JC's Restoration Thread

[Cammie]

Very nice Jeff.

[aprilmaybe]

Thats a purdy bike!!!!

[versone]

Damn that's looking sweeeeeet! I remember when you first got it....Very impressive.
How did you end up treating that tank. I have an extra tank which is going to need the rust removed. I coated a cruiser tank once with kreem, didn't turn out that great.

J.

[JC]

Thanks guys!  I'll do some before and after pics a bit later once I've gotten it all polished up.

Jonah,  I just used some phosphoric acid to get the rust out.   I put it in and shook it around and then let the rust drain, did it a couple of times.   If it's really bad I'd take it to a radiator shop and have them clean it and reseal the tank... kreem tends to not work out too well.  Good luck

[JC]

The restoration draws in on its final step.   I've yielded to time pressures in an effort to "Get the f'ing thing done."   I am in touch with a nice guy in Tehachapi who has a pretty substantial shop in his back yard.  He works on nothing but old bikes.  He'll be bleeding the brakes to get them as good as they'll get, he'll be replacing the fork seals, and using digitial synch and intake/compression/exhaust tools in order to completely tune and/or rejet the carbs to get it running like butter.  It'll be a few hundred dollars, but it'll be done!  I'm driving out there in a few weeks to have it all done.  Wooooo!

[aprilmaybe]

thats great, I can't wait to see it in reality.

[JC]

OK so this was a big bike week for me.   I spent Saturday reversing the year's worth of corrosion on the bike since I moved here.  Lots of polishing of metal and chrome, lots of dusting.

Yesterday I loaded the bike and made the 2 hr drive out to Tehachapi.  It was cold as balls there.   31 degrees and snow on the ground.  Anyway, we got the suspension set!   Took the forks off, replaced the suspension with progressive springs, replaced the seals and dust covers, put in 15 wt oil... Man what a difference!  Also apparant the fork oil had NEVER been changed 

We also rebled the brakes; they felt great!   soon after, they felt bad again.   Somewhere I'm losing pressure.  I'm considering buying a new mastercylinder just to rule that out of the equation, even though I've spent so much work on it.

We synched the carbs, it was running like an beast out for blood.   She was SCREAMING.    Of course..... heh....  That changed when I left 4000 ft elevation and came back to sea level.  Lots of popping.   I think, ultimately, I'm going to need a rejet.  Just not sure which jets.  I'm going to try to get home enough early to take it for another ride to try and get an ear on the problem.   Anyway, one of the major issues (forks) is done.  Brakes I'm closing in on the problem.   Carbs... hey she runs, and runs well.... she just sounds a bit tempermental.  You all might see her soon enough

[zerog]

We synched the carbs, it was running like an beast out for blood.   She was SCREAMING.    Of course..... heh....  That changed when I left 4000 ft elevation and came back to sea level.  Lots of popping.   I think, ultimately, I'm going to need a rejet.  Just not sure which jets. 

That's strange, I thought popping happens when the mixture is too rich and you get left over gas that explodes when it hits the hot exhaust pipe?  If your bike runs fine at 4k ft elevation, when you come back down to sea level, the mixture should be leaner than before since the air is denser.  But then that contradicts the popping symptom?   Maybe I'm understanding the popping issue incorrectly. 

[JC]

LoL  you got me man, I don't know nothin' bout nothin'

[pshaw118]

Ouch.  JC got schooled!  btw, if you're curious, the popping from running rich is called "dieseling".  I guess it makes sense.  It's like a diesel engine.  Small combustion in your exhaust of fuel mixture combusting spontaneously.  Yeah.  I don't know nuthin' but I can play it off like I know stuffs.

oh yeah.  I ran into Charlie today.  Give him my contact info in case he needs it later.

[JC]

Hehe... good info guys, keep it coming.   Carb jetting is def not one of my strong areas.    I'm going to try and get the bike out this week to try and get a better bead of whats going on.  I'll post up when I have more info

Pat, I will.  HIs last day is Wednesday

[JimT]

Did you rebuild the master cylinder? Its pretty easy to do, all you need is a new piston and seal and snap ring pliers. I did it on my EX500, only took an hour or so.

If you get it apart and find that the bore is corroded, then you would probably need a whole new one.

[JC]

I did rebuild it, thanks Jim.  The bore seemed to look ok if I recall correctly.   I'm going to try draining the resevoir and taking it off to make sure there's nothing that would be breaking the seal between those two pieces

[JC]

Ended up getting a brand new aftermarket MC.   It looks a ton better, having a square resevoir instead of the old circular res.   Braking improvement?  Meh.  I think older bikes just have less braking power.  Plus, its got a LOT of weight on my SV.

Got the pilot circuit of the carbs dialed in pretty good by replacing the pilot air jet (I was one size too big, creating a lean condition), eliminated great majority of the popping.    Now investigating the needle circuit.  I might need to raise the needle a notch.  However, the problem seems exacerbated by RPMs, not necessarily the throttle position.  This indicates that it may not be the needle circuit at all, but rather rust/corrosion/dirt in the mechanical ignition advance.   Am going to be taking this apart this upcoming weekend to scope it out.


I had a lot of fun doing some electrical things.  As I mentioned in another post, I got my horns put in.  I also replaced a few of the old corroded bullet connectors with some insulated spade connectors.   I felt the old ones starting to heat up as a result of increased resistance from corrosion.   A happy electrical system is a healthy electrical system.   It really is a shame, however, that they used such tiny and brittle wires back then. Apparantly they weren't looking 28 years down the road    I'm going to continue doing this from time to time which I identify wires that could use a little trim and a new connector.   

A bit down the road, I'm even considering building a new fuse box.  The current fuse box uses the old style glass fuses (5 of them), and doesn't leave any room for expansion.   The old wires result in voltage drops to things such as the horns, coils, and headlights for a lot of old bikes like mine.  As such, people tend to run direct from the battery terminal via inline fuses and relays.   A new 8 or 10 ATO fuse box would enable me to run direct from the new box to the relays, and it would keep everything tidy.


Anyway, that's the latest.  Preparations have really picked up the past 2 months as I prepare for my road trip to yosemite in mid july.