20 years of....Building the dream......

Hey, what projects are you planning or preparing for? CBX, other motos, workshop, WHATEVAH!
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cbxtreeme
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20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

I'll start this out at the beginning....
Ever since I saw the first advertisements of the CBX in 79, I had thought it was the wildest thing to ever roll on two wheels.
Graduated in 81 and bought my first bike, a Yamaha XS400....(everyone has to start somewhere)
But I would always look at the poster of the 79 CBX I had out in the garage everyday, when I would get on my bike, wondering how anyone could ride something with such a massive motor.
As the years rolled on, the CBX stayed in the back of my head, as the biking world moved on to faster things. And I tried to keep up with a GS1000, then a FJ1100, a Katana 1000, FZR1000... Then, (1995) as I almost lost sight of having a CBX, a friend told me he knew someone who had one that was a dirt drag bike, and most of another for sale.
I thought what the hell, I'll see whats left of them, and maybe have that dream bike after all.
The dirt dragger, I managed to get pretty well cleaned up and put back on the street....realizing how much I was falling in love with that beautiful engine, I decided to do up the other basket case into a modern dream.
Starting from, well,....basically a frame...and going from there

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There weren't too many people in the States doing up old bikes with newer suspension during this time, and info was slim at best trying to do this on my own (I had not heard of Ebay either)
I had seen a few CBX's done up more modern though, and wanted to give it a try.....
Last edited by cbxtreeme on Sun Jan 03, 2016 11:44 am, edited 3 times in total.
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

Deciding that I could probably do this after my first test fitting, I moved the project into a room in the house (winter was on it's way)

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Getting the steering head to mate to the GSXR triples wasn't too tuff an issue....
But the FJ swing arm wasn't going to work as I wanted.

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Looking at ideas for a swing arm, I came across JMC in the UK, who said "we can help no problem". I said I had a GSXR 1100 rear wheel, and I needed to mount it up to a CBX frame.
They said send us some cash, we will get it to you......
While waiting about 6 weeks for the arm to get to me, I sand blasted and painted to frame for a fresh start, The swing arm showed up, and was a perfect fit.

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The next question to finish up the roller was..... rear shocks....?
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

Time to get it bolted together...

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Pulled the engine from my dirt drag/now street CBX, as I didn't want to go into the expense of rebuilding the other engine at that time.

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Started getting the CBR F3 hand contols, and GSXR gauges, wired up to the CBX wiring harness.
Finally bit the bullet, and bought some Works Performance rear shocks as well..........

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Getting close to having a complete bike.... summer was getting close...
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

Body work on....

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All bugs worked out, and used from 96 until July 2002....When I bought a new Hayabusa....
Sorry to say, but after riding the Hayabusa, the CBX did nothing but collect dust for about 10 years...

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After surviving ten years of hard riding on the Suzuki, I started getting a bit bored with it and wanted to get back onto something with a bit more character...
Dusting off the CBX was the obvious choice.... but those years of setting did no favors.... which leads the X into it's next stage of life.
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

Rick Pope
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by Rick Pope »

Good story, and pics.

So, where are you in Indiana? There are a couple more Hoosiers here. perhaps we need to set up a day to meet this winter? I'm near Cincinnati.
Rick Pope
Either garage is too small or we have too many bikes. Or Momma's car needs to go outside.

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

I tried getting the CBX running again,...pulled the carbs and went through them. New plugs, changed oil, and a new battery finally got it fired up.
Took it out for a run, but it just never felt right, pulled the carbs again, and found nothing wrong. Double checked the ignition, coils, and timing....all seemed ok. Running out of ideas....I thought I should get a compression check as a base on what could be the problem.
Should have started there first.....10 PSI in #4 cylinder... :violin:
Decided to pull the head and go from there...

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One problem I had though was....I had too many other projects in pieces already. So something that should get done in a few months took....much longer.
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

Rick Pope wrote:Good story, and pics.

So, where are you in Indiana? There are a couple more Hoosiers here. perhaps we need to set up a day to meet this winter? I'm near Cincinnati.
I'm just east of South Bend, about 10 miles south of the Michigan border
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

Nothing really obvious to lose so much compression looking at the cylinders or the valve area on head....
But since it was apart I figured no turning back now.
So I started saving up money for the new pistons....1147 10 1/2 to 1 JE from Tims....$$$$ ouch
But every time I had just enough saved up. the money ended up going somewhere else.
Finally had enough to get them ordered, had to be custom made (non in stock)...which took the project out a few months more

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They look almost too good to hide....

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I figured the valves may have been the problem since the bike had a hard life racing in the dirt for who knows how long.
So, realizing what new valves would cost, and the machine work....I bought a low mileage head from Ebay to save some money.
One problem with the head I did not see, was one of the exhaust stud holes was reamed out so big, there was nothing left to rethread.
Which caused more time lost as I took the head to a shop to get the hole welded and retapped... another 8 weeks down for that.

Once i got the head back, I soda blasted everything to get a clean start. lapped all the valves, new viton seals, and tried to make it a useful product once again.

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Last edited by cbxtreeme on Sun Nov 22, 2015 7:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

Sent the cylinders out to get rebored, which took another couple months, and then I had to set ring gap.
And with all the other projects I had going on....it took....almost 5 months to get back to gaping them and getting them on the pistons.

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Took an hour or two to get old pistons off and clean off the base surface....then I finally put the pistons on the rods.
A monumental point, as I was actually putting it together instead of pulling more parts off.

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Then came another task I was NOT looking forward to....trying to get the cylinders back on by myself....

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But I did it without snapping any rings or any other issues....finally thinking this might run again some day... :pray:
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

daves79x
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by daves79x »

Great story! Looking forward to more.

Dave

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

During the time period I was saving up for pistons, I decided it might be time for a color change. Purple was a cool color in the 90's, but....times change.
I have come to realize that as far as paint goes on a bike....original never goes out of style. So that was the route I decided to take.

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Time to say goodbye to a familiar face....

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And a fresh start...

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The next step was deciding which shade of red I wanted to use
I started with a silver base, then a pearl white, then the candy apple red....testing various base and pearl options

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___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

EMS
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by EMS »

Nice job! Great story! Hope to see the conclusion! One minor thing, though: You should have pulled and replaced the cylinder studs. Honda changed the smooth ones from the earlier engines with a knurled design with more strength. They obviously had some problems with these. Considering that you are running over 10:1 compression.... :think:

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

I noticed when I was torquing the head down, the studs were twisting and would spring back. The other engine I have has the twisted studs...but I've been out of the loop for a while, and didn't think there would be a problem.
Do they not hold a torque value well, or do they snap?
The head is on, cams in...engine bolted back in now.... :(
___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

daves79x
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by daves79x »

I wouldn't sweat it now. Most of the 3000 early engines that had them still do and run fine. Honda broke one testing a CBX engine to failure at 10,000rpm after 1/2 hour, or so the story goes, so that's why they changed them.

Dave

cbxtreeme
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Re: 20 years of....Building the dream......

Post by cbxtreeme »

Well if that's the case, I'll try to time it to only 15 minutes at a time :mrgreen:

Made a decision on the red, and painted the bodywork.
Then put on the factory identical decals from RDDecals in Canada.... with the exception of a decal for the Honda name instead of the metal badge.

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Tail lights from a 1960 Mercury :!:

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___________MY TWO STROKE ADDICTION_____________

RGV VJ21 L___________________RZ 350_____________
RGV VJ22 FL__________ GT 750 long term cafe project___
RGV VJ22 N ________________RS 250 Cup Bike_________
RGV VJ23 T__________And one for the water...SX-R 800_
____________________RZV500R______________________

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