CB500 K2 Cafe build.

[Mitchv60]

Morning,recently joined the forum and I thought I start a thread on my project I;ve just started.

CB500 1972 K2 purchased just over 3 weeks ago with the intention of doing a cafe racer build.Unfortunately the bike was in worse condition than I hoped so now its a ground up build rather than a tart up.


First job is to make sure it runs before I take the engine out of the frame.I'm going to have a compression/leak down check done to see the the state of play and then I'll do an oil change if hasn't got to come apart,then clean the carbs.


Carbs off ready for ultrasonic cleaning/servicing.

Ordered my new battery,oil filters,carb servicing kits,master cylinder service kit as that seized solid.
This is state of play as of last night.It will stay like this now until I get the engine checked and carbs cleaned and back together to see if she fires.


Just for comical value,the pile of rust after the strip down

[deltarider]

Cb500K2
Were they imported in England?

[Mitchv60]

It was imported from the US in 97

[deltarider]

Interesting. The US 500K2's were 1973 and didn't have the colors and striping of the later 500K2 [ED, F, G] for Europe in 1976.

[Mitchv60]

 
yes,this is a bit of a bone of contention.
The bike was registered as built in 72 in the US so I presumed it was a K1 but i have been told by chaps on here it is a K2.
Have a look here and you'll see http://www.sohc.co.uk/index.php/topic,4793.msg22158/topicseen.html#new

[Mitchv60]

Time for an update

Things have been going a bit slow because work has been hectic.
The carbs have now been sorted ,ultrasonically cleaned and serviced by my mechanic and then back to me for the cosmetic bits.
There was only so much i could do to them because of the state they where in.
All the rusty steel bits have been cleaned and sprayed,the carb bodies have been dremeled with a wire head.The carb mounting plate has been vapour blasted and I've given it a couple of coats of lacquer.Most of the nuts and bolts have been changed to stainless.
This is the finished result,it won't win any concourse shows but I'm pleased with the results compared to how they where when I removed them.




I'm still waiting on my exhaust which should have been here today but it now looks like the 14th
On the plus side I've had 2 new clocks and a bracket arrive from dime city cycles in the states,very nice quality as well.



Thats about it so far,need to get the carbs back on now to see if it runs.

[UK Pete]

Carbs look great, nice job, its amazing how many man hours can go into building carbs
Pete

[K2-K6]

The carbs look like a good job and all being about right with the motor should give you a more than evens chance of getting it fired up.

It amused me that you appear to have the carbs in the kitchen.....just clear all that cooking malarkey out the way and make room for some real stuff.....starting off in style I think.

[andy120t]

It's that level of detail I envy though. Look at every component / assembly in isolation and then say 'what needs doing to make this stand out on it's own'. Then, when it's all put together the attention to detail really hits you. I just wish I could do that .... usually I'm in too much of a rush to have it up and running, then I don't want to take it apart again.  I think I lack 'finishing skills'!

[Mitchv60]

Yes I recon the carbs took me a good couple of weekends to do.

Yes the pictures where in the kitchen but that's only cause the lighting is good in there.

The brass caps are actually very polished it just doesn't really show in the pictures.
The only reason I've changed the clocks are because they are in such a bad state.They may be salvagable if you could find spares but it's unlikely plus there in kpm although I know you can get round that.

I've had another box of bits arrive tonight.

[matthewmosse]

250 superdream clocks are the same internally so I just swapped the inners into my old casings when they internally fell to bits on my 500. For doing carbs I have an old writing breurau in my sheds attic, with all the stationary holder slots built in it's pretty handy plus the writing surface folds up over it all to cover up the carb bits when not in use to keep the dust off. The breurau looks like somethig off bargin hunt and must have been a nice piece before the last owner let it get woodworm, my gain though, it was £2 and is stil tough enough for workshop use after a good dose of worm killer (and carb cleaner injected down the odd hole when bored)
Personally I abandoned doing cosmetic inprovements like that as once cleaned the temptation would be either to not use the bike or having to keep it that clean, I doff my hat to those of you who have the persaverence to keep at it and do the nice looking bikes and keep them there.

[Mitchv60]

I've managed to get a couple of small jobs done over the christmas break.
I mocked up the front end,bars,clocks and grips just to see if it was the look I was after.


Stripped the paint on the top yoke,removed the worse casting flaws and polished it.

[Mitchv60]

A bit more done,making the most of some time off over christmas.
Welded up the subframe loop and added some triangular gussets beneath it just to finish off the line of the frame so it doesn't stop abruptly.
I'll leave the dressing up of the welds till I've got the engine out of the frame so it's a bit easier to do.
I take my hat off to any one who is good at welding because I am not,I can turn my hand to most things but I admit I struggled a bit with this.
I suppose it will get easier the more I do as this was my first time.


Next job is getting seat pan sitting right and sort out the fixings for it.

[UK Pete]

Looks like its coming on on well, i know what you mean about welding i try to do a bit here and there but i also find it hard
Pete

[matthewmosse]

Make life easyer, just tack weld the parts in place then leave final welding and dressing the welds until the frame is stripped and light enough to put each weld in flat as vertical welding is far harder to do.