How to build a Honda Chopper

Back when all the parts you could ever want for a honda chop were off the shelf. I may not have been around during this era of free and easy building, but I can certainly appreciate the effort put forth by the shops that provided the parts. Take a look at the A.E.E goods being assembled in this rag from 1973.

Another Citrus Salvation

My wife's cousin builds freaky-mutant-go-fast go-karts so I got him a CB350 engine as a little present a while back. While I was rooting through some parts that Jeff at Saint Motorbikes kindly donated, I found a set of cb500T carbs and boots. They're a bit large for a 350 but they'll certainly do.

These carbs were more than locked up. The CV piston was glued in on both of them and I couldnt even get the float out of one of the carbs. Here are a few pictures of what lemon juice can do. All we did was tear the carbs down and throw them in some boiling pucker juice.

This time I had a bigger pot so boilovers wouldnt happen. That and a new buddy to keep me company. A really stale beer.

The CV pistons move like bearings and everything is spotlessly clean. Once we find some rebuild kits these will be ready to go.

New Project in the Shop - "HotRod"

After winning a hardtail section at the WHCM raffle (generously donated by CycleOne Manufacturing) it was just begging to be used immediately. So we put a few other projects on hold for a bit and dug a frame out of the rafters (a '76 CB750 K frame to be exact) to hack up.



Been wanting to use a couple "hotrod" CB750 parts and make a cool little bobber (pardon the overused expression) so let's see what we end up with.

Following the instructions, the first step is to carefully remove the kickstand mount. Don't want to ruin the tubing, or the mount since it can be re-used later.


A couple passes with a flapwheel and it's like it was never there.


A little cutting, a little prep work, and before you know it the frame is ready to go back together


Test Fitting


Bolted the engine in for final alignment and tacked it up.


Here's the roller with a CB450 frontend and an Akront 18x4.25 rear wheel off an old KZ dragbike.


A perfect stance in no time flat. Plenty of grinding, cleaning, sculpting, and chopping left to do, but it's off to a great start. Big thanks again to Red and Kate at CycleOne for the hardtail section, and Jeff at SaintMotorbikes for welding and the forks. Keep watching, this one's gonna be quick.