To my surprise, I started the CL200 today.  As anticipated, it started right up and ran like a champ.

About 3 or 4 minutes into it, I saw smoke rising though.  The wire from the speedometer cable was glowing red hot.  It was never connected because the speedo is shot (tonight though I replaced it with the working one I had leftover from the CB360). 

By the way, the wires you see holding the cable up were actual live wires for something….and melted together during this incident.  I cut off the ends in order to get them off of the speedo cable. 

I immediately shut it off, but now the entire electrical system is dead.  No power anywhere.  I checked the one fuse it has, it’s fine.  I tried reconnecting the two wires that I cut as well.  Any suggestions?

Well, I got the bike back today.  All I can say is “outstanding.”  It runs like it’s new.  It rides like a 36 year old bike should ride.  I love it.

So, back to the restoration, to the left is the right side cover after about three or four rounds of filling and sanding.  Looks beautiful, right?

I have to say…I’m pretty pleased with how this is turning out.  Here is the side cover after the second round of primer.    As you can see, I did cut the remaining vertical bars out and just make it an open vent.  I have to argue that it’s almost looking like a professional job.  That’s important to me because it will hopefully set the stage for the rest of the bike’s restoration….I tend to lose steam and start settling for “good enough.”

Finally, here is the left side cover as-is.  It’s intact and just has some scrapes that will need to be filled.

Well, no pictures tonight since I can’t seem to find the camera, but the side cover is coming along and is really turning out to be a good lesson for having patience…which is necessary with body work.

The good news is that the CL200 is coming back on Saturday.  The guy is another really great person to know and with his permission I’ll also give out his name.  Anyway, for just over $350 (including pickup and delivery) he said it’s running and riding well now.  Here’s what he did:

• Install a new clutch cable and adjust the clutch – the clutch cable was just too short and causing all of my grief.
• Acid wash the tank and remove all rust
• rebuild the petcock
• Install new ends on the battery terminals
• Adjust the carbs
• Change the oil
• Install a new front brake cable and adjust the brake

I can’t wait to ride it!

I am truly sorry I haven’t posted in so long.  Between a lack of funds and the hecticness of late summer, I really haven’t had much time to ride my rider (2008 Kawasaki Vulcan 500) let alone work on my CL200.

However, over the weekend it finally made its way into the shop.  It seems that the issue with no power was most likely due to the clutch cable being too short.  The guy recognized the problem right away.  A new cable is on the way and I should know for sure in a few days.

Aside from that, I’m paying him a little extra to clean out the tank and do a few other little tasks that are very difficult without the right tools.

So, hopefully in a week or so I’ll be back on it….finally able to ride it and do the slow restore as planned.  On another positive note, a good friend of mine may finally have the go ahead from his wife to buy a bike.  He’s more into the sport bike scene, but hey – I’m more interested in the company than I am in what they ride.

As I mentioned a few days ago, I did finally remove the exhaust to have a good look at it.  It’s pretty rough.

The pipe in the picture is the lower pipe, from the left hand cylinder.  It’s far worse than the upper pipe..as can be expected since the upper pipe is shielded by the lower pipe.

A little bit of elbow grease though has resulted in the less rusty sections that you see.  Some areas are completely pitted and will need a good grinding.

The back side of the exhaust heat shields are also pretty rough as you can see…but nothing that can’t be cleaned up with some work and possibly some Dremel attachments.  I suppose I’ll end up sanding most of the chrome off in the process of cleaning these up, but that’s ok.  They need to be clean for now and I’ll get them rechromed in the future.

The muffler is pretty well shot.  I’m having a very hard time finding a replacement, so for now I’ll try patching it, sandblasting it, and painting it with a high temperature tolerant black.  As far as I can tell from pictures I’ve found, the muffler was black from the factory.

I’m debating whether or not I should just get the pipes coated black.  It may look pretty good and will also be cheaper than chroming…but it’s just not original.  Any opinions?

Here’s a picture of the main heat shield from the front side. It’s not too bad from this side except it has a crease that needs to be straightened.  Also, the screws REALLY need to be replaced…I barely managed to get them out, due to them being already stripped.

So, I’m going to bust a nut trying to get these pipes cleaned up before they pick up the bike next week.  I’ll send it over to the shop without a muffler and try to get that patched and blasted while they’re looking at the engine issues.

Well folks, I guess whenever you get into projects like these, you have to accept that at anytime you may stumble upon a huge setback….one that just takes the wind out of your sails. 

I guess it’s not that dramatic, but I have come to an enormous setback on what I’m considering phase I of this project, which is to just get it running properly.

I did get the carbs back on and it DID start nicely and run on both cylinders…that was a major milestone.  The problem is that it has no power.  When you let out the clutch it can barely chug along at all before stalling.  Also, I noticed that just pushing it in gear while it’s not running is really far too easy.  The back tire should be almost (if not completely) skidding but it’s not.

Without even looking into clutch issues, it definately seems to be a lack of compression.  I’ll have to get the compression tested (maybe see how much that tool costs – may be handy for later use).  Also, I’ve started shopping on ebay to get a new set of rings and a complete set of top end gaskets.  I’m REALLY hoping that once it’s apart I won’t find any cracked heads or pistons or anything like that.  The fact that it runs ok and there’s no smoke pouring out of it seems to indicate that it’s probably worn piston rings.

The other thing I noticed is that there’s a whole lot of oily mess that seems to be blowing out of the loose (as I found out) right hand exhaust port (see the pictures above) or out of the tachometer housing.

All in all. this really isn’t a huge deal, but it does kind of kill my plans to have it running in July.  Engine overhauls are beyond my expertise so I’m looking for someone that will do it really cheap.  I propably wouldn’t mind doing it myself in order to learn, but parts for this bike are rare and expensive.  I guess this is a lesson learned – don’t choose a rare bike for a learning project.  However, what’s started is started and it’s gonna get finished.

Some good news.  I started it this morning and it IS running on both cylinders now.  The idle is set way too high, and it’s running kind of crappy in general, but that’s nothing major.  Some fuel is coming out of the left hand overflow now…but not nearly as much as was coming out of the right side before getting it fixed.

When I get home for work…..I think it’s time to try throwing it into gear and taking some test runs down the street.

Well folks, I’m like a kid the night before Christmas.  I got my carbs back today but by the time I got them reinstalled, it was after 10:00 PM.  I gave it a quick start but shut it right back off.

I think first thing in the morning I’m gonna fire it up.  One good thing is that the right carb doesn’t seem to be spewing fuel anymore.

I also took this opportunity to install some inline fuel filters, because the tank is still pretty gritty.  I did put in some gas and nuts and bolts and shake it all around – but it will need much MUCH more shaking.

If I start it in the morning and it’s running on two cylinders…..I’m gonna call this a major milestone on this project.

I had this excellent experience today.  I took the carbs to a guy in Mentor that replied to my Craigslist posting for some help.  When he’s done with them, and with his approval, I will do a nice posting about him, his shop, and of course his meticulously restored CL350 that’s also his daily rider.

Anyway, this guy is living the dream.  He just finished grad school and has a really good day job but he also has a little garage in Mentor where he mostly keeps his excellent collection of motor toys and does little side jobs in order to pay for the place.

So anyway he starts taking the carbs apart on the spot and immediately shows me where I went wrong, explains what he’s doing, and mostly got them fixed…I think.  I ran out of time so I’ll pick them up later in the week.

The really exceptional thing was that rather than just tell me to go buy a bunch of parts (that we both know are extremely hard to find for this bike), he actually put the effort in to work with what I have. 

Here’s what he found (and is almost done fixing):

• Left carb (the one where gas was not making it past the float) – the jets were both still extremely clogged as well as a bunch of other parts that I didn’t even see because they were so covered with debris and gunk.  As far as I know, this one is good to go.
• Right carb (the one that was getting fuel into the engine but spewing just as much fuel out the overflow tube) – same story as with the left carb, but he also found that one of the floats has a hole in it.

Now it makes perfect sense.  The float valve is working (as I thought it was) but the float is filling with gas and is too heavy to go up far enough to stop the flow of fuel.  Therefore, fuel keeps coming in and right back out the overflow hose.  He got  all of the really rotten old gas out of the float and is working on plugging it with a really delicate soldering procedure.

Also, since both idle jets were completely clogged, it makes sense now why it won’t idle..duh!

I am not only totally psyched up about the good change that this bike will finally be running by the weekend, but I also learned so much about carburetors today.  The mystery boxes now make sense to me.  Well, the learning is very much one of the most exciting reasons to get into a bike restore.