Built To Last

Three old friends, two neglected old bikes. Steven Troupe brings a couple of single-cam Honda 750s back to life – and then gets to ride them…

Over my recent summers I worked on a couple of Honda CB750 sohc fours. Both are owned by childhood friends of mine, both needed engine work. Jim, Ray and I have remained friends since high school, all the way into our 60s! When we were teenagers we had motorbikes and we still do. In fact, Ray still owns the 1977 CB750 he bought new at 20 years old!

I enjoy working on Honda’s sohc CB750 motor. I remember putting together a one-third scale model kit when I was 13 years old, a working model with clear plastic parts that allowed a view of the engine’s internals. In real life, other than the need to remove the motor from the frame, the CB750 is quite easy to work on. All the cam block tops and bottoms are labelled, the cam has that little notch in its end to help align things, it has a simple rocker arm adjustment system and it is easy enough to set the camchain tension. Sure there are things to watch for, like not dropping anything (including the camchain) down into the crankcase, but overall it’s quite a robust and fun motor for a home mechanic. As a matter of course I replace the Phillips-head screws with Allen head screws or bolts. And I keep a supply of blue Loctite and a good torque wrench handy.

THE RAT BIKE

Jim is proud of his 1975 CB750, a self-styled‘rat bike’ with Invader wheels, 4” extensions to the front forks, king/queen seat, sissy bar, ape-hanger handlebars, straight-through shorty pipes, a side stand from a Harley-Davidson and a grey and black flame-out paint job. It does make quite a sight…

…especially as it was leaking oil profusely from every top end gasket. When I first saw it, the entire bike from the engine back was coated in decades of oil, crud and dirt. Even the sidewalls of the 15-year-old rear tyre were caked with grease. Still, at least there wasn’t much rust in those areas! But the front wheel had surface rust just about everywhere.