Mick’s cb550 was starting to lose a little power so it was time for a good carb cleaning. Took us about 3.5 hours which is a little long, mainly because 4cyl Hondas have the worst air-box set-up ever. Can’t wait to get pod filter on that thing. Fuck that air box.

Get a good manual.

Get tough.

Take the bowls off, take all the jets out, and go ape-shit with a bottle of carb cleaner.

Get Justin to help get the airbox back on during re-assembly.

Done deal.

Bike: Todd’s CB350.

The new signals have two wires, a ground (black/white) and power (black). This is different than the stock signals which only have a single wire (power) running out of it. This is because the bulb socket is grounded to to the metal signal housing which is grounded into wiring harness through the headlight ear bolts (green wires connected to the bolts inside the headlight ears). These can be removed since the black/white will be used as the ground instead.

The black wires connect into the light blue (right side) and orange (left side). The black/white connects to green.

Installed!

Note: If you have a later model CB, the front signals are also running lights. This means you’ll need signals with 3 wires: gound, power, and flasher. The extra wire will connect into the blue/white or orange/white wire from the harness.

Below is the info you need to get pod filters dialed in on your 79-82 cb650.

79-80 (mechanical piston slide carbs)

  • 120 main jet (stock is 92)
  • 42 slow jet (stock is 35)
  • mixture screws set to 1.75 turns out
  • float height set to stock measurement
  • mac 4-1 header / exhaust (ebay)
  • emgo 48mm pod filters (ebay) – (you have to slightly modify the 2 inner pods to clear the choke, i doubled up the rubber sleeve and used rubber epoxy to seal, glue them together)
  • Better than pod filters are velocity stacks. Bike runs best with these. They’re a little hard to find though. You want 43-46mm

All jets bought from either:

81-82 (constant velocity slide carbs)

DynoJet makes a kit. All the info you need is on below links (the kit says 80-82, but that is a typo… it will only fit 81 and 82):

* Note

All this info for 79-82 is dependent on the fact that you’re living around sea-level, and your carbs are already running good. If you have shitty carbs, you might wanna rebuild them and get them clean as fuck before you attempt putting pods on. If you’re high up in the mountains, you want slightly smaller jet sizes than what I spec’d out.

* Note

The cycle will run a little hotter, simply because you’re going to be making a significant amount more power than stock. Makes sense that more power (more of an explosion in the combustion chamber) is going to create more heat. To offset this extra heat, I recommend adding an oil cooler. INFO FOR THAT HERE. Also, for 79-80 carbs, my set up is the tiniest bit rich, so it’s absolutely not running lean. Lean would add extra heat. My spark plugs have been a perfect light-golden brown for over a year now.

-Ed

The 650 rebuild is finished. It’s running pretty damn good. Going easy on it for the first few hundred miles.

Here’s what I did in the last step:
- Re-did my wiring, I cut out about half my wires. Props to Adam!
- Installed oil cooler
- Spot-painted frame
- Re-mounted gauges lower and tighter
- Installed new rings, assembled engine. Props to Nick!

- Original wiring

- Shit we cut out

- New wiring… streamlined!

- Ready for the engine to go back in

- All back together

- Gauges mounted lower and tighter

- Custom headlight switch, mounted in fork ear
- Oil cooler adapter plate which makes the entire cooler set-up work, purchased from:

www.randakks.com

Thanks to everyone who helped. Couldn’t have done it without you guys. Extra special thanks to Adam, for his intricate wiring knowledge, and Nick for his master engine expertise.

-Ed