Modern Vespa

A very nice 1981 Honda CB900C was traded in at one of our local dealerships a few days ago, and it immediately caught my interest.

I was able to get down to the dealer when they opened at 9:00 AM, and after a brief lookover and a short ride, I bought it.

It's cosmetic condition is extraordinary for a machine of this age (43 years), with good chrome, near perfect paint, and absolutely no fading of the red handlebar switches or other red details on the speedo face, etc.

It does have an inch and a half inch separation on the seat cover, but new reproduction seat covers are available for this model.

It has a color-matched Vetter Windjammer fairing that I will soon remove, but I will properly store it to preserve it, as it almost certainly was purchased and installed when the bike was new, I just don't care for fairings and windshields much, and this bike will just be a fair weather Sunday driver anyway.

In spite of it's very fine cosmetic condition, it has almost 48,000 miles on it

I'll have to find a complete headlight shell assembly for it, and a pair of front turn signals as well if I'm to remove the fairing.

Two photos of it from yesterday...

Hotness. Enjoy.

It may be easier just to remove the windshield from the fairing and just run it. Meanwhile from the look of it, probably never saw much rain, no snow and never in a humid or seaside environment. That thing is cherry, someone loved that machine.

The right side upper muffler does have a rust hole underneath, but it's difficult to see unless you get down on your knees and look for it. That's pretty typical for these old bikes, and it's unusual for a machine of this vintage to even have it's original exhaust still on it and presentable.


It's not all sunshine and butterflies though.

After getting the bike home, Trixie was about to gear up and hop on 'cupcake' when we noticed that the right side of the rear tire's sidewall was shiny, and it appears that gear lube was being lost from the rear drive housing.

I CAREFULLY rode it back to the dealership, where they pulled it into the shop and determined that several oil seals on the rear housing were shot, almost certainly from the bike sitting for a long period and rubber parts drying out and failing.

The shop is trying to source the needed seals, and they'll repair it ASAP, hopefully before too long.

Of course it's a disappointment, but something not entirely unexpected when dealing with older bikes.

I'm going to do a little 'networking' on my own and see what's still available for this particular Honda model.

It never is with older machines, there is always something that needs doing in them. And any scoot with upswept mufflers are going to rust out on the bottoms. It just part of owning one and they all have their weak spots.

Upside is that it is a Honda which aren't as hard to find parts for than other brands. And the prices are usually reasonable as well. Try that with a Kawasaki, for some reason their parts are like three times higher than Honda and not so easy to get sometimes.

The four-stroke bikes were certainly prone to rusting out, but it was never a problem with my GT750 Suzukis, they retained enough oil goo in their four upswept mufflers to prevent any corrosion.

Yeah the Kawasaki Triples too

A few more detail shots of it that I just took at the dealership when I went back to see if they had located the needed parts yet.

Please pardon my ignorance - what are the two levers that look like shifters?

That's a high and low range gearbox. Essentially giving you 10 gears instead of five to work with.

Cool! Thanks!

Congrats JBacklund, cool bike for sure! I've owned two CB900C's over the years. Smoothness! The fog of time gets in the way, but I remember they are known for a failure prone charging system. The stator is not cooled in an oil bath, thus the air cooled windings tend to fry. Don't fret! The aftermarket has fixes to cure that or any voltage regulator-rectifier issues that may arise. You got yourself a classic!

And....I'm trying to contain my jealousy.

I knew posting that photo would get some interest, and bearcat answered it.

Yes, it's the 'Hi-Lo' secondary foot lever for selecting the odd gearing ranges Honda used for this particular model.

You can change the five-speed transmission from low range five-speed to hi range five speed while moving, though for the life of me, I don't see any practical sense in it.

'Hi range' seems just a normally geared motorcycle five-speed, broadly useful in 'normal' riding situations.

I have been aware of this transmission since 1981, but had zero actual experience with it. Before I rode the bike home from the dealer the other day, I watched a YouTube video on it's operation.

Truthfully, I think it's a silly complication to answer a question that wasn't asked.

I don't pull camper trailers or fishing boats with my bikes, but what the heck, it's a great little conversation starter.

It's like a CT90, but all grown up.

I had one. The low range could easily pull a car in second gear. I did it, on pavement. I was pretty sure that in first gear, it could climb a wall

I honestly turned down buying one years ago because I saw no sense in it and figured it would be another thing to break down. It was only after I talked to a rider that had one on a trip pulling a trailer when I thought it may be useful.

It's cosmetic condition is extraordinary for a machine of this age (43 years).

Just like yourself JB.

Very nice motorcycle

The success and popularity of the quirky Honda dual range 10 speed transmission can be reasonably surmised by the number of copycat machines utilizing it over the past four-plus decades.

Thanks to a link provided by a a member over on the Adventure Rider forum (advrider.com), I was able to order a complete reproduction headlight assembly for the CB900C so that when I remove the Vetter fairing I have it on the road quickly.

For a few bucks under $55 USD for the ENTIRE headlight assembly, including H4:halogen bulb and shipping, I'm not expecting a showpiece chrome headlight, but at worst it will get me by until a better one is scrounged if needed.

It will also need a set of OEM handlebar grips to replace those thick foamy ones a previous owner installed...yes, you guessed it, I don't like thick, foamy, handlebar grips either.

The Honda has a set of chrome engine guards, complete with folding 'highway pegs' attached to them. I haven't decided whether to keep the small 'crash bars' or not, but those God-awful highway pegs are definitely going to a new owner via eBay.

One undeniably nice thing about scrounging parts for an old Honda is that there's more available for that brand than any other bike other than probably Harley-Davidson, either as OEM or aftermarket reproduction items.

The seat of the CB900C has a 'seam' separation on its seat cover, but I already have a new, reproduction seat cover on the way.

I have a professional motorcycle/car upholsterer only a mile down the road from me who I will have install the cover.

Well said!

I had an '80 Honda 750 which I rebuilt with the help of this site:

https://www.cb750c.com/index.php

They are great guys and full of advice and ideas and there are a few of the 900s as well. This was the result...

That is a beautiful bike. Brings back a lot of memories. Like my cousin showing up at our house with a fairly new CB 750 and six weeks later, the police showing up at our house to impound the bike and take my 16 year old cousin back to the jurisdiction where he "borrowed" it. They didn't even let him keep the Kerker 4-1 that he'd installed. Back then, you could unplug the ignition switch and kick just about any bike over.
One of my suppliers in Italy is a big fan of the Honda CB models, Especially the first 750 and he stocks a lot of rebuild kits for brakes, carbs, petcocks, master cylinders, wheels, gaskets, spokes etc, as well as other parts. Every time I pass through that part of the catalog, I get nostalgic for my old CB550. They were great bikes for the time.

Reproduction Honda seat covers are great. I just put one on my CB200T it fit great.

So....I get a call this afternoon from the mechanic who was stuck with the job of finding out why my newly-bought, '81 Honda CB900C was puking oil all over it's rear end last week, and it's good news, they found that the rear end had been severely overfilled by the previous owner and was dumping lube all over from the overflow.

This is the best outcome. So no unobtainable obsolete rubber parts need to be found, and labor will be minimum...although that's the dealer's problem, not mine.

If this proves to be the case, then I'll have the bike home day after tomorrow.

"Hey boss. I smeared some gasket sealer on the leaky spot and emptied most of the oil out. Should be good for a few weeks."

The sad bit is that the seal is likely still available, just not in a Honda package with a Honda part #.

The seal face could be wiped down and it should have a three numbers molded on it, like 10-16-5. This format is the inner diameter, outer diameter and depth of the seal (in millimeters).

That example happens to be the size of the oil pump seal for a 2T Honda 50. Books say NLA, but they're out there listed in the format I shared and they work just fine.

I wouldn't consider an old seal a deal breaker simply because they can't get it directly from Honda.

The saga continues, and takes a weird turn.

It was an overfill transmission case, but the former owner wasn't the culprit, it was an incompetent dealership mechanic who, after the bike was traded in, was assigned the task of making sure it was ready for resale and going on the sales floor, by checking all the fluids, and going over the bike generally.

It seems that he failed to realize that the transmission case's oil was at the proper level, which I was told is 600cc's, and he then just 'topped it up', and ended up with over 1100cc's of oil in it, which was just forced out it's overflow when I rode it home.

The dealership's owner told me that this wasn't the first problem with this 'tech', but was, as they say, 'the straw that broke the Camel's back', and he was 'let go' from his job there.

I rode the Honda up to Deadwood this morning, and it ran very well.

As soon as I got it home this morning, I removed the ridiculous 'Highway pegs', and installed a set of OEM rubber grips to replace those oversized foamy things.

I'm about to load Trixie onto it's back seat in a few minutes and see how it is for two-up work.

You probably won't notice any decrease in performance at all. That scoot has the beans.

It's power is...ok, but it apparently requires some revs to find it. I'm used to relatively slow turning motors with strong low and mid range power characteristics.

This engine will rev to 9500, but I doddle it around
at 3500-4500 most of the time with, 5000 on the Interstate at 75 mph in 5th.

Trixie likes the back seat, says she thinks it's actually more comfortable than our 2018 GoldWing was.

Top of the torque curve is at 7,000, top of HP is at 8500 with a fairly linear climb on both.

Yup, you gotta rev those older Hondas up

Early this morning. After cutting and yanking those stupid foam grips off of the bars last night, replacing them with a pair of OEM Honda rubber grips, and also removing those silly 'highway pegs' that it came with, I had to give it a little 70 mile test ride for coffee.

Now to ditch that chrome 'Jungle-Gym' crash bar mess, and pry the heavy-as-lead Vetter Windjammer fairing off of it, I should just about have a decent old sickle to bop around here on...for those rare days that I won't be riding my Vespa, of course.

Mr. JBacklund, sir...I only have one word to say to you: SWEET!

Victor

Those Vetter fairings were built to take punishment - hence the weight. I can understand wanting to remove it, but for long trips/touring, they were fantastic. I had one on a 1974 BMW R 75/6 and I could not have asked for a better touring machine in any sort of weather.

They were 'the right thing at the right time' before the bike manufacturers realized what a huge market there was for touring-equipped motorcycles and began to offer their bikes 'trip-ready' right off of the showroom floor.

Craig Vetter made a bundle from that
miscalculation, and rightly so.

Personally, they don't suit me, and I have removed them ASAP from every bike I've purchased that had one mounted on it.

Yesterday afternoon I performed a partial 'Vetterectomy' on the old Honda, but found that I won't be able to completely remove the single-piece mounting bracket until the engine guards are also removed.

It's always something, isn't it.

Yesterday afternoon I performed a partial 'Vetterectomy' on the old Honda, but found that I won't be able to completely remove the single-piece mounting bracket until the chrome engine guards are also removed.

It's always something, isn't it...