huge importance also. Not that difficult, but important to the shaft seal remaining oil-tight. Perhaps some type of air-box recycling vacuum line, to keep a vacuum pressure in the cases at all times, then the shaft seal would suck air in, if anything at all.

Look at how compact of a clutch they run on the new DUCK engines. Makes me wonder what I'd get away with on the DOHC 985cc......

-S.

[SoyBoySigh]

Clean up them DEAD PIC LINKS, people!

And hey - I keep getting drawn back to this page, due to pic links of the RCB that I keep following up. So....

While I realize this is a SOHC four-um, well perhaps BECAUSE it's a SOHC four-um, is it really correct to lay claim to the RCB as a SOHC derivative which coincidentally just happens to be DOHC - and at the same time to ignore all of the OTHER versions of the DOHC - based on what exactly? If the RCB is a DOHC derivative of the SOHC CR750/CB750F etc - Well then WTF do you think the CB1100R is then? Seriously!

I realize that if you were that inclusive with the race bikes & derivatives, you'd wind up with not only CBX750F & NightHawk-S models on the tally, but perhaps even a few liquid-cooled CBR models as well. So no, I'm NOT going to suggest that the CB1100R be included here. Or even the RS1000 simply for it's similarities to the RCB itself.

Rather, I'd like to suggest that you give BACK to the DOHC-4 buffs OUR patron saint RCB racers! One might well think of 'em as a missing-link, but then they might be forgotten altogether. Well, WE of the DOHC-4 proclivities wouldn't let that happen - it won't slip between the cracks simply for having a dry sump or what-not. Indeed several of OUR race-bikes were also dry-sump and even dry clutch etc. Such a myriad of such configurations -

There's no one feature which should warrant inclusion to the SOHC family, in that the cylinder spacing is the same from SOHC to DOHC anyhow, and the race-bikes would often omit the crank-end mounted generator anyhow so this feature hardly warrants the distinction either - When you look at the GUTS the INNARDS of the RCB engine, it's hardly similar to EITHER of the families - siblings I should say.

Ah, but it's YA'LL who cut off the DOHC series from your lineage, left the CB900FZ out in the wind & the cold as early as it's own introduction - ya'll & yawlz (yawze?) beloved moto-PRESS with their sweeping statements about "the end of an era", their sentimental lament at the introduction of the DOHC - I suppose we should really blame THEM, but their one central notion seems to have taken root - and where more-so than the many SOHC-4 four-ums 'F-orums and forums themselves?

And as a result, the CB650 itself being left out like a red-headed step-child - and it's own derivatives the DOHC CBX550F, CB550SC & CB650SC are left out as true orphans.  Even the early '80s DOHC-4 'F-orums don't wanna take 'em?

Well - fair enough. But you can't keep the RCB!

-S.