Honda-SOHC

I've got Max, who used to be a member on here, to make me a stainless steel linkage rod for the 500/550F carbs. The original ones as we all know tend to rust and pit for fun. In the past I've had a few hard chromed and that works well but whilst the first ones I had done cost me about £25 each the last 2 cost me £65 each. I spotted some stainless steel one being made in the USA a few months ago but after contacting the seller to enquire about the cost of making me 6 the first thing he did was increase the price, that didn't sit well with me so I declined that offer.

As I said I then contacted Max to see if he could make a few, with the idea being to fit them in carbs I'll be restoring and selling and also in case any other members wanted one. With Max no longer being on the site I thought I'd see about becoming his go between, he sells them to me and I sell them onwards to members. I may also be doing the 400 clutch basket rubbers as well in case you were wondering, he's just waiting on some more Viton to arrive to make some more.

Anyway, Max sent me a pic yesterday of the new rod and the original I'd sent to him for him to copy. I'll test the new one to see how it fits etc and if it's ok I'll order a few more but maybe after Xmas to defray the cost during what is an expensive season for most

Here's how they look.



If you're interested in one let me know so I know how many to order made. Cost will be approx £45 plus P&P onwards, say £2.

Just wondering if anyone has ever checked or compared the profile of a Cruzinimage piston against a genuine Honda one.

I'm reading some really negative stuff about aftermarket pistons and especially about the quality of Cruzinimage  piston rings, notoriously the 350 four ones which are reportedly very soft and wear extremely quickly. Reports I may add that come from a very experienced mechanic and certified Honda/Kawasaki mechanic trainer, not the sort of person to shout wolf you'd image.

I've seen an image where 2 pistons are joined on the same gudgeon pin, so they sit side by side and it's impossible to get them misaligned as that's exactly where they'd sit on the conrod, the rings were in different positions, the crowns didn't align or even look the same, Hondas are normally flat and the aftermarket was really domed, this would seriously affect the compression.

Another image of Cruzinimage rings after less than 500 miles, both a before and after picture showing ring end gap, it had doubled in less than 500 miles, which is worrying as a lot of members have fitted these kits.

Not trying to scare anyone here, just wondering IF anyone had done a comparison, especially of the piston. Just curious to see how they compare.

I have completely restored this badge after it suffered a small amount of damage when the bike fell over.

It has been polished and the paintwork redone. Painted exactly like a new one. If your rotor cover is already polished this will suit it perfectly, if not it will at least make the existing rotor cover look better.



DS charging £90 for a new one. £60 inc P&P.

This loom is for the CB550F1/F2. Never fitted, not tampered with. Labelled as made by Alans Electrics. Sold by Al for £265 or £295 on Ebay. For sale here for £200 inc P&P

Just bought these.

Solid stainless steel, highly polished. Meant for another bike but took a chance and bought them and they fit perfectly, except maybe the width is very slightly bigger, will find out if it affects them fitting soon but I test fitted them in my spare swinging arm which has no paint on and they are just ever so slightly proud but a coat of paint may cure that.

I found my old cutoff in the wardrobe the other day, had badges on there that would be rare now, stuff long gone, like an Ogri badge or a Bike magazine badge, plus old club membership badges etc. A lot of these were either sew on or iron on. The sew on ones still look great, not so much the iron on ones. My favourite bike has always been the 500-4 and there are 4 iron badges from the 70s depicting this bike, they say something like Honda 500 four, they were made of felt with printed letters IIRC, when the jacket got washed the felt contracted and distorted the badge, the edge lifted and you could see the glue underneath still attached to the denim, not a great look.

The cutoff doesn't fit me anymore, ok just by itself but still tight around the shoulders but over a leather jacket it's a no go. So I've decided to buy another cutoff and transfer all my old badges, those that can be transferred that is, the 500 ones won't make it and for some reason that kinda upset me. So I decided to see if they were still available to buy and no they are not. Bummer.

With that in mind I looked around and frankly the badges that are around are pretty bad. So I thought of having some made, properly made, sew on, with proper background not felt, proper embroidery etc. The question was what design should I go for, same as the old one or something else. I decided to go for the side panel badge, it's sort of unique, got colour in there and anyone seeing it knows what bike you like or own. So I send a pic of the badge to a specialist firm and they are going to do a mock up of how the badge will look. I struggled with the background colour TBH, the edge of the badge is black so I thought black background would be out, not enough contrast. However after discussing it with the firm they say the background would be black twill, the edge of the badge in black embroidery and then the rest in chrome and orange like the badge itself. May go for the edges of the badge in gold. They'll be 150 x 50mm so not huge but approx the same size as the badge.

It's the cost of them that concerns me however, minimum order is for 10 but if you increase it to 25 the cost halves per badge and for 50 it's a quarter of the cost.

So I thought I'd see if anyone would be interested in buying these badges when they are made, I'll buy them anyway, I'm not relying on uptake here, I can put any excess on Ebay I suppose.

So, any thoughts? except of course how sad I am for thinking of wearing my cutoff again, you don't need to say it, I know. I'm reliving my youth and I make no apologies for doing that. Roo, shut up before you say anything.

As promised in my measuring oring thread I have managed to start supplying orings for certain parts of the CB500K and CB550F/K. Please check with me first if your not sure if the rings will fit your particular bike.

The range is still fairly small but it will expand as time goes by. I need to buy in bulk in order to get prices as low as possible and the initial outlay is well over £1000. As the new rings start to arrive I'll expand the list.

If the rings come into contact with modern petrol they will be Viton™ rings, if they don't they'll be Nitrile.

Oil Pump kit, 5 rings included. The first batch though will have 6 rings. There will be 1 x Oil Pressure relief valve 91315-044-000,  2 x Dowel rings 91301-268-020, 1 x oil pump to crankcase 91302-250-010, 2 x Oil Pump cover rings (these are not listed by Honda) this is because it's this ring I'm still assessing, I have 2 members testing which is best. However I'll provide both and you can decide which you prefer until I get some feedback either way on which works the best. All the orings are the exact size required. I've taken pics of genuine rings fitted out of a full gasket kit and my rings and they are identical. I can safely say this is the best kit out there. Cost £7 inc P&P. DS want £15.83 plus P&P for the 4 rings that are available.

I also can do the 4 oil gallery orings, these are the 3 plugs which fit in the lower crankcase and the one which is fitted to the plug in the main oil gallery inside the generator cover. So 3 x 91315-044-000 and 1 x 91319-300-000. Cost £5 inc P&P. DS wants £16.06 plus P&P for these 4 rings.

I also have available.

Camshaft end cover cap rings, 91319-323-000. These are in Viton™. 40p each plus P&P or free postage if ordered with any set

Dipstick oring 91354-702-000 30p each plus P&P or free postage if ordered with any set

Starter motor end cap, 91309-300-000 40p each plus P&P or free postage if ordered with any set

Starter Motor internal oring, 91206-286-158 40p each plus P&P or free postage if ordered with any set

CB550F/K clutch adjuster bolt, fitted low down on the clutch casing. 91301-040-000 40p each plus P&P or free postage if ordered with any set.

Tacho Drive and oil restrictor orings at base of barrel 91309-035-000 40p each plus P&P or free postage if ordered with any set

Coming soon will be tappet cover rings and inlet manifold rings, 91302-001-020, the EXACT size as specified by Honda. These have to be specially made to order.

Also a full carb set of orings in Viton™. Again specially made to order and the exact size needed. I've already tested the float bowl ring and this one stays inside the groove without needing glue, unlike any others I've fitted in the past.

I was looking for something else yesterday and found 2 old oil pumps for the 500/550 lying in the bottom of a huge box, I decided on a whim to restore them, both were complete except one has one of the small collars missing that have the bottom O-Rings around, will probably find one of those somewhere. So I took them apart and cleaned them both up, must say they cleaned up very nicely. However the O-Rings will need replacing so I decided I'd see if I can find them without having to buy genuine Honda. After recently seeing a tappet cover O-Ring provided by an Ebay seller which claimed to be a perfect replacement for a genuine Honda O-Ring and finding it so bad I couldn't trust using it, I decided this time to source my own. The problem though is that Honda are kinda sparse with the info for the oil pump, the pressure relief valve (both of which were stuck BTW, that's both oil pumps and 3 filter bolts now where the relief valves are stuck, that could be from standing so long, they've been in that box since before 1980 I reckon) is the only one listed with it's full info, 19.4 x 2.8mm. Honda state the big O-Ring is 47mm but no section is listed. Same for the 2 collar O-Rings, just 14mm is listed, no section. The O-Ring under the cap isn't even listed as being available and it isn't included even in a full genuine Honda gasket kit so that will require some thought.

I looked online on advise on how to measure an O-Ring, looked easy enough but nope that didn't work. The 47mm O-Ring now measures 52mm, the 19.4mm is the closest to being correct at 20mm, the 14mm is now 15mm. The other problem is, if the diameter has changed so has the section, being squashed distorts them over time. I measured them all and wrote down what I thought they were, then I remembered having a genuine bottom end set in the loft, so that came out and I measured a brand new non distorted O-Ring and they were quite different. None of the measurements I'd carefully taken were correct, which means the one not even listed will have to be carefully thought about. It's now a loose fit on the top of the pump, it fits inside the cap just fine but there doesn't seem to be any compression taking place when the cap is fitted with the old O-Ring, I reckon it must have been a tightish fit around the flange on the top of the oil pump when new, it must be slightly taller than the flange as well or it wouldn't seal too well.

So now I have some on order, I've done a few choices for the cap O-Ring, I'll see which one I feel is best.

One word of caution on buying none genuine Honda O-Rings, first off they are all nitrile rings (AFAIK) and unless the ring comes into contact with petrol that should be just fine to keep using. Viton is usually harder to compress, not a huge difference TBH, a normal ring is 70 and Viton tends to be 75 or 80. A number of the genuine Honda rings are also really odd sizes, that can normally mean they aren't available to buy from a UK manufacturer, the tappet cover is one, which is also the same ring as the inlet manifold rubbers, on a tappet cover is not absolutely vital to get a perfect seal but on an inlet manifold that's another matter. The one I was given to fit was so bad I ended up robbing an old one from a tappet cover and fitting the new one there instead. You cannot buy these rings off the shelf, you have to have them made specially and the minimum order is normally 500. It's the same for the pressure relief valve cap on the oil pump, it's such an odd size they don't make it anymore. Incidentally it's also the same ring that fitted to the 3 oil gallery bungs in the crankcase, that's why there are 4 of them in the gasket kit. You'd need to order 500 specially to get a perfect fit, that can be expensive.

I'm in contact with a large UK manufacturer of O-Rings about getting some rings specially made for me,  tappet covers and inlet manifolds will be one, the relief valve and oil gallery plugs will be another if I feel my replacement doesn't fit the bill well enough.