Prologue

In September of 1998, a car made an unsafe left turn, cutting off a friend riding my old CB-1 in the opposing direction. The bike was probably going 30-35 MPH at the time of the accident. The impact first sheared off the forks below the triple clamp, then rammed the loose front wheel assembly into the radiator and exhaust headers, and finally pitched the wreckage down hard on its left side. The rider was thrown and flew over both bike and car, suffering a serious concussion but no broken bones.

I took possession of the wreckage and eventually decided to put together a track bike to race with the AFM. Cleanup work started in January 1999 while I searched for a replacement front-end, exhaust, radiator and other parts. Jim Serfass came through big in March with a complete front-end and exhaust as he was putting together a Frankenstein CB-1/RVF400 project. But the continuing lack of a radiator dashed any hopes of an April race debut on the CB-1 (I rode my roommate's EX500).

On the eve of May's race weekend, and with the help of friends and power tools, we managed to cajole, coerce, and hack an used Hawk radiator on to the bike. The race CB-1 was complete, and more impressively, it ran on the first try after eight months.

Before & After Snapshots