My newest project 73 rd350

It has a long way to go. Pulled the bad piston out tonight. From what i saw the owner cleaned the carbs and could not get the boot back on the right side from the air cleaner and it ran lean. Check out the piston. The bore looks fine but i have a set of 350 jugs std bore i am gonna use the right side one and then i will have the cyls punched out to fit my 65mm pistons for my 250 it will be 357 cc then. Gonna replace the crank seals just in case.
Ken those were the only colors in the states in 73 all the 350s were red and 250 blue. Hard to believe they are both original paint jobs from the factory. 41 years old this month both are with in 100 miles of each other.
Yes they are fun bikes start adding performance parts and they are little rockets. Hard to believe back in the 70s they were faster on the track then the honda 750s thus giving them the name of giant killer. The nerwer ones like kens liquid cooled can be punched out and stroked to 440 cc and can produce up to 120 hp with the right set up

 

but using drill bits to set the slides works like tits though

fast fast indeeeeed!

 

The clutch cable is very close to the choke lever and idle screw.I guess when you set the slide height with a drill bit you run the idle screws out all the way? The way i was taught which is a pain in the butt pull the carbs make sure cables are all the way seated raise the slide with the throttle til its even with the top of the bore adjust the other til its the same height. I am gonna put a y boot on the 350 also maybe the banshee crossover I took it off the 250 when the cyls were connected not enough velocity and had to run a 35-40 pilot jet. Had to do the dave f mod could not get the needle and needle jet set correct.

 

thats the way i set my slides , cant go wrong, anyway for anyone who's not sure what an rd350lc looks like , here tis again, , sorry i cant help it. id be snapping up any 250/350 RD's myself, imho they would make a good long term investment.

 

Love the lc They are getting fairly hard to get here and to get a nice one your looking 4k+ for that kind of money you can get a decent zx12 gsxr1100 that is more then a cbr900rr . Remember when you first got it ones over here much worse are going for 2-3k I just cant talk myself into it. Even daytona specials over here are running 4-6k. My oldies every year are jumping in price very good investment for sure

 

im drooling

 

i would love a daytona special , this one is excellent but expensive, in fact any good ones that come up ,people are wanting silly money. i still cant get over how cheap bikes are in the US compared to here
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/YAMAHA-RD400 ... 35d&_uhb=1

 

I would not mind a daytona special. 30 years ago i had a built 78 400 last year before they put all the emission crap on them. You just have to be in the right place at the right time. Its funny as soon as the add came up i just happened to look on cl wrote the guy 2x then called him 1st thing in the am. After i called he said he had to pull the add over 50 calls in an hour. A few days before i got this almost bought a zl 1000 eliminator with 19k miles. The guy buys and sells bikes told me it needed a slave cyl kit. I thought about it and figured if it was that simple he would have fixed it he wanted 1k for it
Ken is your lift a normal sized one over there? Mine is about a foot longer then yours. Can you get your fj on it.

 

yeah the fj fits on ok, it has a bit you can add on but i dont need it, what you see there is 180 cm or 6 foot, at the moment the cb750 is on it no worries, as far as a clutch slave cylider kit goes , if thats all it needed its a fairly cheap/easy fix,at least on my fj anyway,, from memory you can get a whole new slave cylinder for around 70 bucks

 

Thats crazy why would anyone pay that. If you rode it at all the seals would start leaking. The bike essentially needs a complete rebuild before putting in service. Brakes crank seals and all the rest of the seals tires ect. I guess if you had a lot of money and were gonna put it in a collection just to look at would be fine.

Ken as long as they fit would be great easier to walk around. Mine has a removable plate where the rear tire is for changing tires. Don't think i would be messing with the bikes like i do without it so much easier

 

Mt wisecos just showed up. Nice pistons i would have went with the rd400 pistons i have that are new i did not llike the way the rings looked would have been $100 for rings plus i needed pins $16.00 ea. So i looked up the wisecos 393m06450 1/2mm over stock was finding them from $290.00 down to $212.00 one of the motorcycle supply shops for amazon had them $110.00 off per piston to clear out their stock. paid $34.00 ea free shipping they come with rings pin and clips. Held my breath thinking someone pulled the rings or something nope number is stamped in the pistons right ring number. Have to box everything up and send it to bore tech that will give me a few weeks to keep cleaning

 

Here is a better pic of the new toy . Time to disassemble clean and restore parts are headed to the machine shop this week

 

Everything is ready to ship to bore tech. I have the pipes sprocket cover taken off as well as the carbs. 2 stroke oil is all drained out. Time to clean out all the crud from the inside of the countershaft sprocket cover i bought new seals shifter clutch rod ect. Will get the brushes and cleaning solution out this weekend scrub the frame and parts of the engine cases top front bottom get 41 years of oil dust ect off then polish and paint both side covers and wax the frame. 1 Carb is clean stripped and polished i need to do the other tomorrow. Where the former owner hosed the bike off before i got it water got into the 1 carb where they cut the gas hose but was able to get them all apart. Just clean strip polish put back together and put both in a zip lock bag til i am ready for them.

 

Waiting for the cyls and pistons to get back. Motor is all clean most of the frame has been polished and waxed. All fluids drained. Pulled the side covers have to strip polish and paint them in the next few days

 

A few pics. I have 4 heads 2 race heads and the stockers that someone had the combustion chamber intake and exhaust ceramic coated. Had to take the ceramic coat off in the exhaust port it was chipping so i did not want to take a chance. One pic shows the ceramic coat and the race head. The next 2 show polished fin and what the head looks like without the ceramic coating. This head is ready for paint. when i am done painting i have to cc the heads and see which i will use so compression is right.

 

Ooohhh combustion chamber porn...

Only the true "motorheads" amongst us get it; while we're drooling others simply can't figure out why the fuss over an old 2-stroke.

Nice work. Really brings back memories. (My Norton is a '74.)

 

good pick up on the wisecos ,are you going to run premix or an oil pump? i prefer the pump personally,

 

I run oil pumps have never had a problem with one with all the 2 strokes i have ever had. To much of a pain to mix plus if your out someplace and you run low on gas your stuck. I do not want to carry a nasty oil container. I have to clean everything good from where they poured the oil in the tank to fast and it burped and they never cleaned it up. I know i am asking a lot but when i am done if i work on something i don't want to get messy.

 

Thanks fitz i love building go fast engines in cars and bikes. I am in no rush with this one so i am trying to do everything right. Here is the pic of the finished head

 

Finally cyls and pistons arrived from bore tech. I made a big mess cleaning out the crank wells. Thought all the penetrating oil and atf was out. Cleaned out the oil holes and sprayed come compressed air. Flew all over my honda ate the shine off the polished covers . It took me an hour and a half on the buffer to get the stains off. Hopefully in a week or so i will have the cyls painted fins sanded and completely washed out to get the ultra fine specs off the bore from the machine shop.