BUILDING A RESTOMOD

[itsacbx]

hey all,
I have a good friend who wants me to help him build a mildly customised restomod.....
To some its sacrilege, but bear with me, he owns an inch-perfect 79 and my 79 is close to his in quality and finish. Neither of us need another CBX. I have an 80 engine and he has an 81 rolling chassis, along with a 79 bare frame, so restomod it is.

I have no trouble with lighting, electronic instruments and the like but the big issue for me is fitting an USD front end and brakes to match.
He is proposing a Metmatchex [?] swingarm or similar, along with modern discs, high-end shocks, LED lights, electronic instruments etc. I have a talented welder/ machinist at my disposal so creating any special parts is also not a particularly difficult hurdle to overcome. Its his money after all....

I believe I read somewhere that Hondas up to about 2005 front ends were virtually a slip-on fit, but I dont recall where I read it, or if its true. Realistically it would be ideal to buy a complete modern bike and steal the wheels, front forks and complete brake systems, so what I need to know is can anyone offer commentary as to what bikes are best for a complete suspension/wheel swap.
Further, is there a group online for CBX restomods and if so, can someone point me in that direction please?
Thanks
Al

[NobleHops]

The two challenges that come up immediately are that most USD front ends are much shorter and use 17 inch wheels, and so the bike is lowered quite a lot, with all secondary consequences of that. Another that is easily overlooked is the offset of the triple clamp. Most modern bikes have forks with very little offset, and can contact the tank of an older bike, plus it reduces the trail a lot and can make the bike less stable. Cognito Moto is one place that was machining triple clamps to make this work better, conventional approach is to press the stem out of the stock clamp and into the machined clamp, so all your fit-up to the steering head is simple. Ducati Multistrada is one bike that I know has a longer fork, for sure there are others, or you can make mods to the fork to lengthen it.

There are a couple of forums that specialize in this stuff, Custom Fighters is one, and there is a Facebook group around resto mods too, you can start poking around there for starters.

https://www.customfighters.com/forums/

N.

[Jeff Bennetts]

CBR600F3-4 is your friend, pretty much bolt on Al! The stuff is pretty inexpensive and still available.

[steve murdoch icoa #5322]

Lots of info in this excellent, detailed record of a "streetfighter" from BikeyMikey.
viewtopic.php?f=102&t=7330&hilit=mikey