Vintage Dirt Bike Q & A

I finally have a "roller" so I installed the motor and a few other parts today,
it's gaining weight in a hurry. My expansion chamber has a nice bash in the
head pipe where it faces the ground so off it goes to Pacific Crest pipe repair
to be blown out. Unless there is some other surprise, that will be the last
part that needs attention. Everything else is sitting on the shelf waiting to
be installed.

Had a beautiful day here so naturally, I had to take some more pictures. I
even rolled my '73 out for a couple of "sunny" shots.

dogger

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1973 CR250M
1979 CR250R
1993 CR250R
2008 CR500R
2009 CR250R

Dogger,

What a gleaming piece of perfection! I keep going over, and over your pics, and the attention to detail is unbelievable.

Hope to see your CRs someday in person.

Mike Middleton

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mikebike11y

63 Rickman Metisse
66 Triumph
66 Suz S32
66 Honda CB160s
69 Montesa Cappras
79 C&J Honda XR500
81 Honda 185S ATC
82 Suz GS650G
84 Honda Z50R
86 ATK 560
01 Kawasaki ZRX1200R
06 RCF450R "WOOD Dirt Tracker"
and a Sears lawnmower

Beautiful! -
Did you cad plate the rear brake actuating arm, or how did get it that color?

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I have too many....
my wife thinks I should join motorcycles anonymous.......

I have a NOS rear brake actuating arm and it is that color....

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Michael Stiles
1979 Honda CR250R Elsinore | 2006 Husqvarna SM510R | 2007 Service Honda CR500R-AF

very nice, i've been looking at these pictures for about a half hour the detail is amazing! though i did see some brown stuff in the kick start shaft- tacky . do you still have the red powder for sale, i'm right in the middle of building my powder coat oven.

Outstanding,This resto work is more than Honda Collection Hall in Tochigi !

Thanks everyone. I am glad all the work is paying off and it looks like this project
is going to produce a decent result. Like I said in a previous post, I tried to do
this restoration on the "cheap" by restoring rather than replacing parts. Where
my '73 is over 60% NOS, this '79 is less than 30%. That yielded a significant (less
than a third the cost) savings.

Boatfixer, Honda begin adding gold chromate to the cadmium plating in 1978 to offer
more corrosion protection. In addition to the better resistance to corrosion compared
to straight up clear (silver) cadmium plating, the chromate plated hardware also adds
a striking visual effect in my opinion - kind of like a red John Deere. In my attempt to
faithfully restore this bike, I tried to use the same plating process Honda used when it
was manufactured.

Badsix, Good catch. That "brown stuff" is surface rust. Looks like I need to spray
some MTTL in the shaft, so much for attention to detail. Glad to hear you are getting
an oven, you are going to love doing your own parts. I still have a few bags of the
Tahitian Red powder and a few sample plates (satin only). PM your address when you're
ready.

Holly, I've been to the Honda Collection Hall in Tochigi; I'm honored, thank you.

I still would like some input on what bike to restore next. Anybody have any preferences/
suggestions? Only restriction, it has to be a CR. I was thinking maybe a 1983 CR480
(Michael), but I'm open to suggestions.

dogger

_________________
1973 CR250M
1979 CR250R
1993 CR250R
2008 CR500R
2009 CR250R

My suggestions would be a 1983 CR480R, a 1986 CR250R or a 1993 CR250R. In the case of the 1986 you could try and put on the 1987 parts (rear brake etc.) to make it more like Johnson's "production" works bike.

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Michael Stiles
1979 Honda CR250R Elsinore | 2006 Husqvarna SM510R | 2007 Service Honda CR500R-AF

Dogger, is that an NOS cdi box? If not, how'd you clean it up so nicely?

Beautiful work; sets a pretty high bar.

I'd go with the 480 for your next stop, or a nice 80 125r.

They look great, what do you plan to do with them when your finished?? Your not going to ride them are you?

Both of these bikes are sufficiently old and iconic to warrant "preservation" status
in my opinion. As much as I would love to take them out and rip off some fast laps,
it would be a bad idea, especially if I had even a minor get off. That's why I could
never get into R/C airplanes. I couldn't bare to spend a year building my "pride and
joy" knowing there was a significant possibility it might crash and burn on it's check
out flight.

They are both fully functional and race ready (from a purely stock standpoint), and
that is how they will stay. I have newer bikes that parts are cheap and plentiful to
race and ride.

FTE, The CDI box is restored. I looked into a NOS but the price (north of $1000),
convinced me to explore other avenues. I cleaned up the wires and the plugs with
CRC electrical cleaner and replaced the shielded bullet connectors with identical new
ones from a kit I got from a company that specializes in vintage motorcycle electricals.
I stripped and polished the CDI box then brushed plated it with cadmium and gold
chromate. I restored the rubber mounting bushings and collers and used NOS bolts.
Once I finished the resto work, I did a functionallity check to make sure all the
numbers were within spec. It looks and performs like new.

dogger

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1973 CR250M
1979 CR250R
1993 CR250R
2008 CR500R
2009 CR250R