Bike number one turned up two years ago. One of the first models, an ’82 job, 53000 miles, looking as faded as an AIDS victim and sounding more like a machine gun than a motorcycle engine. The vendor loudly proclaimed that he’d fixed the camchain tensioner problem, conveniently forgetting to mention that his engineering skills reached merely to the heights of hammering in the largest nail he could find. The gearbox turned out to have a mere four ratios, I tested my mettle by riding home in the red in fourth. Both clutch and brake levers rattled in their mounts from the fierce vibes that left my eyesight like a ten times a day wanker. You don’t get much for two hundred quid, these days, and I didn’t get very much!
Arriving at my fine London residence - a boarded up ground floor council apartment in Battersea, if you must know - I rode straight into the hallway before any of the gangs of crack addicts had a chance to mug me. It was dark by then, not that I’d had any expectation that the lights would work, and the terrible din produced by the Honda must've convinced the addicts and the other residents that they’d found themselves cast into hell. Even my ears, veterans of too many hacks, were for once ringing.
I had a large supply of dead motorcycles in what was supposed to be the kitchen, where the running water and 30amp electrical outlet were deemed ideal for amateur engineering efforts. It was surprisingly easy to convert the kitchen units into a workbench. However, the Honda was deemed to be sufficiently far from instant demise to forgo any work, other than knocking a silencer on to the collector of the four into one exhaust and fitting a better front tyre.
Three weeks and 900 miles later the engine seized solid. The 70mph skid proved character building when the clutch lever took that exact moment to snap off! That's one of the benefits of running an ancient chain, when the engine seizes it’s sure to break. I freewheeled to the side of the road and ended up pushing the 400Ibs of grime encrusted metal the two miles to home. I was taunted by kids and threatened by cops but I wasn't going to dump the terrible old heap.
On examination, all four pistons had seized in the bores. Whether this was because the main bearings were shot or caused them to go I wouldn't venture a guess. After soaking in penetrating oil and hammering with my best mallet, the pistons were freed up. I had plenty of old rings, a full set bodged out of best of the originals and my box of spares. The pistons and bores were cleaned up with emery cloth and the whole doubtful assembly put back together in a mere day. The engine ran rather like a pile-driver but that didn’t stop me off-loading the heap for £250 as an interesting spares or repairs project.
The next CBX to come my way was an ’86 model, 42000 miles and nice overall condition except that the forks were bent and wheel buckled. £275 seemed fair, to me anyway. I was forced to ride home at 5mph, the front end lurching all over the place, like a ferret up a trouser leg. A worn out CB400 Superdream front end was soon knocked on, worked badly enough to stop me enjoying the potential 125mph top speed. At 90-100mph the weaves were mild enough to avoid immediate arrest or accident but the warped twin discs tried to unwrap the forks every time they were used in anger. My home made horn was used to good effect, a battery melting 200 decibel shriek of someone screaming insanely. Quite appropriate given the vagueness of the front end and lack of brakes!
I somehow avoided killing myself or anyone else for five months worth of riding until the engine went in an entirely predictable manner for a CBX. Yes, the camchain broke. The resulting tangled valves and broken pistons were not a pretty sight and even the vast resources of my spare parts didn’t quite stretch to an easy, as in cheap, solution. No, four 250 Superdream pistons can’t be modified to fit a CBX550! The chassis was sold off to a dubious character who would've probably given me the £150 just for the logbook whilst the bottom half of the engine fetched £75, so once again it was proved that even disaster could be turned around. Some dental work slashed my capital and had me running around on a series of Honda step-thrus for a couple of months. Buy a non-runner cheaply, sort it out and then sell at a profit. Repeat until there’s enough dosh to buy something interesting.
That turned out to be a pig-like '85 model with a huge full fairing in white that scared the shit out of cagers when I growled up behind them, having rebuilt my horn to sound like a police siren (wonderful what you can do with a soldering iron and bagful of electronic components). Neither chassis nor engine would ever see 50000 miles again but they worked as well together as could be expected, making 90mph cruising a fairly tolerable experience.
I had loads of trouble with the enclosed disc brakes seizing up but nothing that a few well aimed blows with the hammer couldn't solve. The exhaust disintegrated but was easily, if not lovingly, bodged from my stash of spares. I even ministered the odd oil change and bit of engine maintenance as I couldn't afford any kind of replacement.
By the time 73000 miles were on the clock the whole machine was thoroughly worn out. When the gearbox gets to the stage that whatever gear’s found, with many more false neutrals than forward ratios, is held on to with desperate diligence, you know it’s time to move on.
Or not, my dogged determination to ignore the effects of mileage and age ended up with teeth shearing off the cogs, bits of metal lodging just about everywhere inside the engine. As I doubted that there was anything worth salvaging, even the fairing had cracked up from the vile vibration (from what's normally a smooth engine), the number plate was removed and the bike thrown into the nearest ditch. I did manage to sell the logbook for £75, so a little bit of dosh was recovered.
The final machine was bought from a dealer on HP, for 500 quid, an '83 model with 47000 miles under its distinctly non-standard wheels. The front end was off a GPz550, the frame had been straightened, the matt black and camouflage paint scheme was cute and the engine was reputedly rebuilt from the crankcase up. I tended to believe the latter because it was the quietest and smoothest CBX550 motor I'd ever come across.
The handling was well weird, combining a tendency to fall into slow speed curves with a need to twitch the bars coming out of fast corners. A high speed wobble encouraged respect for the throttle, which undoubtedly extended engine life. 125mph was possible but I usually stayed under the ton. I found that this example was my favourite as I was pretty sure of doing a few hundred miles in a day without a major breakdown. Minor things like loose wires, leaking exhausts or disappearing indicators were expected and taken in their stride.
When I slid off going around a corner at about 40mph I thought I was lucky to escape with bruising. Until I clocked the engine. The crash-bars had broken off, allowing the side of the motor to be rather modified by the tarmac. The mangled crankshaft was not an inspiring sight, not when I thought there was at least another ten thousand miles left in the bike. I hoped I could sell the chassis off but found that after the accident the frame had cracked where it was straightened. A fitting revenge on my years and thousands of miles of neglect and abuse of various CBX550s.
Somewhere within the CBX550 there’s an excellent motorcycle trying to get out. Buy a low mileage example by all means but don't expect a long lasting camchain. Most examples are high mileage, tending towards rats these days, but given a low price, £200 to £400, they ain't bad buys if you can bodge them.
Larry Davidson