PosterFZ6
Junior Member
In some brake hose related thread FrozenBiker wanted to see my restored '78 Honda CB400T2. I figured instead of just posting pics, I can perhaps start an interesting topic as well.
I would like to start a topic where we can share pics and stories of our first bike/s.
This is the bike that popped my cherry. lol.
I was scared of motorcycles like hell. My brother, Daniel, was the first one to get the bug to start ridding.
In fact this was supposed to be his first bike.
He went upstate NY to a guy to pick this bike for $450. It was his bike as a college kid. He got it as a left over in '82. All these years he kept it in his garage.
It ran pretty good, though as an older brother who thought motorcycles weren't safe, much less a motorcycle from '78. I started persuading my brother to start tearing it apart and checking everything on it for any damage. And so he did. I was right there with him cracking open the carbs, the engine etc and cleaning every last bolt of this bike.
We ended up changing all the gaskets, rebuilding carbs, forks, refurbishing the tank from the few millimeters of rust layering it had inside etc.
We put in tons of hours into it and we literally managed to strip the bike to the bare frame only, lol. We learned some mechanical skills in the process too and it was pretty fun too.
Long story short, the bike had some electrical problem that we just could not figure out. We ended taking it into a motorcycle shop that my brother worked at. They figured it out and the bike was tip top. Engine had compression like the engine wasn't broken in.
In the meantime as I worked on the bike with my brother, I got infected with the bug as well and I ended up loving this bike and I asked my brother to sell it to me at cost only so I got it for $2000 from him.
In the mean time as we were working on restoring this bike he got himself a Honda Rebel.
All in all he put maybe 300 miles on it.
I put on it over 3,000 miles on it.
I passed my motorcycle test on it.
I didn't really outgrow it. It was a really perfect motorcycle for city driving. It had as much power as maybe a middle of the road bigger scooter, but it looked much nicer than a lame ass scooter.
But I was broke and I wanted to get a cruiser.
I ended up selling it with a loss ( not a great, though) to some yuppie guy who just moved from LA to NYC. He loved how vintage it was, so at least it went into good, albeit not very mechanical, hands.
Here are some pics.
I think the first pic is with the new custom seat cover I got, the later pics still show the old ripped up one.
I wasn't sure if I was going to sell it or not. But if I wouldn't be able to sell it before December ( I sold it in mid-November) I was going to get the whole engine cosmetically restored with some combination of tasteful chrome and silver matching powder coating.
this is the only video I have of it.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0jCrfyZP5s]Honda CB400 T2 1978 - YouTube[/ame]
Aayway, so this was my first bike. I still miss it sometimes and I have an itch of picking up some CB750 and either restoring it or making a kick ass cafe bike out of it. ( and no putting a set of club handlebars don't make it a cafe, I would totally go to town with it)
I have a great fondness for Honda bikes. Great quality machines. Chrome for the most part was like brand new, same as the paint. you can never go wrong with a Honda.
So what was your first bike, the story behind it etc....
Please post pics if you have them.
PS- I am hoping that somebody admits and posts their pics of his/her hopefully not crashed Haybusa etc
I would like to start a topic where we can share pics and stories of our first bike/s.
This is the bike that popped my cherry. lol.
I was scared of motorcycles like hell. My brother, Daniel, was the first one to get the bug to start ridding.
In fact this was supposed to be his first bike.
He went upstate NY to a guy to pick this bike for $450. It was his bike as a college kid. He got it as a left over in '82. All these years he kept it in his garage.
It ran pretty good, though as an older brother who thought motorcycles weren't safe, much less a motorcycle from '78. I started persuading my brother to start tearing it apart and checking everything on it for any damage. And so he did. I was right there with him cracking open the carbs, the engine etc and cleaning every last bolt of this bike.
We ended up changing all the gaskets, rebuilding carbs, forks, refurbishing the tank from the few millimeters of rust layering it had inside etc.
We put in tons of hours into it and we literally managed to strip the bike to the bare frame only, lol. We learned some mechanical skills in the process too and it was pretty fun too.
Long story short, the bike had some electrical problem that we just could not figure out. We ended taking it into a motorcycle shop that my brother worked at. They figured it out and the bike was tip top. Engine had compression like the engine wasn't broken in.
In the meantime as I worked on the bike with my brother, I got infected with the bug as well and I ended up loving this bike and I asked my brother to sell it to me at cost only so I got it for $2000 from him.
In the mean time as we were working on restoring this bike he got himself a Honda Rebel.
All in all he put maybe 300 miles on it.
I put on it over 3,000 miles on it.
I passed my motorcycle test on it.
I didn't really outgrow it. It was a really perfect motorcycle for city driving. It had as much power as maybe a middle of the road bigger scooter, but it looked much nicer than a lame ass scooter.
But I was broke and I wanted to get a cruiser.
I ended up selling it with a loss ( not a great, though) to some yuppie guy who just moved from LA to NYC. He loved how vintage it was, so at least it went into good, albeit not very mechanical, hands.
Here are some pics.
I think the first pic is with the new custom seat cover I got, the later pics still show the old ripped up one.
I wasn't sure if I was going to sell it or not. But if I wouldn't be able to sell it before December ( I sold it in mid-November) I was going to get the whole engine cosmetically restored with some combination of tasteful chrome and silver matching powder coating.
this is the only video I have of it.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0jCrfyZP5s]Honda CB400 T2 1978 - YouTube[/ame]
Aayway, so this was my first bike. I still miss it sometimes and I have an itch of picking up some CB750 and either restoring it or making a kick ass cafe bike out of it. ( and no putting a set of club handlebars don't make it a cafe, I would totally go to town with it)
I have a great fondness for Honda bikes. Great quality machines. Chrome for the most part was like brand new, same as the paint. you can never go wrong with a Honda.
So what was your first bike, the story behind it etc....
Please post pics if you have them.
PS- I am hoping that somebody admits and posts their pics of his/her hopefully not crashed Haybusa etc