1981 CB750K - Ruby - 90K km's

[shinyribs]

Old newspaper is good for keeping the oil off your wrap when doing oil changes. It's not very absorbent and the oil pretty much just rolls off. It will soak some,but if you use several layer and pull it off pretty quick,it works real well. And its free! Aluminum foil is fool proof,though.

Glad you got her going well. Now it's time for wheelie videos!

[seestheday]

Minor updates - I sync'd the carbs again and it smoothed out the idle nicely.  I had a bit of a lope that had developed when I first started the bike.  

I managed to strip a valve cover bolt while chasing a minor valve cover leak (I've taken the cover off and put it back on a few times).  So now I have a major valve cover leak:



Sigh.  I didn't have time to fix it last night and now I have oily pants and boots.  I was surprised when it let loose.  I wasn't even close to the torque spec.  Oh well.

Thankfully I have the helicoil and tools I need for this and it is on one of the end ones so I don't even need to remove the valve cover to do the job.  I did have a peak down the hole to make sure the tower didn't break like it had the last time this happened to me.

Other minor things to fix:
- replace fried flasher (I messed up when hooking up my new LED indicators so now they just stay on)
- helicoil stripped tach cable bolt (it sticks enough to hold right now, but it's obviously stripped - low priority)

[seestheday]

Oh, I should also mention that I got a free motorcycle jack.  It kind of looks like this:



But I think mine is a little beefier.  It sure was damn heavy.  My friend was given it as a gift when he had a z1000, but he never used it and bought a rocket 3.  He never wanted to put his 2300cc bike on the jack because he thought it was too heavy, but the jack is rated for 1,000 lbs so it should have been fine.

I had to move it straight to storage because there is no room in my garage right now.  Once I take possession of my new house in August I'm going to be looking for my next project.  It'll be just in time for some good deals because people will be looking to get rid of motorcycles so they don't have to store them for the winter.

[shinyribs]

Oooh,a Rocket 3 ?!?! I'da made friends with him,too!lol  I have a jack like that and it only works when the pipes are off the bike. Hopefully it's different for a twin cam???

Condolences on the oil leak. That's a bummer

[seestheday]

I'm pretty sure I'd have to take my 4-1 exhaust off to use the jack.  That said, I don't plan on putting the DOHC on it until I am doing major work.  I plan on using it for my next project.

Valve cover helicoil'd last night and now appears to be all fixed .  I'll know in a couple of rides if any oil is still seeping out.

[seestheday]

So now that I'm almost done everything I want mechanically, I want to start on some cosmetic stuff.

I have drag bars on with bar end mirrors, and now my instrument cluster looks huge and out of place.



I would like to relocate the fuses and ignition key, and put on a small aftermarket speedometer & tachometer.

I would like to keep an oil light and a neutral light somewhere, but I have some ideas on fabricating something from LED's.

I also want to cut the huge rear fender, remove the grab rail and build a seat that integrates the rear tail light into it, sticking the indicators into the frame below the seat.  I'll probably need to figure out how to fibreglass to make the seat happen.

Does anyone have recommendations on small speedo's/tach's?  Are fairly cheap ones a good idea, or are they garbage?

[seestheday]

I ended up picking up some goodies from DCC.  Some new gauges, controls and cables are on the way.

I also got a package in the mail that I ordered a while ago.



Rearsets!



Got them from Durgam K on the DTT forum.  Put them together and figured out how I want to mount them.

Do I need to destroy my shift and brake levers?  If so, this will be my first non-recoverable mod....





I don't even know what those things are called.  Splined gear shift actuator?

I found a pic of a splined bracket that seems to not be standard.  Anyone know where I can get something link this?  


Am I overthinking this?

I don't have access to a welder so I'm also going to have to find a shop where I can get that done if I need to destroy the levers.

[shinyribs]

Get another set of levers that you don't mind cutting up. Cut them to length and drill the holes for the linkage fasteners and put your originals on the shelf. Or just hack away and dont look back!

One thing I do when making any sort of linkage (used to have a bunch of them on the drag cars) is to use vice grips to mock things up.

Before you cut your levers down you want to make sure you get your ratios correct. You dont want excessive travel in your levers. Or too little: too little travel will eliminate the mechanical advantage and make them require too much effort. Of course,your the Prof.,so you already know this.

Anyway,get your rearsets mounted and pointed to where they feel good. Mount whichever levers you plane to cut up but leave them full length for now. Use the vice grips to ''fasten'' the lever end of the linkage rods in place until you find the sweet spot. Then mark and drill. It's that easy.

A couple layers of tape (duct tape,electrical,masking...whatever)will protect your linkage ends from scratches when you clamp down on them with the vice grips.

You could get your lovely wife to just hold the other end for you,but the solid connection of the vice grips really give you a better real-world feel for what you are making. You can also just drill several holes and decide which feels best as you ride them later. Then trim off the excess after you are satisfied with what you have. If you end up with extra holes after doing it this way...just keep drilling...speed holes!!!!


Good luck with it buddy. I'm sure you'll get it figured out easily enough. I'm really looking forward to seeing this come together!!!!..........hold up a secaren't you the guy who was on my side when it came to stock controls over rearsets just a few weeks ago?!?!?!?!

[Hoosier Daddy]

seestheday wrote

Do I need to destroy my shift and brake levers?  If so, this will be my first non-recoverable mod....





I don't even know what those things are called.  Splined gear shift actuator?

I plan on either cutting up some replacent original style thay are all over on e-bay cheap - OR - Go here, http://www.fastfromthepast.com Rearset Parts
  You want to look in "Brake Arms" and "Shift Arms". They are in there for our DOHC's I have the part numbers written down at home. You may have to go to their "RearSets" Page and find what set # fits our bike then look for the arms that apply to that set, but a little digging and you will find them.

[seestheday]

shinyribs wrote

Get another set of levers that you don't mind cutting up. Cut them to length
and drill the holes for the linkage fasteners and put your originals on the
shelf. Or just hack away and dont look back!

The levers bend out to the side significantly.  Will simply rotating them up and drilling them work?  I think if I just tried to bend them straight then I'd break the weld.  This would certainly happen on brake lever.

shinyribs wrote

One thing I do when making any sort of linkage (used to have a bunch of them
on the drag cars) is to use vice grips to mock things up.

This is a great tip.  Thanks.

shinyribs wrote

Before you cut your levers down you want to make sure you get your ratios
correct. You dont want excessive travel in your levers. Or too little: too
little travel will eliminate the mechanical advantage and make them require
too much effort. Of course,your the Prof.,so you already know this.

Anyway,get your rearsets mounted and pointed to where they feel good. Mount
whichever levers you plane to cut up but leave them full length for now. Use
the vice grips to ''fasten'' the lever end of the linkage rods in place
until you find the sweet spot. Then mark and drill. It's that easy.

I actually hadn't thought about it much, but that is a good idea.  I could do the math, but I think it will be just easier to "feel" it with the vise grip mock-up.

shinyribs wrote

..........hold up
a secaren't you the guy who was on my side when it came to stock controls
over rearsets just a few weeks ago?!?!?!?!

Nope, not me.  I tried sticking my feet on my rear pegs during my 500+ km ride and having done that I will never look back.  It felt sooooo much better.

Hoosier Daddy - thanks for the tips.  I plan on searching my box of cb900 parts first, but if I don't find anything I will look into those options.

[seestheday]

Here is a pic of the brake pedal from the top to give you an idea of what I'm working with (found on the internet).



It is designed to stick way out.  In order for that to work well with a rear set I'll need to cut off the whole arm and then weld on a flat plate.  Anyone see any other way to do this?

The shifter has a much less extreme bend, and isn't nearly as beefy.

[shinyribs]

Yikes. I didn't realize the DOHC bikes had that much offset. Ok..scratch everything i said.

[mk3brent]

Hey, guy.

I like your thread.

Tuned in for more updates. :)

[seestheday]

Ok, I think I can figure out how to get the brake side to work by hooking it up directly to the drum brake. I'll post what I end up doing.

Got a line on a cheap spare gas tank and seat. I'm planning on painting the tank and making a new solo seat.

[seestheday]

Went to look at the gas tank and seat.  I was surprised at how good of a shape they were.  Guy I bought them from was a professional welder and he is making a cool mono-shock conversion out of the 81 cb750K.

I also picked up the headlight and a horn.  They were in much better shape than the ones that I'm running, and I thought it would be fun to do a dual horn conversion to make it a little louder.

No way I'm wrecking this mint tank with original paint.  Instead I'll run the new tank and paint my beat up old one.

I think I will cut up the new seat though, because even though it's in good condition I have a new vinyl cover on my old seat and I like it more than the slightly faded original.

I'm very happy with this purchase.  It is really nice to not have to stop riding the bike while I build custom stuff, and if I ever want to ride two-up I can just throw the old seat back on.

I'm also planning on dropping by the local wrecking yard soon to grab a spare brake pedal and shifter for my rear-sets.

[seestheday]

Regarding a paint scheme, I'm really digging the look of this:


I like how the paint is used to change the lines of the bike.  It would require ditching the side covers, running pods, getting a smaller battery and hiding the electronics.  Lots of mods, might need to be a winter project or something that I slowly work towards.

I also have parts coming from DCC that I'll need to install once I get them.
- speedometer with integrated lights
- tachometer
- new throttle & clutch cables (they feel ok, but they're likely original and I really don't want to be stranded somewhere...)
- new left hand controls (my current control housing is cracked and I want one that is smaller than stock)
- new smaller tail light

To do:
- switch out drag bar and put superbike bar on
- buy a brake pedal and shift pedal from a wrecking yard
- cut the pedals, get plates welded as needed, and get my rear-sets mounted
- pull off the grab rail, figure out how to mount the indicator lights directly to the frame (they're currently on the grab rail)
- clean out bad gas from new tank & install on bike
- plan out paint scheme
- strip paint off of old tank
- bondo small dents so nice and smooth
- shoot it with primer & paint it
- plan how I want the seat to look
- figure out how I'm going to recover it once I tear off the old cover and start shaping the foam so it won't look like garbage
- put on already cut down rear fender from a cb900c to use with the smaller tail light- install new DCC parts

[Hoosier Daddy]

I don't think the factory air box in it's rightfull place would be that much of a distraction on that awesome bike.

[Johnnylevi]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/82-85-HONDA-VF750-VF700-S-right-REAR-FOOT-PEG-BRACKET-/171031613461?pt=Motorcycles_Parts_Accessories&hash=item27d2475015 

Looks pretty close to me

[seestheday]

Thanks, I ended up picking up some pedals from a local wrecker.  They are known for ripping people off, and he did, but it was still slightly cheaper than what I would have paid for someone to ship the pedals to me from the states plus the ebay purchase price.  Because I'm in Canada shipping for everything seems to be at least $40.

[seestheday]

Got my rearsets hooked up.  It is MUCH more comfortable.  I'll get some pics up shortly.

However, It rides like a totally different bike.  I don't feel nearly as comfortable riding it as I did before I put the rearsets on, but I think it's because I was so familiar with my old setup.

The knurled pegs are much stickier than the stock rubber ones so my foot doesn't move back and forth as easily.  I also find myself wanting to make larger foot movements than I need to.  I even hit the kickstand once when I wanted to downshift.

It's like I hopped on a sport bike, or a bike with really far forward controls that I'm not used to.  I'm sure I'll get it, but I have to remind myself that this is basically a new bike now and I need to ride very carefully until I get the hang of it.

I also significantly cleaned up the rear end.  I've put on a shorter rear fender, smaller taillight, removed the grab rail and relocated the indicators.

I'm not super happy with my new tail light.  The running light is quite bright, but when I put the brakes on I don't believe that it brightened up enough.  The wires were all different colours, so I am 99% I hooked it up the correct way.  I tried reversing the two wires (one was obviously ground) and when I did that pressing the brake down didn't increase the brightness at all.

I am going to look into running a small resistor on the one wire to bring the running brightness down so there is a bigger change when I put on the brakes.

The new rear end looks badass, but I also need to make sure that I'm seen.