|
|
Honda Trail 70 |
|
|
|
Honda Trail 70 |
|
|
|
This
story and photo's were sent to us from a fellow CT70 owner and trail rider Stanley
Buck who lives in Oregon. His CT70 ride was so favorable to us that we
decided to post his story. |
|
|
|
Hi,
Thank you for the nice web site. It is a great CT-70 site with much information.
|
Stanley Buck On His 1970 CT70 |
 |
|
My CT-70 TIME MACHINE
by Stanley Buck |
 |
I’m old, but I roll
the years off. Today, as countless times in the past, I satisfyingly surged
forward, in time, in space, in mind. A
wind rush, and my youth was back, full force.
I wicked the throttle, and immediately swept twenty years away as the
CT-70 sped up Dick’s Fork canyon, following pavement, leaning into sharp
turns, and finally over gravel, running out to nimble trails covered in fir
needles and bordered by sword fern, and then into the cool dark side of a remote
forest canopy; a rain forest, just
five miles from the Pacific Ocean. Real Oregon.
| It got steep fast, and the canyon narrowed, followed a stream, often invisible under overhanging vine maple, dogwood, and salmon berry bushes. More years dropped off, and I was living in paradise, somewhere in time, all by myself, not a sight of another human being, or a man made object for miles. |
 |
The stream was so narrow that in places one could jump across it to the other mossy bank, green carpet for the little people, elves, probably hiding in that hollow cedar log sticking out of the moss over there. The water is clear and cold flowing over tan and brown sandstone, covered with small flat stones of various sizes, sorted by nature for us kids who love to skip them over the water.
 |
 |
Finally, the scene was too
much to resist, I pulled the bike over, threw the switch and the Honda’s
thumping heartbeats stopped. Then all I could hear was the running stream and
some slight wind, hundreds of feet up in the forest canopy.
 |
(Just before the bike entered the woods, chipmunks skittered back and forth across the roads and trails harvesting wild blackberries. Holding their little tails high, I accused them of risking their lives, but they wouldn’t listen, just kept eating blackberries and running back and forth. I can’t blame them, because these are not regular berries, these have a distinctive flavor, and very small seeds; one pie and you’re hooked.) I left the bike on its stand, and headed down the bank to the creek, jumped up on a log, and peered into the water. It was clean and clear, like in your dreams, only I live it. Sure are a bunch of flowers here, daisies, foxglove, and other kinds that were too shy to tell me their names. |
I climbed back on the bike,
snicked it into gear, and started winding the clock back toward home again, only
about six or seven miles away. Suddenly, two cute yearlings, last year’s
fawns, appeared standing by the side of the road. One plunged into the brush and
melted out of sight, but the other one raced my bike for a hundred feet, then it
melted into the underbrush. Both were white tails, not all that common anymore.
(There are plenty of black tails, a slightly different species.)
As I passed the grassy
landing strip, near home, I saw a large gray coyote looking for field mice. He
looked at me for a moment, then trotted away and jumped into the brush; and this
was less than a quarter of a mile from the ocean beach.
As I pulled the CT-70 into the yard, the coach turned back to a pumpkin, so to speak, and the same old man climbed off the bike. The young man was still there too, but he was trapped inside the old man’s body.
Stanley Buck, Waldport, OR
|
Attached is a picture of my
1970 CT-70 with about 215 miles on it. It had set out for several
months, so the chrome was rusty. I cleaned it up, and it is
effectively a new bike. It probably would be a good one for a full
restoration, but I needed a user, and it is a great bike. It has a
smoother engine than my CT-90 or my new Panda FunRider. The Panda
is much like a Honda Z50J Monkey.
(By the way, last week I had
a flat on the FunRider, and when I took it down to fix the flat, I found
that the rear brake shoes have the Honda logo markings "HM"
cast into them. I believe that the Panda is actually a Honda in
disguise. I see little difference in them. I read all the
stuff on the Jincheng site, and other places, but those Honda brake
shoes are a dead give away.)
Stanley Buck
Waldport, OR
|
 |
|
|
Thank you for the nice web
site. It is a great CT-70 site with much information.
I'll be 67 this Sunday, but
I still ride street and trails. I've got a gold 1970 CT-70 with
only 200 miles on it; a 1977 CT-90 with 4000 miles, and a new Panda
FunRider with less than 200 miles. My favorite bike is the
CT-70. I had bought two new ones for my kids, one in 1969, and one
in 1970. After the kids grew up, I sold them, sorry ever since.
Anyway, I found one last year with 137 miles on it, but it had been left
out for several months, and was rusty; but I got it for 50 bucks.
I had to spend about 100 dollars more on it, and several weeks to clean
it up. I live in a rain forest area, with hundreds of miles of
trails and forestry service roads. I rode 20 miles of trails with
the CT-70, time machine, last Monday and had a great time.
I'll send you a picture of my CT-70 later.
Below are impressions
of a ride that I made last month.
|
|
The guys that had it before I did could not get it to run; they didn't know about the battery cable shunt. They stripped some parts off trying to get it started, levers, gas tank, and other stuff. They gave up and left it leaning outside against their garage in the weather. That's how I found it, a mess. It wasn't until I was loading it in the pickup that I noticed that it was low mileage, and then I thought the speedometer was probably broken. I thought I was buying some parts, and ended up with a near new bike. Thankfully, they still had the tank, but no gas cap. I found a gas cap for 10 bucks. Those guys had also tried to force rusty cables, without oil, and broke the front brake cable. I got a new one for 25 bucks. The fuel lines were gone, but I used standard automotive fuel lines. There are no motorcycle dealers near here, so I have to improvise some parts. I was lucky, because everything was clean and like new under the cosmetics. I lucked out.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
These show where I
started cleaning this bike up. The wheels were too badly rusted
for me to do, so I had them sand blasted. Then I primed them, and
gave them 4 or 5 coats of "Hamerite Rust Cap" spray paint.
This paint costs about 7 dollars a can, but it stops rust, even on the
coast. It has microscopic glass flakes that make a shield, like
shingles, over the metal. It's good stuff. I used it on the
transmission/engine case, too.
|
|
|
As you can see, the bike
is getting better in these pictures. Before I began to work on
the bike, I got it started to see how it was going to run. There
was no crud in the carburetor, the points were as new, and even
the valve gaps were right on. The bike started right up, after I
fixed the wiring and put the gas tank back on, smooth and
perfect, as new.
|
|
|
|
|
|
This is how the bike looks today, except I installed the original luggage rack, after I corrected the rust, and painted it. You'll see that in subsequent pictures. The Hammerite paint looks much like the original paint. Hammerite dries quickly, but hardens slowly. When I first used it on my car's tow dolly, I didn't like it because it seemed too soft and subject to abrasion. After it gets several months old, it gets really tough, and it is hell on rust. (This bike is one great user, and it is almost a shame that I don't restore it to show bike status.) |
|
|
All Pictures And Stories by Stanley Buck
|
|
|
Trail 70 Carb Restoration |
|
NEW |
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
|
|||
|
New! The Wheelie-ing Elvi |
|||
|
New |
|||
Honda CT70 Bikes By Year Model:
My 1977 Model Bikes:
4 Speed-Manual Clutch Bikes:
3 Speed-Automatic Clutch Bikes:
