Hi Guys-
It's been a while since my last post regarding the '74 850 I brought back from Colorado in Oct. so I thought I would give an update. I read the forum almost daily but in working on this Commando everything was pretty straight forward so I didn't want to pester you guys ridiculous questions, (what wt. motor oil, size tires etc!).
Anyway after close to 20 years of this bike laying dormant I finally got it running today. At the beginning of all this I was pretty sure I would do a full restoration minus paint. The more I got into tearing the bike down the more I realized that a full re-do of everything was really not necessary. It was in such great shape. In fact several of my riding buddies told me I would be crazy to go OCD on it. The more I thought about it I came to the conclusion that it would only be original once and I should try to leave it that way. I'll let the next owner go nuts.
I did strip it down to the bare frame, cleaned and detailed every part on the bike. Lots of polishing. Brake rebuild, carb kits and overhaul, new ignition parts, fork seals and boots, oil lines etc. That shot of the wheel rim is exactly how it looked when I pulled the tire and rubber band off. Not a grain of rust. How often do you see that on a 38 year old bike? I did not tear the engine down. Just short of splitting the cases and pulling the heads I replaced every seal and gasket I could. When I drained all the fluids I was amazed at how clean and uncontaminated the oil was. I was told that the bike ran perfectly fine when parked but we've all heard that story! In this case I took a leap of faith and believed it. It sounds great.
I do have one issue though: While checking the timing with a strobe, fiddling with the air screws, idle screws etc. the bike was idling for approx 2-3 minutes. Suddenly oil started coming out of the area where the wires for the points run through the case up toward the harness. Not on the points side ( I replaced that seal) but the opposite side. When I pulled those wires through so I could get the timing cover off I did not notice and type of seal or grommet there which when reassembling I thought a bit odd. In fact I've just checked the Andover Norton exploded views for the timing cover and the engine cases again and do not see anything to seal that wiring off. It doesn't look like I'll make the Rock Store tomorrow with it. What did I miss?
Anyway, here are a few shots of the progress I went through:
Picked it up from CO. She still hasn't sold me that TR-3 yet!
After getting it home and a 30 minute cleaning. Could not wait to get those handlebars off
The tear down begins
I did not touch this rim with any cleaner whatsoever
Starting the reassembling process
And this is what it looks like today
And this is a shameless shot of me racing at Laguna Seca back in 1987 or 1988. This was a 750 Fastback I built from a basket case to run
in the Battle of the Twins and the AHRMA race that ran in conjunction with the Grand Prix that year. Not sure if anyone knows Mick Olfield
but he helped me with some engine and chassis work. That is a 650 Ninja front end! They were not happy with me in Tech inspection.
I disconnected the anti-dive and that made them feel better!
It's been a while since my last post regarding the '74 850 I brought back from Colorado in Oct. so I thought I would give an update. I read the forum almost daily but in working on this Commando everything was pretty straight forward so I didn't want to pester you guys ridiculous questions, (what wt. motor oil, size tires etc!).
Anyway after close to 20 years of this bike laying dormant I finally got it running today. At the beginning of all this I was pretty sure I would do a full restoration minus paint. The more I got into tearing the bike down the more I realized that a full re-do of everything was really not necessary. It was in such great shape. In fact several of my riding buddies told me I would be crazy to go OCD on it. The more I thought about it I came to the conclusion that it would only be original once and I should try to leave it that way. I'll let the next owner go nuts.
I did strip it down to the bare frame, cleaned and detailed every part on the bike. Lots of polishing. Brake rebuild, carb kits and overhaul, new ignition parts, fork seals and boots, oil lines etc. That shot of the wheel rim is exactly how it looked when I pulled the tire and rubber band off. Not a grain of rust. How often do you see that on a 38 year old bike? I did not tear the engine down. Just short of splitting the cases and pulling the heads I replaced every seal and gasket I could. When I drained all the fluids I was amazed at how clean and uncontaminated the oil was. I was told that the bike ran perfectly fine when parked but we've all heard that story! In this case I took a leap of faith and believed it. It sounds great.
I do have one issue though: While checking the timing with a strobe, fiddling with the air screws, idle screws etc. the bike was idling for approx 2-3 minutes. Suddenly oil started coming out of the area where the wires for the points run through the case up toward the harness. Not on the points side ( I replaced that seal) but the opposite side. When I pulled those wires through so I could get the timing cover off I did not notice and type of seal or grommet there which when reassembling I thought a bit odd. In fact I've just checked the Andover Norton exploded views for the timing cover and the engine cases again and do not see anything to seal that wiring off. It doesn't look like I'll make the Rock Store tomorrow with it. What did I miss?
Anyway, here are a few shots of the progress I went through:
Picked it up from CO. She still hasn't sold me that TR-3 yet!
After getting it home and a 30 minute cleaning. Could not wait to get those handlebars off
The tear down begins
I did not touch this rim with any cleaner whatsoever
Starting the reassembling process
And this is what it looks like today
And this is a shameless shot of me racing at Laguna Seca back in 1987 or 1988. This was a 750 Fastback I built from a basket case to run
in the Battle of the Twins and the AHRMA race that ran in conjunction with the Grand Prix that year. Not sure if anyone knows Mick Olfield
but he helped me with some engine and chassis work. That is a 650 Ninja front end! They were not happy with me in Tech inspection.
I disconnected the anti-dive and that made them feel better!
