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1983 CB550 SC

CactusCat

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Tomorrow I am going to pay and trailer home a 1983 CB550SC, with approx 19K miles. Pics below . . .

Does anyone have any experience with one of these? Any tips? They were only sold 1 year in the US (1983) and another year in Canada (1983-1984).
 

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OK, I bought this bike. Now, a question for the membership . . .

Is it worthwhile to stay on this forum since I own a CB550 and not a CB750?
 
Your call there, all the bikes have at least some similarity. That bike you have was rare as hen's teeth back when they were new, think I saw maybe one of them.
 
I am going on a longish ride tomorrow morning -- 50-60 miles (that's long for me :)). I will then give my (brief) observations.

I know one thing already, the front tire needs replacing -- it has some cracks in the sidewalls.

Here are a couple of pics in front of my garage . . .
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IMG_0867.jpgIMG_0868.jpg
 
Dude, it's your life and do what you will BUT........................I absolutely would NOT ride a bike with visibly cracked tire rubber on it! I can tell you why as it has happened to me in this life already and it's NOT very pleasant at all. Luckily I escaped serious injury both times but it most certainly had nothing to do with my skills.
 
Dude, it's your life and do what you will BUT........................I absolutely would NOT ride a bike with visibly cracked tire rubber on it! I can tell you why as it has happened to me in this life already and it's NOT very pleasant at all. Luckily I escaped serious injury both times but it most certainly had nothing to do with my skills.
OK, you shamed me out of my ride today. I guess I should thank you for that. Thank you. :thumbsup: It's just that I won't be able to get it to the shop for a couple of weeks . . . after Christmas . . . and I really wanted to go for a ride. Oh well . . . I'll just have to ride that silly CTX1300 of mine. :wink2:
 
Both times AMC? So, you would ride with cracks in the past, just not any more :D They wouldn't slow Burt Munro down!

That bike looks brand new! Sweet find there.

As for the cracks, sometimes the tires are fine, sometimes not. "Better safe then sorry" is never an incorrect statement though. On another note, if the tires are old enough to have cracks they may be a lot less elastic (harder) which will seriously degrade not only the performance of the tire but the way the bike feels as you ride it.

I've only had one sudden depressurization of a motorcycle tire while riding. Unbelievably, my rear tire was impaled by some needle nose pliers laying in the road. A quality tool too, I still have them in my toolbox, anyways, it was not a fun experience.
 
I haven't had a flat tire in ages -- knock on wood. I think I've had two flats in my 50 years of riding, one on the rear while I was riding -- that was a bit scary. And the other time a tire went flat overnight in the garage -- picked up a drywall screw, probably one of mine. :(
 
OK, I know I shouldn't be riding it till I get new tires but . . . I decided to pull on the dragon's tail . . . I went for a short 30 mile ride -- first ride -- keeping the speed down.

As soon as I got the bike home two days ago I siphoned all the gas out of the tank and put 2 gallons of fresh premium in the tank.

It ran real badly for the first 10 miles, like it was only firing on 3 of the 4 cylinders or was starved for fuel. Then all of a sudden it "cleared" itself and ran great. Not sure WTH is going on yet. I was almost back home after the first 10 miles and I was going to test the temp of each exhaust pipe to see if there was a "non-firing" cylinder, but then all of a sudden it ran great so I went back out and rode another 20 miles.
 
Once tire rubber cracks that signifies that the oils have evapped out of the tire rubber to make it not flex, the rubber instead cracks more. Bike tires much worse because you rely on the normal flex for your handling. Had a rear come apart as well as a front, the front being a come to Jesus moment.

I've blown out several car tires (20?) driving them over the years cracked in addition to the bike issues. I tend to overlook safety issues on the cars and simply ran them until they popped and easily slowed down to a stop to change to another tire. Bikes not the same and if a front goes I assure you you will NEVER do it again............BTDT.

Here in Texas all the tires eventually go bad due to suncracking in the summer, I can't drive them enough to wear out due to pure wear alone.

Yours and do as you will................
 
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