Long Sleeping '79 CBX Restoration

[shiskowd]

Continuing to catch up... Tore apart the forks, repainted with PJ satin black engine paint, installed Race Tech fork emulators and springs chosen for my fighting weight. The emulators are a good bit of kit, adjusting them will be laborious but hopeful the suggested settings are in the ball park.



Positioned the engine on a home made stand and dropped the frame with the front end. New bearings and seals from the front wheel (you'll recall my angst with the fubar'd bearing retainer), cleaned up and painted brake rotors, vapor blasted the lower triple clamp and repainted the top clamp with the same PJ engine paint as the forks.





Resurfaced the alternator clutch plates. The pair I had were in pretty good shape but still required a good effort to get both surfaces to mate flat. Installed with one of Mike Nixon's spacer washers. Lots of good resources on the site and Nil's Facebook page on the process.



Before I got too far along with building the balance of the bike around the engine, and with the oil cooler attached (with Teven's excellent hoses), the alternator, oil filter in place and the required amount of Honda GN4 oil I wired up the starter & solenoid to a battery to spin the engine on the starter to check the integrity of the lube system. Soon after the engine started to spun, I could tell the 10w40 was pushing out the assembly lube as the engine spun faster on the thinner oil (good sign). The oil pressure switch soon opened when the oil cooler filled, indicating sufficient oil pressure discharging from the oil pump.



Both of the crank bearings at the end of the engine began to weep oil as did all 4 camshafts at their ends indicating oil was getting to these extremities.

[shiskowd]

The Goldwing coils were a touch shorter so I improvised a bracket to mount them in the stock holders.



To further test on the Ignitech ignition with the coils mounted and shortened high tension leads, I sawed a chunk off a damaged crank end cap enough that I could see what the crank timing mark yet catch the oil that would flow with the engine spinning on the starter. A stripe of nail polish made it more visible and the timing light confirmed the Ignitech unit with the pulse generator position where doing what they needed. The partial end cap managed the oil, not sure if it would with the engine actually running.

[shiskowd]

Two notable 'investments' I made into my project...

The first was a set of period correct Koni shocks that Jeff Bennetts dug out of his workshop and offered at a fair price. He included the original packaging and his purchase invoice from Competition Accessories in April 1985. Shocks are in great shape but planning to replace the seal(s) and oil. Thanks Jeff!



The second was a NOS sport kit that I found locally that was all in the original packaging. The kit was purchased by an earlier owner in Calgary from Aurora Honda (Aurora CO) in September 1983, changed hands a few times but has sat on a shelf.



Both will be great additions that I look forward to enjoying at some point when I get this wrapped up.

Lastly, Bentleys Painting finished up the tank, fender, tailpiece and side covers. Excellent work as I've come to expect from Bentley. He's painted a number of exacting CBX restorations in the past and his experience shows. I test fit the pieces with the recovered seat.

[EMS]

...and Bentley's painted the tank pinstripes touching Poor form!

[daves79x]

I wasn't going to say anything.....

Dave

[Rick Pope]

Perhaps having the stripes meet is "right" rather than "correct". To my eye, it looks better when they touch. Maybe all the original tanks were "wrong."

[hondaman160mph]

Perhaps having the stripes meet is "right" rather than "correct". To my eye, it looks better when they touch. Maybe all the original tanks were "wrong."

I agree, why wouldn't they meet? I always thought
original tanks with stripes that didn't meet looked
like the person who applied them screwed up.

[daves79x]

Well, we don't know why the stripes don't meet, but it was the way Honda did it. So when the last few batches Honda commissioned had stripes meeting and the lower stripe too high as a result, it sticks out like a sore thumb. So the goal is, for most painters, to get it right as Honda declared when new.

Why didn't they put the good shocks on the US/Canada market '79 CBXs? Why didn't they paint CBXs blue? Same logic. They did what they did.

Dave

[shiskowd]

I saw the post a few months back about the stripes not touching on the original early models but I was too late to change. Whatever, seems Honda messed up something back in the day to get them out the door like that. Obvious that my tank isn't original.

Leak checked the carbs and the approximate installed angle. Everything nice and tight, no overflow from the bowels so the floats & valves are doing their thing. Also had a nice stream from each accelerator nozzle once the accel circuit sufficiently primed.



I used 2 of the '79 overflow manifolds to separate the left and right banks for the carbs to better avoid the 'hole in one' issue. Used Motion Pro fuel vet hoses, not sure how those will hold up. I'll install the vacuum operated fuel cut off that I have as further insurance.



Ready to fit the carbs on the engine and see if it will light...

[daves79x]

Carbs look good to go! The hoses should hold up OK, as there is normally no fuel in them, or shouldn't be. Not busting your chops on the tank, the work looks fantastic. It just comes up in conversation.

Dave

[shiskowd]

The moment of truth had arrived. With the carbs installed and the old Mac 6 into 2 exhaust installed, it was time to see if this thing would light up.



The first start was Wednesday evening. Engine caught right away and settled into a nice idle with only a small adjustment on the idle adjustment. Close inspection shows there was no oil/fuel leaks and while this is my first closeup of a running CBX, no concerning sounds coming from the engine. The alternator was charging strong at 14.5V. I had a couple of blowers moving air across the engine and let it idle for about 15 minutes.

Tonight was the 2nd start, this time on camera. Cold front had come through and it was only about 6C in the garage so it took a few spins before it caught w/ full choke. Video clip below.

https://youtu.be/i4wgEMCFLwg

The sound recording on my camera is terrible so through to 2:00 mark the audio was captured by a Zoom H5 audio recorder which is far more realistic. After 2:00 the audio is from the camera which amplifies the higher frequencies and the engine sounds. Again, my first closeup of a running CBX, let me know if something sounds amiss. The characteristic sewing machine sound from the valve cover is not nearly as noticeable as the camera records. The Mac exhaust sounds as if there's nothing inside those short cans.

I'm waiting on some vacuum port extenders to stick on the carbs to check the syncing - would appear I'm in the ballpark with the bench sync. All those hours I spent on those carbs seems to have paid off

I captured some footage at the end of the video of the Ingitech software showing the real time ignition operation - pretty slick.

[steve murdoch icoa #5322]

Congratulations! Sounds great to me.
Can't believe there isn't a huge smile on your face.
btw, love the auxilliary tank.

[daves79x]

Sounds fantastic! I know, cell phone video makes even the best-sounding engine sound like a bucket of bolts. That's why I put very few of them out there.

All your hard work will soon be paying off. You will enjoy the bike for many years to come.

Dave

[Jeff Bennetts]

Very nice outcome, sounds great for an out of the box tune! That Mac exhaust system is just temporary right? too nice of a build for that pipe to be on there.

Thanks for sharing your build with the board, now go have some fun.

[shiskowd]

Thanks for the comments and the support over the past months with this project, greatly appreciated.

V...That Mac exhaust system is just temporary right? too nice of a build for that pipe to be on there.

Yes, I have a set of what I believe is a recent edition of the Sankei replica's, sold by CMSNL via Northeast Vintage Cycle which I believe are the same ones the Bert @ SIxCenter sells (his shop closed for the past month due to moving) and maybe even David Silver. I haven't fitted them on yet but they look great. However, there is a dent on the back lower portion of the right pipe and CMSNL made good by shipping a complete right pipe assembly - should be here next week.

I have a few things to complete including a rebuild of those Koni shocks. Registering a vintage bike in these parts can be a chore as well but looking forward to the first rides.