Turning a 1979 CR250 "barn find" into a 1978 RC250 replica

Rich; is it a hand held-hammer type or an air ratchet type?

That would be perfect, Rich.. I can come get it and bring you the 15 wt fork oil I promised.

I made some progress the last few nights.. front and rear ends all done and today I will install the new, NOS piston/ rings and get the motor finished.


I replaced the fork seals with a nice seal driver from Motion Pro.. they went in harder than they should and I believe the reason the seals came out so hard is that the tolerances on the machining of the lower tube are a little too tight. The highlight of the fork rebuild was how nice the lower tubes came out when I polished them. better than new! I also installed a rare set of DG fork air caps and polished them up, too. I used 285 cc of #5 weight fork oil in each leg.. 10cc more than stock like most of the Honda team did back in the day. The spring that Race Tech spec'd is on the stiff side in my opinion. I have the air caps in case wanted to go a little stiffer, but I doubt that will be the case and instead the valve can be used to alleviate pressure when they get hot. I think I will replace the blue caps with black anodized ones. The Race Tech springs are also narrower than OEM, so when you shake the forks, you can hear them wiggling inside the fork tubes.


Here is the hollow tip screw driver set I got. The tips are straight rather than angled and help prevent the tip from mangling the screw when you apply a lot of force. These tips are often used in gun smithing..


The shafts on the Fox Air Shox will be well protected by this shock guard from Stevie Denton

Lots of little gems here from Stevie, some custom made such as the nice post that screws into the brake plate to mount the rear brake torque arm.

Borrowed the Snap-on impact driver from Rich.. what a tool.. a single tap with the hammer and each screw came out easy as pie.. thanks Rich! Need to get me one of these babies! Here is how she looks with those trick RC replica special case screws that Stevie D. made up. These things dramatically change the look and the trickness of the whole side of the engine and I would consider them a must have (Stevie.. I hope you are putting them on your own bike.. these are so cool.. thanks!)

You can get a glimpse of the PDE titanium RC replica swingarm pivot with the special case screws. That is the original shift lever installed at the factory on there which gives you an idea of the low hours/ level of preservation this bike is in

Here is the hollow point driver that allowed me to get the screws tight without buggering up the heads.

Another must have from Stevie is this stainless exhaust flange so you can start up the engine without getting 2-stroke oil dripping down the frame tube..

RC replica bolts throughout the entire engine and frame..


The bike should be about finished the middle of the coming week.

Thanks Paul, how is your build coming along?

mike

Any pics of the 80 CR125 and 73 CR250?

Nice looking CR125, Paul.. where are the High Point boots?

While I sit here waiting for the DHL guy to knock on my door with another set of NOS Honda piston rings so I can finish assembly today, I took a few close up shots so you can see some of the detail which came out better than I thought using original parts..

Every part in this shot is original parts installed at the factory and only cleaned up. The handlebars, triple clamps and hardware you see here is all original and nothing repainted or replated. Handlebars are straight as an arrow.

Inlt parts repainted here were the front sprocket cover and the wire guard on the frame rail that the rear brake rod passes through. Original hardware was in great condition but I used lots of Denton jewelry in this spot and for an obvious reason.. it rocks!

I think I am supposed to say something manly here like "this is the end of the bike the other riders never see".. or something like that / Only parts replaced here were the throttle grip and white plastic inside which had a small crack in it. Both levers were un-scarred but I replaced them anyway as the plastic covering the metal had yellowed slightly. If any parts were replaced, it was only with NOS OEM Honda parts 100% correct for this 1979 model. I did use RC replica triple clamp pinch bolts from Stevie for the detailed works look. That is the original factory installed front fender on there also.. Phil Cox brought it back to its original glory


The fork lowers polished out awesome. From the factory, they come with some sort of silver coating which scratched easy, but was done to prevent the raw aluminum from spotting before being delivered to the customer. I really dig this polished look and it only took a few minutes as the forks only had a few minor scratches which completely disappeared with a polish which also involved removing the original silver coating. Although the original hardware was in great condition, I still replaced the nuts on the lower axle clamp and the front hub with NOS OEM pieces to really make everything look new and make it pop. Looking at the pics, I just realized I forgot to detail one part.. the end of the front brake cable.. a little WD40 and a 3M pad will make it all shiny again with 20 seconds of elbow grease.

Anxious to hear her run, so I have the 40-1 Motul gas all mixed and ready to dump into the tank after I get the cylinder back on today.

She is pretty much finished.. just a few minor details left. She started right up and sounds great, too.

My garage doesn't have the best lighting. Need to take some better pics outside in natural light to get a good impression of the detail.

Many thanks guys.. she is great to stare at in the garage.

Hi Ledger.. when I saw the previous owner's friend post on the bike and saw that it was close by and in crazy nice condition at a good price, I moved fast as it was a rare opportunity and wasn't looking to get into a new build.. but this changed that quickly. It was a good price but I did put another ~$4K+ in parts into it and nothing really needed replacing.. just upgrading.

I really need to call out a few parties that helped make this bike come together. Foremost is Stevie and Phil Denton.. they don't just sell parts they produce in batches, they will work with you on any one-off part and this is such a rarity these days.. there is no way you can build a bike this level without having them as a "partner". The single coolest part for me is the replica HRC case screws that Stevie made special of a picture of Joe's engine.. I remember these special screws so well on the original RCs and now I consider a must have for anyone doing an RC replica build.

Next I have to mention CMS in the Netherlands.. not only do they have a great supply of NOS parts, but I can't believe they can have a part to me across the Atlantic (I am just outside NYC) in just 2 days or so. They are fast! I think I have every color key chain now?


Also Richard for helping me out with parts and tools whenever I ran into a problem.

Finally, there is Phil Cox who did a great job giving the original fenders a 2nd life.

While I stayed on the RC theme.. there are a few areas that I decided to go my own way in order to preserve the original parts that are so rare to find in this condition. Therefore I stayed with the original carb finish instead of going black (really like the black though), used the original front fender which Honda did also in 79, used a red laminate on the exposed part of the air box instead of painting it red, etc. I think it was the right choice. I also switch the DG air fork caps to black.. red or blue anodized just don't look right on this bike.. this looks much better..


Next I need to fine tune carb air screw adjustment and idle and put on the new chain, so I can annoy the neighbors with a few braaps up and down the street

Well Bryan.. I could trade these very rare blue and yellow ones for HRC parts.. they are made of Kevlar and have titanium chains/ key rings on them

Brought her outside, but the sun went out. The all original 40 year old plastic and paint still managed to shine!