CB350F Restoration by royhall (NOW FINISHED)

[Tiny Tim]

Who/where did you get the rear shocks from?
Looks very good so far.

[royhall]

Cheers Tim. Believe it or not they were an eBay purchase all of £60. They will probably bounce all over the place but at least they look good.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

[royhall]

Been neglecting this thread for a while whilst working on the bike. Now I have a spare hour I shall try and get a bit more up to date.

A few items have returned recently, the first was the chroming from RS Electroplaters in Manchester. Had a good look over it and all I can find wrong is a little bit of rust still on the rear brake pedal. As its only under the footplate cup and not seen, I fixed it with a rub down and some silver Hammerite. £210 plus vat and a 3 week turnaround is not too shabby I would say. Well done Mark Bray Cotton.

Talking of Mark Bray Cotton, Mrs Royhall saw his name on the desk and it turned out they lived next door to each other as children. Small world eh, didn't get me a discount though.

The kickstart lever is missing from the photo as I had already fitted it before the picture was taken. Also the clock cups were just polished as they are stainless.

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Sent the clocks off to Kent400 who's well known on the forum. The original clocks were a bit of a mess so I tried to get some replacements off eBay, these turned out to be as bad. So I sent all 4 clocks off to Peter to make a good set from the lot. Turns out the eBay speedo was the best, that's why the recorded mileage is different.

A couple of before and after shots.

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The first and last picture of the clocks really shows the difference.

I cant thank Peter enough for the great work he did, these clocks have literally come back like new. I wont say what he charged me as he is a forum member, but I will say, in my opinion it was very reasonable and worth every penny. I will have no hesitation sending my next set of clocks to Peter. A true craftsman. Thanks.

[royhall]

Next job up, I decided to tackle the wheels. Like the rest of the bike these were a hell of a mess.

DSS must be making a mint out of selling the retainer removal tools for the front and back wheels. Still helps make the job go smoothly ish.

The front retainer came out quite well, but the rear took 3 days of PlusGas and heat before it would come all the way out. As is usual with fine aluminium threads it had "picked up" totally destroying the retainer and damaging the hub.

Got new retainers for front and back then took the hubs to my local superstar engineering shop (David Burton again). He put the hubs in the lathe and carefully re-cut the original threads. Did it while I waited and charged me a tenner, absolutely brilliant place. Afterwards the new retainers screwed all the way in with just slight resistance. Cant praise David Burton Engineering enough.

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With that out the way, I cleaned and re-polished the hubs. Decided not to lacquer them as it tends to go yellow, so gave them a liberal spray with ACS50 instead. Got two set of AllBalls bearing kits and pressed them in, the new retainers fitted like a dream.

I really need to cut the escalating costs of this build so decided to use the Union Cycle rims from DSS and standard spokes. The standard of the rims turned out to be really good so am pleased. With cost saving in mind I was going to have a go at building the wheels myself, but found a guy that does them for £35 a wheel. So it was not really worth me buying the kit to do the job (not really got room for any more gear either). I used Alan at Southport Wheel Building for the job and he was great (0151 234 9831).

I think the pictures speak for themselves.

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Had a bit of luck and found a NOS speedo drive plate on eBay for £20 as mine had perished and was in three pieces. As is becoming the norm for pattern parts, I came to fit the rear sprocket and the drive pins wont fit without the sprocket being re-machined. These pattern parts are getting to be a pain (Bitsa will be smiling down). Another huge stroke of luck found me a NOS sprocket/pins/backplate assembly on eBay for £24. So just waiting for that to arrive.

I was going to have the brake disk re-ground but on closer inspection decided to have a go at polishing it. I think it came out really nice.

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Okay I think I'm up to date now. So signing off, more soon.

[AshimotoK0]

Brilliant rebuild thread Roy and great that you are sharing restoration tips/restoration services/costs with us.

Ash

[UK Pete]

I second what ash says, i am getting a bit enthusiastic about my bikes again and reading through your thread gives me inspiration, at one point i nearly threw the towel in and almost sold the sandcast, and k0, i did sell my f2 though
pete

[Chris400F]

This is all looking very nice Roy. Looking forward to seeing the finished job.
Have you worked out what to do about your paintwork yet?

[Lobo]

Stunning stuff Roy.... making me jealous.  And hear / hear to Peter (Kent 400) who's working his magic on a couple of clocks of mine - inc the Fizzy speedo.

I did my 400F wheels earlier in the year - polished hubs, new bearings, spokes, rims, the works - just wanted to look at 'em all day...

Thanks for the thread,

Lobo.

[royhall]

This is all looking very nice Roy. Looking forward to seeing the finished job.
Have you worked out what to do about your paintwork yet?

Thanks Chris. Not had a lot of time recently to find a painter, but as each bit goes on it's getting more urgent. Got an idea I may go with Ashimotos suggestion of a modern metallic with the colour matched. I may be able to find a local car shop that will do that. Have ordered a set of decals and warning stickers etc from the states, a company called AFE Graphics. So am really waiting on these arriving then I can tour round the paintshops. Maybe get lucky who knows, but am going to have to keep the costs down. £550 is just too rich for this project, as I'm trying not to spend in total more than the bike is worth.

[UK Pete]

In my experience 550 is about as cheap as a good paint job comes, a quick blow over with minimal prep would be about 250,
pete

[Green1]

The paint makes or brakes a bike 

Mick

[SteveD CB500K0]

Braking with the paint sounds exciting. I hear the MotoGP boys get their head down now as well as their elbow and knee...

Maybe that's what Scott Reddings had in mind

[Green1]

Typo I'm not really that dim 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dq-OMUwg2Gw

Miick

[beemsquar]

Looking good Royhall!

I've been following this thread closely as seems very similar to the 400.

Out of interest, how did you refurbish your brake disc?

Andy

[royhall]

The brake disk wasn't too bad so not worth the cost of a re-grind. Just cleaned it up with a course Scotchbrite wheel in the pedestal grinder. My rear disk on the 750F2 was re-ground by David Burton Engineering at Thornton-Cleveleys for £45, came out like brand new.