Light at the end of the tunnel - but boy am I a numpty!

Lots of progress this weekend, while Elaine was away on a girlie weekend in Scotland - I felt compelled to closet myself away in the shed so that the lads could concentrate on revision....

Most of the remaining work is engine related. First off, I cleaned up the old valves with the trusty Black & Decker and wire brush attachment, then lapped them in. That went surprisingly well. Refitting the valves was a bit of a problem, but mainly because of the pretty basic spring compressor that I bought. Done now though, and a nice clean combustion chamber to show for it. Non-geeks may leave now!

Cylinder block was then refitted, with the help of no 1 son, who held the block while I squeezed the rings. The Haynes manual suggested doing it this way without a ring compressor would result in nightmares, but it went surprisingly well! (The nightmares were saved for a short while later.)



Then the cylinder head went on sweetly - it's starting to look like an engine again. The vapour blasted parts look great against the newly painted cases.



Here is where it all went horribly wrong and I took leave of my senses. I could skip over this bit and no-one would be any the wiser, but I hope by sharing this I might save someone else making the same idiotic mistake that I made.

You see, I came to install the very long bolts that hold the cylinder and head down and there are 4 that sit in the centre of the head under the "spine" of the frame. The photo below shows the problem I faced - that there was insufficient clearance to get the bolts in, as the frame was in the way. The photo also shows the blindingly obvious way that Honda designed this problem out, but I missed it! I was tired; it was late and I decided to sleep on it.

My solution involved having to virtually remove the engine again to get enough clearance - see below.

Clever Mr Honda's solution, which I didn't see until I was bemoaning my fate to my son, was to thoughtfully provide 4 nice holes in the frame to drop the bolts through! I must concede here that I think Honda's solution is better than mine!

It has taught me a really good lesson though - I think I am normally pretty good at stepping back and thinking about the bigger picture, but this time I was so blinkered to finding a much more obvious solution. Shame on me......

Anyway, all's well that ends well and before long the tappets were set and the head cover installed.

So now the gorgeous new exhausts could finally be properly fitted. This time I thought a bit harder about it and it all went much smoother!

It was those short stumpy exhausts that first attracted me to the styling of this bike all those years ago when it was launched!

Finally, for today, the carburretors have been reinstalled. I'm not mad on the look of the jubilee clips holding the airbox connectors but the original hose clamps are shot. I think I'll bite the bullet and get some new Honda ones pretty soon (or next winter? :) )

You can see from this photo that I've also done a lot of the detail stuff as well - the engine side cases are on; kick start and gear lever refitted; head steady installed etc

Incidentally, the replacement left hand switch gear turned up and was in worse condition than mine, with a definite intermittent cable break somewhere in the loom - beware EBay descriptions by scrappers beginning "Good Condition"! It will be going back for a refund. 

On further investigation, my horn problem was not in the switchgear but is a faulty horn! I've ordered a new one from Wemoto. There's a pattern here of me overlooking the bleeding obvious!

Final bits to do this week before trying for a start are the clutch cable, fit out the tank and install a fuel filter and then all of the fluids etc. I'm really hoping it works, otherwise the Thundersprint Show is under threat.