1981 Honda CD200 Benly

[s1105117]

think it is about time I started a thread for my latest project!







She is, as i'm sure you've all gathered, a 1981 Honda CD200 Benly. Specifically the early 6v TA version. Now when I was first getting into motorbikes my buddy turned up on one of these tat he rescued from a scrapyeard aged 15, and oily-rag restored and still has some 10 odd years later. I saw it and was immediately determined to own one as i decided it was the coolest little thing. Like a Bonneville somebody had put on a hot wash. So when the opportunity to own this one came up, I couldn't say no! Not much known of her history, she has been off the road since about 1998 judging from the old MOT's (each about 15 months apart...) and the chap I got her from was a scrap dealer/house clearance-er so who really knows.

I had her brought upto Bristol from southampton (in the dark, naturally) which led to much anticipation prior to arrival, an excitement upon it! exactly the right amount of patina (lots), as I'm sure people who know me will agree I way prefer oily rag resto's and things that tell their story to a pristine machine (though they are also cool!). Had an instant bond with this machine, chuffed to bits with it.

Initial perusal noted a few missing bits, no terminal rot (plenty of surface rust and chromework pitting mind), some electrical oddities (help) but good compression and weirdly, a new rear tyre.

A parts list has been drawn, some shopping has been shopped, some tinkering has begun and a lot more needs to follow of both the shopping and the tinkering.

On a random note, my mother dearest is also very fond of saidbike, and know wants a motorbike test for her 60th birthday! She can have the test, however I'll build her her own bike I think this is mine! My tradition of naming my machines continues, with Ruby Tuesday.

[chris y]

They are great bikes, some friends had a few, and my Mother had one that I got for her, they are a great bike for short people, the only bike bigger than a learner bike she could comfortably ride.

They have a brilliant engine, not loads of power but very pleasant and mega reliable for high mileages as one of my friends proved.

The back wheels used to commonly collapse and the silencers rot but otherwise they didnt tend to have much trouble.

[rattlecan]

Rare I would suspect & very very slow

[greg350lc]

I have a similar thing with the same engine, albeit 233cc. Pushes towards 100mpg on a run, low saddle and one of the easiest bikes to ride I've ever had, and that's including a Suzuki VanVan. Engines last forever too.

[waynedear]

B***ard things, they are the reason I limp.
Despatched on one in the early 80’s in Manchester, flying round Trafford Park and front mudguard came off and jammed under the wheel, needless to say I went over tit landing in front of the bike, I slid gracefully on my side until a handy concrete bollard and my lower back decided to stop me.............
then the 2 wheeled curse word hit me.

[brachunky]

Back in SA, most pharmacys had a delivery Benly on which crazy delivery chaps would rag these things to death and you would see them daily, dragging each other from traffic light to traffic light!grizz may remember too that in the 80's they held annual delivery bike races at the Aldo Scribante race circuit which were a right sight!

[grizz]

Nov 11, 2019 17:25:28 GMT brachunky said:

Back in SA, most pharmacys had a delivery Benly on which crazy delivery chaps would rag these things to death and you would see them daily, dragging each other from traffic light to traffic light!grizz may remember too that in the 80's they held annual delivery bike races at the Aldo Scribante race circuit which were a right sight!

One of my all time favourite tracks.

Yes the races were mad.

Some of those guys could ride.

Today..... maybe development rider jobs.

[Deleted]

I remember following a delivery rider on one of these years ago in South Africa. It was evidently after his Christmas party,and he was pi$$ed as a coot. Must have fallen off about ten times in the 15 minutes or so we followed him. Eventually he got so fed up with falling off,he left it lying it the ditch where he dropped it last,and staggered away into the dark, three steps forward two steps back.... 🤣🤣🤣

[s1105117]

Thanks for the positive comments peeps!

greg350lc I believe that to be a CB250 nighthawk you have there? looks very tidy indeed. I saw something similar come up for sale recently, I watched it just long enough to get told off!

rattlecan rare failry (finding parts is proving to sufficiently annoying) and slow, certainly. By all acounts it will do 70 or so but thats about your lot. Might upgrade the sprocket which apparently helps with gearing for cruising speed.

waynedear all I have got to say to that is f_cking ouch. bad business there... As you may note the front mudguard on this bike is snapped, and patch riveted together. Its gonna be replaced!

South Africa tales sound pretty interesting, nice and lively then! Don't suppose anybody fancies a parts trip for me? lol

chris y they are pretty small, should be interesting as i'm about 6ft 3 or so! these engines I hear are pretty legendary, my intention for this one is not for speed certainly!

by way of an update, she now looks like this:


and one of the shelves in my diddy worksop looks like this:


the strip down has revealed no horrific corrossion, some surface but nothing more. Brakes are all free and working nicely, although it took me some time to work out that if the bike is on her centre stand the rear brake lever doesn't move! Only found this out after coating the whole thing in wd40... anyway no harm done!
carb is on the shelf and will await a trip to be cleaned.

The strip down itself was painless, no seized bolts which was nice. Well when I say painless, that doesn't take into account idiocy... When I got the bike the key provided turned the ignition, but not the tank (key looks very aged, so unclear whats gone on here) so i had to unfortunately. break into the tank. removed the cap until just the barrel was sitting there in the whole, ready for me to put some mole grips on, turn it and remove it. easy. Why oh why did i decide to prod it?? naturally it fell into the tank, resulting in about half an hour of me with molegrips, and the remaining bit of my broken telescopic magnet to retrieve it.

so strip down as far as I oped to go, and a following appraisal of bits and bobs went as so:
rust to trip around lower forks. Not structural but will need replacing
missing indicator relay. weirdly it has three wires going to it, when it ought to have only 2. Apparently German market bikes had 3, no sign of German market here though as far as I know (the numbers all tally)
front sprocket cover missing
chain guard missing
battery long since flat
handlebars are surely bent
RHS switchgear incorrect. Could be a CB200/125 or a USA part, no starter button interestingly when it ought to.

first thing I did, obviously before testing say the engine, was a bit of shopping. a sprocket cover and top half of the chainguard were acquired from the bay of E, and stowed nicely on the self.

I then decided I wanted to check for a spark and general electrical life, so I acquired a fully charged brand new battery (bit of a pain as the bike, i believe, remains in her 6v form) wired it in exactly as the previous one was and... nothing. No life on the cluster, and no spark. curse word. I am pretty useless with electrics, not totally, but pretty.

one thing I did note is that the points and condenser look fairly new, which is both good and interesting.



however, the wiring around the battery positive terminal looks odd, and i'm fairly convinced that a fuse ought to be creeping about. |I am wondering if a previous 'attempt' to start her has been made...



so for the moment she is under a thermal blanket waiting for me to make a plan, and look for a wiring diagram, and or a sister bike to copy (i like to learn that way).

I also intend to rob expertise. I have a couple of friends who have vintage lambretta's and the odd vespa, so I am counting on them having knowledge of electrical issues! however if anybody is in the local of bristol who wants to pop round and lend a perusal, I wont say no! I have tea.

in the meanwhile, i'm still on the hunt for the missing bits. and a replacement fuel tank cap. As I decided to go to a jumble and look for one, however did i remember to take the measurements/a picture of the tank... nope. Though I did get a nice new interesting spannery clampy thing....

[PHUQ]

There's one appeared in work's car park today funny enough. I shall try and track the owner down, he may be able to assist with your electrical woes!

[waynedear]

Might be worth joining VJMC on facebook and get a Haynes manual for it.

[93fxdl]

A source to older Honda parts is David silver spares.
www.davidsilverspares.co.uk/CD200TA-BENLY-1980/
Most of the small Hondas shared a lot of parts and design, which was copied by many of the small Cheap bikes, so these could be a source of cheap spares.
My first step with electrical problems is connections and earth points
Ttfn Glenn

[PHUQ]

Tracked down said owner (it was a fair guess, there's only one guy in the factory mad enough to be riding a classic bike to work in this weather), PM with an email address incoming.

He said David Silver has nearly everything for them.

[s1105117]

A box of goodies has arrived!!



This is the headlight with the loom in it, the switchgear all wired up (tho a spare RHS switchgear as the one attached had a split wire), as well as a coil, blinker relay & starter relay and all the associate wiring. As well as an airbox, and a set of clocks, some more spares to boot. Essentially lifted off of a donor bike and sent to me!



I think it is time for me to conquer my fear of wiring.

I swapped the RG switchgear over, had a perusal in the headlight and found all the connections,actually very satisfying!



The plan is pretty much to lift off what is on the bike, and swap in the new stuff! Will change the ignition barrel but otherwise should all go on nicely!

Fingers crossed.

Alas my shed has no power (more wiring...) so tucked away for fun another day, still the shelving bench looks pretty good and Honda Benly-ish

[s1105117]

one thing that has certainly come from my first look at the wiring, well two things, number one i certainly learn better when I have seen a template and can work from it, and second, somebody else didn't have a template or a clue and has done some odd fiddling in there! things are looking up for the Benly! However, forgot to get a set of non-bent bars.... oops

[s1105117]

Little bit of tinkering time, so replaced the ignition barrel.

The new clocks came with an ignition barrel but no key, have a key with the one already in the bike so swapped them over. Not too bad a little job, would be easier if I got working electricity in the shed though!!


Found a few disconnected wires in the existing headlight, but did manage to take the indicator wires so should be easier to connect up when the headlight is switched over.

[s1105117]

So the wife went to bed a bit earlier than me, so rather than watch the TV I did a bit more late night benly tinkering!

First thing was the airbox. The one on the bike had a split pipe to the carb, and was plenty rusty. Thought weirdly housed a brand new air filter. Removed it, again no seized bolts thankfully so it came of easily enough. Here's the new and old together



Both air filters were ok tbh but the first was better so moved that across, fitted with satisfying ease and precision.



Then it was a matter of swapping the rubber holder for the indicator relay over as well (thank goodness for wd40) then popping the cover on and that nice little airbox is ready to go on the bike.

Seeing as my torch was still working I decided to investigate the front mudguard. It's had a weird loosness to it and has some really bad old riveted patch on the top. So with with the addition of a ratchet extender bar (I love the simplicity of this bike to work on it's brilliant and very accommodating, so far) had the front mudguard off.



As soon as I had it off something ominous became apparent



And well, here is the before of the patch in all its glory



And here is the after



That might explain the loosness! Perhaps it be time for a new one me thinks. Front mudguard added to the shopping list.

[s1105117]

Went to the Carole Nash classic motorbike show this weekend, which was pretty good fun, lots of amazing bikes.

Had a bit of success at the jumble there as well!



Set of correct mirrors, found in a big box of mirrors and obtained for £3! Will need a bit of the wizzywheel and autosol treatment,but a pretty decent find. Especially as RT didn't have any mirrors, and they're a tad more from David silver spares! Alas didn't manage to find the elusive petrol cap, or a new front mudguard though but never mind.

Did also manage to pick up a 6v/12v battery charger and some thermal gloves.

[s1105117]

Me likey what the postwoman bring today!





An original front mudguard! Found on the bay of E, technically it's from a cd125 but as they're the same bar the engine it was a safe bet. It has a fair amount of patina, which is in keeping with the rest of the bike.

I decided to fit it immediately, and I'm pretty pleased with it. Such a reassuringly easy job to fit (I suppose the name Benly does derive from the Japanese word for convenience) and it's nice to see a part being fitted on rather than taken off! Will be out with the brush and autosol soon.



On a separate note I decided to remove the rear support from the old mudguard, just in case it was useful. So I now have the bracket and and support separate, so could be useful if I want to make a custom mudguard or something (not for this bike!) however in this process the old mudguard snapped in two! So iI think that really might have seen its' last mile. Still, approaching the weekend where all being well the electrical transplant shall take place! Fingers crossed that that works!

[milk]

No idea with bikes and older ones. do finding this very interesting. is your plan to restore it to like new condition or usable condition or any mods planned?