The 1984 Gyro was the first project. When I got it, the starter didn't work, and the P.O. guessed that it needed a new bendix drive. When I took off the right clutch cover, I found that the special left hand nut on the end of the crankshaft had come loose, allowing the drive plate to come off the end of the crankshaft. The bendix was perfect, it just couldn't engage the gear on the drive plate as the plate wasn't in the right place. Also, the tiny spring plate that locates the oil pump gear was missing, and the bolt that is supposed to hold it in place to locate the oil pump gear was nowhere to be found. The cover gasket was homemade, so it was obvious that some rube had been in there, probably to change or inspect one of the clutches. He probably didn't own a torque wrench and never tightened the crankshaft nut properly. I cleaned out all the gunk and old oil from the bottom of the clutch housing, and found the plate for the oil pump driveshaft down in the gunk. I installed the spring plate holding the oil pump gear, put the drive plate back on the crankshaft, properly torqued the crankshaft nut, re-installed the side cover with a OEM Honda gasket, filled the clutch housing with oil, and found that the starter and bendix now worked perfectly. The engine started and ran great, but only if I first primed the cylinder with raw gas. I stripped and painted the front basket with white single stage automotive urethane. I also stripped and painted the wheels with silver single stage urethane. I also straightened/replaced the broken turn signals. I installed new Bridgestone Hoop tires, and then went to work on the body. The louvers in engine cover were badly melted because a previous owner had thrown away the muffler protector, and while he was at it, all of the fan shrouding and much of the air cleaner box. I was able to get most of the missing parts sourced from this board, and a new 2 inch too long, but fits and works perfectly, front brake cable off eBay. I also had to rebuild all of the mounting tabs for the plastic engine cover using PVC plumbing pipe cement, and cutting up a piece of a white plastic tray I got at Walmart. Unlike as I found later when I worked on the Spree, most or all of the Gyro plastic is molded in an off-white plastic, and painted with paint that is not even slightly resistant to lacquer thinner. I painted the repaired engine cover with Fusion for Plastic Pepper Red, and found it to be a very close or perfect match to the factory color. I also repaired the seat lock area, as the seat lock had been punched out and thrown away. I spotted in that repair with Pepper Red, and you can't tell. I got a new seat lock from Honda, and they are still available. I also cleaned the carb and fuel delivery system, and cherried up the fan shrouding, and air cleaner box and air cleaner. Then I went to work on why the engine needed to be primed to start, and found that the air bleed idle circuit was completely blocked. I cleared the blockage with compressed air, took it for a long test drive to get good and warm, and then set the idle speed and idle mixture. The Gyro is a pretty high mileage unit, with the odometer showing 5091 miles, but now it starts and runs perfectly well, cold start and warm start both seem correct. Top speed on the level is 34 mph indicated. In an odd twist of whimsy, I had to buy a box of engine shroud pieces in order to get the rear bumper that was part of the lot. Included in the lot were all of the muffler shroud, airbox and fan box parts that I had previously bought.. hahahaha.. now I have a bunch of spares I may never need.
The 1984 Aero 50 was a much simpler project. I replaced both brake cables, stripped and painted the wheels and put on Bridgestone Hoop tires. I also stripped and painted the front basket. I also straightened/replaced the broken turn signals. Surprisingly, the toughest job was replacing the horn button switch. I also replaced the plastic speedometer gear in the front wheel. The gear is still available OEM at Honda. I cleaned out the fuel system, set the idle mixture and idle speed, and now it runs and starts perfectly. It has 2937 miles showing on the odometer, but I don't know how long the odometer was not operating. Top speed is 35 mph on the level.
The 1986 Spree was a great find.. 807 miles showing on the odometer, and everything in reasonably good shape, except that the engine wouldn't start or run. It took me almost three weeks to solve the engine problem, and I described it in a separate post previously. Bottom line was that the left crankshaft seal had blown out of the engine block. I installed a new OEM crankshaft seal, and new OEM piston rings even though the motor didn't need rings. I fixed the broken or bent turn signals, painted the wheels silver, installed new OEM tires from Honda, found a fuel valve cover and painted it black, and cleaned the fuel system, adjusted the carb, and so on, by now the usual stuff. I found that unlike the Gyro, most or all of the plastic body parts on the Spree are molded in color instead of painted, but Fusion for Plastic Gloss Black is a good match for the black and I used it to paint the fuel valve cover I sourced that was cast in the wrong color. The Spree starts instantly, and runs great, and top speed on the level is 31 mph. It is actually pretty quick off the line, so if your Spree seems to bog off the line, maybe the clutch is slipping. Mine was, but now is fixed. The key for me was that the bogging got worse as the clutch got hot. I've now put over 100 miles on the Spree, so I think the crankshaft seal is going to stay in place. My only guess is that perhaps a previous owner might have used starter fluid in the carb, and it seems like a bit of a stretch, but maybe there was a bottom end explosion that blew the seal out. Seems impossible, so it might have been something else. I do know that the engine had never been apart since it left Honda, and the same for both side covers. I couldn't find any other damage other that the seal was blown completely out of the seat in the block. I really don't know what caused it.
The 2000 Elite S was the fourth project. The last man to work on it said he put on a new top end kit and that it runs, but it sounded like it had bad main bearings. Before tearing into it, I decided to start it and see if that made any sense. When I first turned it over, it wouldn't fire, so I pulled out the carb slide, and then squirted a couple of pumps of fuel/oil mix into the carb and put the slide back in. When I hit the starter, the engine started right up and ran for a couple of seconds until the prime was used up, and it did sound like bad crankshaft bearings. I primed it again and ran it a couple of more times, and the last time it ran long enough to see if the variator and clutch were working, and they were. So I decided to tear into the engine and see what was going on. I removed the engine and put it up on the bench. I found that a P.O. had done a very nice job grinding out the restrictor washer in the muffler, as good as I could have done, so no further work was needed there. The airbox had been modified a bit. Instead of punching out the blocking restricting square, he had drilled it out with a big drill bit, so I cleaned up and squared the hole with an exacto knife. The variator restrictor plate had not been removed, and I couldn't find any modifications to the variator and everything looked ok there. I removed the restrictor plate and re-installed the variator. The main jet in the carb was a 75, so I assume that the P.O. had upjetted a bit and the motor probably ran well for a while until it blew up. I replaced the main jet with a 78 as used on the Elite SR. The oil pump was unchanged, and not wired in the WOT position. I assumed that lack of oil in the gasoline is what blew the motor up. The left crankshaft main bearing was bad. The right crankshaft main bearing was ok. The connecting rod bearings seemed ok. Since I didn't get to see the original piston and cylinder, I am not sure what condition they were in, but I assume they suffered from running with lack of oil. I replaced both main bearings and crankshaft seals, and installed an SR oil pump and double throttle cable. I also noticed that the SR came with a different carb needle set than the S, so I installed an SR needle set. As it turns out, the SR needle is very noticeably thinner than the S needle. I also installed the emulsion tube that came with the SR needle set. The Elite runs great now, and top speed on level ground is an indicated 34 mph. It is perhaps the fastest of the fleet off the line, but then feels heavy and is slow to go from 28 to 34.
The 1988 Elite ES was the most recent project. Very little was wrong with it. A good carb cleaning got it running right. While replacing the fuel line from the fuel valve to the carb, I found that the fuel valve was stuck in the "on" position. Using the procedure described in the workshop manual, I got the fuel valve working right. I'll replace the fuel valve when the part comes in. I straightened the kickstart lever as it had been bent inward, and touched up the black paint in places to remove layover scratches. I also installed a new helmet hook. The original one was missing and a new one was still available from Honda. If the speedometer is to be believed, this Elite ES goes 40+ on level ground. It is as slow as the Spree off the line, but seems to rev up higher than the rest of the fleet, and it does feel like it has the highest top speed of the fleet. I plan to build a front basket for it similar to the one on the black Spree, as the under seat storage, while very useful, is pretty warm and no good for the transport of ice cream here in Florida.
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Right now, I am driving each of them every fifth day to run errands around town.
Anyway, here are photos of the fleet I took today:
