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Working on my gen 4


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Just a thread to document some of the work I am doing to my 750 which I only got two weeks ago.

 

Today I decided to take the rear wheel off, clean around the swingarm and inspect and grease the eccentric bearing holder. It soon became clear that previous owners have not exactly done much routine maintenance.

 

Firstly check this out : a previous owner decided to spray the brake calipers an attractive copper colour. Unfortunately they seem to have sprayed the rear one "in situ" and done an absolutely shoddy job!

 

It might not even be possible to clean that off everything without lifting the original paint. Grrr!

 

I found it very difficult separating the axle/brake assembly from the bearing holder. I literally had to use a sledgehammer! Even after that, and removing the circlip,  it was a pain getting the free bearing holder out from the swingarm. I know that prising the swingarm halves apart with a large screwdriver helps, but there was a lot of grit inside the swingarm which stopped it sliding out. Eventually I freed it using compressed air to blow the grit away. One piece of grit was about the size of a pea!

 

How did it get there? There is a small hole in the bottom of my swingarm. Has anyone else got this? Presumably it's meant to be there, but I'm definitely going to plug it up.

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Is the hole possibly a drain?  If so, maybe not a good idea to plug it.  Can you add a photo of it? 

 

BTW - love your tag line at the bottom.  Two of my pet peeves in "modern" English are the use of "like" and "right" repeatedly - sometimes multiple times in the same sentence!  :wacko:

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That hole is there by design.

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Hole is there by design. Drain for water. There should be another hole closer to the swingarm pivot.

 

Did the PO just spray paint the rear caliper?

 

Everything being hard to come apart is pretty normal for a bike that hasn't had it done before. I had to use a hydraulic press to get my axle out.

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What is your aim with this build?  Bring her back to a safe working condition or bring back to original luster?

You a Scotsman, me a Dutchman (who lived a good couple of years in Scotland), so by nature we abhorr spending pennies :laugh:

 

The Dutch VFR club has a member owning  a large stash of parts and sells for not sllly money, so if yer stuck I can check.

 

 

 

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Yes Cogswell, it's definitely a drain hole.

 

image.png.536107849610429e53a3c7be70c906b1.png

 

I will try and find a rubber grommet and just drain it from time to time. Yoshi, thanks for pointing out there's a second hole! The front calipers were also sprayed copper, and there's some silver overspray on the rear shock. I'm all for looking after bikes, but wish it has been done properly!

 

Today I'm going to try and remove/clean the shock, and maybe remove and clean the chain - there must have been about 100 grams worth of grimy paste behind the front sprocket cover, the worst I've ever seen.

 

Dutchy your question is a good one, I just want the bike to be safe, ride well and look and reasonably presentable. I do my own servicing.

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 After reading this...now I think I had better take this apart on my '97 since I have not in the six years of ownership.  Although since weather is quite nice these days...will likely wait until June.

 

Keep-up with the pictures and do add any hints or tips for servicing the eccentric bearing holder.

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Took the shock out. What a footer, you have to remove seat, rear panels, fuel tank, rear coils and battery case to get at the top bolt.

 

Anyway removing the shock reveals these two giant "grit intakes" in the swingarm. I can't see Mr Honda's reasoning, maybe someone can explain the point of these holes?!

 

Also once I'd cleaned around the front sprocket, I notice there's a little free play in it, see video. Is this normal?

 

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No idea, but they make a good place to feed the brake line through the swing arm.  I've seen people epoxy screens over them; I've seen people fill the whole thing with expanding foam.  I wouldn't bother plugging the drain hole: the grit probably entered through the large holes anyway.

 

Ciao,

 

JZH

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On 5/2/2021 at 9:10 AM, Bowf said:

Yes Cogswell, it's definitely a drain hole.

 

image.png.536107849610429e53a3c7be70c906b1.png

 

I will try and find a rubber grommet and just drain it from time to time. Yoshi, thanks for pointing out there's a second hole! The front calipers were also sprayed copper, and there's some silver overspray on the rear shock. I'm all for looking after bikes, but wish it has been done properly!

 

Today I'm going to try and remove/clean the shock, and maybe remove and clean the chain - there must have been about 100 grams worth of grimy paste behind the front sprocket cover, the worst I've ever seen.

 

Dutchy your question is a good one, I just want the bike to be safe, ride well and look and reasonably presentable. I do my own servicing.

🙂 I do my own servicing

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The G2 caliper paint works great, I used it on my DRZ400 Super Moto calipers, and it came out great! I brushed on 3 coats a few years ago and they still look perfect! Ebay and Amazon both sell it.

 

 

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11 hours ago, jefferson said:

That play in your sprocket looks fine to me. I had that with a brand new sprocket on.

 

8 hours ago, squirrelman said:

how many miles on her ??

That's a bit of a relief, Jefferson. I recently owned an old Transalp and they are a little notorius for spline wear caused by non-OEM sprockets.

The bike has only done 27000 miles, Squirrelman. It's a fairly new looking Renthal sprocket, though I have ordered an OEM just to be safe.

 

Nice job, RC. At least you thought to remove the caliper from the bike first! The shock has silver paint sprayed on top of the red spring.

 

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My next step will be to remove the swingarm to make it easier to plug these huge holes. On another forum someone mentions finding a beer bottle lid and a battery terminal bolt inside their swingarm, that made me laugh!

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Just noticed where some of you guys are from - I have actually been in both Buffalo and San Jose on my two short trips to the USA. What are the chances of that? Landed in Buffalo and drove through it so see the falls. Saw Cirque du Soleil in San Jose, an absolutely amazing show.

Both trips were in search of love in the early days of internet dating. Did they work out? Did they heck, but I'm glad because I have the best woman I could hope for now 🙂

 

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Hi everyone. This weekend I removed the swingarm, centre stand, linkages and brake calipers with the idea of getting these things renovated and checking/greasing the suspension bearings.

 

Again I don't find the VFR an easy bike to work on, for example you have to remove the centre stand to get the linkage off, and it's not exactly easy to find a suitable way of supporting the bike, but I managed eventually. I'm sure I will love it once I get to ride it more!🤗

 

Recently I ordered some non-OEM mirrors for a 2000/01 800. They have the 50 mm hole spacing, and look so much nicer than the old ones with their shrunken, cracked "condoms". I got a sheet of 3 mm thick neoprene rubber and made my own bases for the mirrors.

 

I probably won't be doing much to the bike for a couple of weeks but will post more photos when the parts are renovated.

 

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  • 3 weeks later...

There's another thread somewhere which mentions Hella horns.

I couldn't see the exact same kind for sale here in the UK, but I got a similar Hella on eBay for just over 15 quid.

 

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As already mentioned, a previous owner had spray painted various parts of the bike without removing them or masking other areas off properly. They "did" the horn, and it ended up all over the headlight unit.

 

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That's paint, not a reflection. Anyway, the horn was quite large so I had to bend the bracket otherwise the top of the RH lower fork leg would have smashed into it on braking.

 

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That nut holding the bracket to the horn is on really tight, and it must also be re-fitted tight or else the volume drops right off.

 

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I am pleased with the outcome. Horn is loud and deep (335 Hz). Bike is still in pieces.

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Many people fit extra-loud Stebel Nautilus air horns.  They can be challenging to fit, but the plastic horn part can be separated from the metal compressor part if necessary.  (That's what I did on my FP, but I can't remember where I put the plastic part...)  Personally, I wouldn't bother replacing an OEM disc horn with another disc horn!

 

Ciao,

 

JZH

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  • 3 weeks later...

I do have a pair of similar Fiamms, just couldn't find anywhere suitable to mount them. But believe me this new Hella disc horn is LOUD.

 

Anyway after some delay I finally have the brake calipers and carriers back from being vapour-blasted and ceramic coated.

 

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With new seals, pistons, bleed nipples and rubber boots and brake lines they should be almost as good as new.

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Here's something weird. A previous owner had painted the hub sprocket carrier thing with a brush. It looked disgusting.

When I got it back from the vapour blaster I can appreciate why they might have done that - this huge manufacturing flaw is revealed:

 

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I call it my "fault line". It's as if the piece was cast in two instalments!

 

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What do you think? It's not likely to break in two, is it?

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Eventually that’s going to fail, given that it’s got a steel ring, the sprocket, around it then it’s probably going to last a long while 

 

Theres a few on eBay for £35

 

Personally I’d regard that as £35 well spent 

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I reluctantly agree, Thumbs. Two things annoy me:

 

1) Honda must have sold the bike like this.

2) The vapour blasters should have phoned me as soon as they saw the flaw. They are bikers themselves FFS! Instead they coated it and charged me more.

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54 minutes ago, Bowf said:

 

1) Honda must have sold the bike like this.

2) The vapour blasters should have phoned me as soon as they saw the flaw. They are bikers themselves FFS! Instead they coated it and charged me more.

Agreed on both points 

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IMHO that appears to merit replacement.  Not just that it could fail,  but the consequences of it doing so could be severe.  

Although that could have been manufactured by a subcontractor,  it is still very un-Honda like for something that obvious to slip through their QC. 

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It looks like they ran out of material, waited a few minutes, and poured some more - I would replace it just for piece of mind.

 

Maybe mail it to Honda and ask for an explanation...

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