[midlandsnick]

Ok not sure if this will work but here goes, been years since i posted a thread up on a machine..

Aquired this about 3 months ago from a local chap and his wife, had been sat in a shed on their property since 1985.

Found it purely by chance after being there to do some work and mentioning I had a love of motorbikes and classic machinery. He offered to show me some old stuff he had ferreted away and amongst it I spotted this little honda twin , didnt really give it much more thought till I realised it was a 125 and therefor ridable on a CBT by me. I jokingly said that I wouldnt mind that ! and we got on with our days, few months later got a message from the chaps wife asking if my offer had been genuine as it seemed such a shame for it to be sat there going to waste.

At first sight (probably should have run a mile)

Tyres were flat and perished badly, the centre stand didnt work and was missing most of its foot on one side.
Dragged it back to work and after blowing up the tyres so it would roll I hit it with the power washer to see just how bad it was. Seat had rotted completely away and simply fell off. tank had no mounts of any sort and was just sat on bike

offside still wearing its farm dust

nearside after a blast

sat back inside and dried off with airline , seat and tank sat back on temporarily

First impressions were of a sound if not "ratty" bike, the spokes in the wheels were poor but still had a healthy ring to them, the stand was siezed on its pivot and missing one side, the front and rear mudguards were rust free, as was the frame, it had the wrong headlight, seat and bars, evidence of an accident on the tank on the right hand side of it and no indicators. It did however have paperwork and showed up on the DVLA system. I had no keys for it but knew of a man in southampton who was a whizz with keys, and had also found a good friend on facebook who is an amazing lady with four of these bikes !! and a mountain of knowledge.

Engine was oil free and still turned but with no compression to speak of (fingers in plug holes and nothing )

hand painted tank badges in red (they are staying red) and the damage

what I think is a benly headlight? could be wrong

tried a little go with an airpowered minimop on the hand painted blackness

more to follow as i find the photos

 

[midlandsnick]

Decided after getting bored with having to lean it everywhere that first job would be centre stand, as Robyn had predicted (shes good!) the holes in the frame had been ovalled out by the bar siezing in the stand itself and pivotting in the frame instead, it also explained where there were no nuts holding the exhausts onto the ends of the pivot bar.

Im sorry I dont have photos of all the processes that followed as was busy trying to get it done but did grab a few.

After using a gas axe to heat the stand I managed to drive the pivot bar out of it. once I had cleaned all the burrs off the ends where I had been gripping it to twist it out I could see there were massive wear rings where it had been pivotting in the frame.

pivot bar out of bike showing wear points

The areas of wear were duly loaded up using the mig welder

this was repeated on both sides and then it was put in the lathe and spun back to the original diameter (or as near as I could).
You can see the band of new metal in the middle of this shot.

With the pivot all good I welded up the holes in the frame around their edge and drilled them back to the correct diameter (sorry no photos) and set about sorting the bar the stand hits against, it had been badly bent to the point the brake pedal wasnt working very well and at an angle. This had to be dissected to get it out the frame but the damage is self evident, a new one was made from 22mm solid bar machined to shape and welded back into the frame

stand stop with brake pivot

I then set about remaking the stand, I thought id got it in line but once on the bike it was evident its not and the legs need to be longer (can see why there was an odd extension on the existing leg now) on standard tyres it would be fine but im running fat tyres like what it had on it as liked the look.

this will be getting redone as it bugs me no end, but for now it will let the bike stand on its own.

.

As was to be expected the carburettor was full of crud, luckily though being crud from old fuel not modern fuel it cleaned up very well with little more than compressed air and carb cleaner, the diaphragm had a small split in that I glued up and it was refitted, the fuel tap was solid through with white oxide but once i had figured out how to remove it I stripped it and cleaned it all out (every screw and nut so far had come undone on this bike with no problems at all). My new key had arrived by now and a battery borrowed off my honda express was temporarily fitted to get me power for the points. A gallon of fuel was put into the tank (which to this day I have done nothing to except blow out with an airline) . The bores had been sitting full of diesel for a couple of days so I sucked out what I could, drained the oil and changed that, gave it a spin over and there seemed to be compression so the plugs went back in and I tried for a start. It took a few kicks but amazingly it fired and caught properly and after a few seconds was on both cylinders sitting there running on its own for the first time since 1985. The following video was shot a few days later for someone on the facebook who asked how it sounded.

With installation of a battery it meant I could start sorting electrics, out, none of the dash bulbs were any good so I ordered up some 6v led off of ebay (they came prewired) and with a combination of hot glue and soldering them to the original bullet connectors I changed all the bulbs in the speedo.

Neutral light

all the bulbs in the warnings lights are just as bright.

ok folks thats all for now, running out of photos,
thanks foir lookin !

 

[jonnyuk]

looks like a good project. Are you going to restore it or leave it as it is, just sorting the mechanicals and making it roadworthy.?

 

[midlandsnick]

taxed and tested as of last weekend, took it to my sons in a trailer and over the weekend we covered 300 miles or so, will use for this summer and then look at some new paint over the winter and sorting those grotty wheels, amazingly even with 63000 miles on it the engine runs like a watch now its had some use, all the gears work (did have some fun with a stuck non disengaging clutch for a bit though). Heading out in a bit to get some arty shots of the old heap in some picturesque locations

 

[nigelrharris03]

Wow great work

 

[ancientdad]

Neutral light

and the speedo with an unbelievable number of miles for that bike - wow. awesome find, good work getting it going

 

[midlandsnick]

i had a honda express with over 40k on it.. its not that hard to achieve !

 

[ancientdad]

i had a honda express with over 40k on it.. its not that hard to achieve !

My thought was more from a long-term reliability standpoint - most of those 125s didn't last that long over here, usually blown up before 20k to 30k but probably the fault of the owner... they were all kids riding them back when I saw them in use regularly, high school classmates

 

[jonnyuk]

taxed and tested as of last weekend, took it to my sons in a trailer and over the weekend we covered 300 miles or so, will use for this summer and then look at some new paint over the winter and sorting those grotty wheels, amazingly even with 63000 miles on it the engine runs like a watch now its had some use, all the gears work (did have some fun with a stuck non disengaging clutch for a bit though). Heading out in a bit to get some arty shots of the old heap in some picturesque locations

Nice one. I think it looks real good not restored

 

[midlandsnick]

i wont be making it factory, but redoing what the previous owner was trying to achieve, the black with the pin striping really appeals to me, just needs to be a bit cleaner

 

[ScramblerCurtis]

Absolutely Brilliant!!! Good on you for rescuing that little gem. It appears you are certainly more than capable of the restoration. I'm envious of your shop.

BTW - in post #1 last picture it looks like the side cover is red underneath the black. Was that the original colour or was that a second cover the PO put on there?

George sounds pretty good and its such a stroke of luck that the wiring/electronics was still in good shape.

 

[midlandsnick]

no electronics on this bad boy ! ! points condensor and good old fashioned copper ! ! had a little bit of fun with the wiring from the engine stator being chaffed behind the side cover, didnt find it till I was 4 miles from the workshop out riding about.. long walk which started with a very very steep hill.. needless to say I was incapable of speech by the time I got back and somewhat sweated to hell... second hand cover I suspect original colour was a metallic blue as found under the ignition switch