CB750F Rear Fork Paint Done and a Much Needed Reset

The last session ended with a hard lesson learned about carb cleaner and painted metal. After accidentally softening the paint during the rear fork cleaning, the only real path forward was to scuff the whole thing down and start fresh. That turned out to be fine in the end, and the CB750F rear fork paint is now done in satin black, which is all I actually wanted out of that part from the beginning.

This episode is more of a check-in than a wrenching session. The walls were starting to close in out here with parts and supplies piled everywhere, so I figured it was a good time to take stock of where things stand, clean up a little, and knock out some of the smaller parts that have been waiting in the queue.

Finding Satin Black Paint

Finding the right paint has been on my to-do list for a couple of weeks. Walmart and Harbor Freight both came up empty, carrying only gloss, matte, or flat black but not satin. A minor plumbing emergency over the weekend sent me to Home Depot for parts, and while I was there I spotted Rustoleum satin black on the shelf. Picked up two cans, which turned out to be exactly what I needed to finish both the rear fork and the rear caliper torque link.

One thing worth passing along on the paint prep side. I did not have proper bungs to plug the threaded holes before spraying, so I used foam ear plugs instead. Squished them down, slid them in, trimmed anything protruding with an X-Acto knife, and painted right over them. They pop out easily with a pick afterward. Not an elegant solution but it worked perfectly and cost nothing since I already had them on hand.

Both parts are hanging in the garage now to off-gas and fully cure before I start handling them. There is no rush since reassembly is still a good ways off, but it feels good to have that paint done and that particular thread closed out.

Small Parts Cleanup and Organization

The lift has become a de facto collection bin for every supply run I have made over the last few months. Nitrile gloves, wire brushes, Scotch-Brite pads, blue painter’s tape, wire wheels, storage bags, it all ends up piled there and I cannot even get to my toolbox half the time. So part of this session was just getting things sorted and making some breathing room.

While organizing I also worked on cleaning up a handful of small parts that have been waiting. The castle nut and bushing from the rear caliper torque link, the nuts from the chain guard, a cotter pin, and a couple of caps and the axle that go with the rear fork. These are the easy pieces that just need rust knocked off and a bag labeled before they get lost in the shuffle. I also found a random washer that I cannot place at all. No idea where it came from or what it belongs to. It is in a bag now and I will deal with it later.

The gas cap needed some attention too. It still smells faintly like gas after all these years, which says something about how well petroleum permeates metal over time. I got partway through cleaning it up with the Dremel before the battery died, and rather than fight it by hand I just set it aside to finish once the tool was charged. That one can wait.

New Tool in the Shop

The plumbing situation that sent me to Home Depot also led to picking up a Hercules oscillating tool from Harbor Freight, which was not exactly planned but turned out to be useful. I needed to cut an access panel in a wall cavity to reach some buried shut-off valves without risking a saw blade near the pipes, and the oscillating tool was the right tool for that job.

I have been hesitant about the Hercules line from Harbor Freight for a while, mostly because my background is in a professional wood shop where tools needed to hold up to daily use and I tended to stick with brands I trusted. But the use case is different now and the pricing on Hercules is genuinely hard to argue with. The oscillating tool ran about eighty bucks, plus another hundred and ten or so for a battery and charger since Harbor Freight does not really do kits the way other brands do. So it was not a cheap impulse buy, but if the tool holds up I can see it earning its keep on the bike too. Getting into tight frame junctions for sanding is exactly the kind of thing a good oscillating tool handles better than a piece of folded sandpaper.

I also picked up a hand impact driver for around seven bucks on sale. The seat lock on this bike needs to come apart and the screws on it are a bear. My dad suggested the hand impact as the right tool to break those loose without mangling the heads, and at that price it is worth trying before I start doing damage.

What’s Still on the Workbench

Beyond the small parts cleanup and the paint, there is a running list of things that have been deferred. The workbench base still needs to be built since the plumbing fiasco ate the weekend I had planned for that. The seat lock still needs to come apart. The JB Weld steel stick epoxy I picked up for the seat pan rust repair is sitting on the shelf waiting for me to get into the seat seriously. And the garage still needs a better organizational system than using the lift as a shelf.

The bigger picture is that the back half of the bike is getting close to stripped down enough to start thinking about frame touch-up and eventually reassembly. The trunk, tool tray, battery box, and wiring harness are still to come off, and the tank trip to Jeff for the weld repair and the seized caliper piston heat treatment are still in the queue. But the rear fork and torque link are done, the small parts are cleaned and bagged, and the shop is at least slightly less chaotic than it was. Sometimes that is what a good session looks like.

Ride With Me

If you are following along on the CB750F Restoration and want to catch every session as it goes up, subscribe to the WaltInPA YouTube channel. If you know someone working through their own vintage bike project or dealing with the classic garage organization problem, pass this one along. And if you want to talk shop or share what your own parts storage solution looks like, come hang out in the WaltInPA Discord where good people compare notes on exactly this kind of stuff.