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Front Sprocket Conversion

Krenisky

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Has anyone had any experience getting a front sprocket that fits a 525 chain? I've been scouring the internet to try and find one but it's proving fairly difficult. I've though about getting a 525 blank from mcmaster carr and paying someone to machine out the 1978 honda splines. Any advice/ sprocket suppliers/people who have a water jet in their garage... would be appreciated!

Bike is a 1978 Honda Cb750F and the chain is a D.I.D. 525 VX
 
Because I have a Ducati 1098 Rear end on there now and it has a 525 sprocket, I was trying to avoid altering that if I could. Plus I already have a 525 chain for it. But yes, if I can't find a 525 then I'll have to go that route.
 
You're looking to do it the wrong way. Buy a 530 to fit the shaft and then have one or both sides surface ground down to the 525 thickness needed, roughly a total of .060" or so thinking. More room for error and not having to perfectly center the hole like you plan on. As well you can grind only one side to more perfectly center up with the rear if you need to move sideways any for better chain alignment.

The inner splines are generally case hardened and the machine shop will hate you for forcing them to cut that, it kills tooling. As well your new work won't be and will wear very fast.

The outer teeth are hardened too but the sides will not wear as fast because not nearly the load on them as the teeth. If you had some way to mount sprocket on a shaft to spin easily like a trans shaft with bearing on it you can even hold the bearing and let shaft/sprocket spin against a bench grinder wheel to cut it yourself...........BTDT.

A machine shop with a rotary table can easily cut the sides down on a sprocket. Or on a lathe with a tool post grinding setup. Cheaper too.

You can even run 530 chain on 525 sprocket but the wear will be funny after a while. Pitch is the same, only width change there.
 
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amc49 that's exactly what I was thinking of doing too, I was just hoping that I could find an "off the shelf" 525 sprocket for these bikes somewhere. I think that's my best bet for now because like i said before, I would like to avoid altering the Ducati rear setup if I could. I have access to a machine shop with all of those tools so I'm sure I can figure something out. Thanks for your thorough reply, I totally agree with you!!
 
There is likely 'no' 525 sprocket for them, the makers usually only make commonly used parts when it comes to sprockets. Why I run a welded outer on DOHC inner 530 because I couldn't find a smaller tooth count engine sprocket back in the day.
 
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