Tuesday, March 10, 2009

The Beginning - Part 3

I guess it is about time I finished the story about how I got nixon.

So as I was watching craigslist for CB350s, I happened to see a listing for a CL450 in Atlanta. The 450 is a little bigger that the 350, but very similar. The CL designation means it is the Scrambler version of the CB. It is designed for riding on dirt roads and trails so it's exhaust pipes sweep up and to the side and the handlebars are a little beefier. The picture in the ad looked pretty good and it was running. Since I was in SC, I had to wait until Saturday morning to go see it. This time I just took my car figuring if I did buy it, I could just come back later and pick it up. I had a funny feeling I might actually get this one so I stopped by the bank and got some more cash out so I would have enough on hand.

When I got to the guy's house, he had it out in the driveway. He had been trying to get it to start but to no avail. He said the homemade starter button had fried and he couldn't start it with the kickstart. I looked it over quite a bit. I liked the paint job and it looked to be in fairly good condition. There was a some rust in the tank and it had been modified somewhat. It didn't have the original seat, no passenger pegs, different tail light and the start button was relocated under the seat with a Radioshack special. I tried kicking it and got nothing. For some reason I felt I needed this bike so I offered the guy $250 less than he was asking since it wasn't running. He took it. In retrospect, I probably overpaid for it a little, but I had a bike. The guy even offered to tow it back to my house for me.

Now the funny part. As we were exchanging money and filling out the paperwork, we started talking about the bike and some other things. It turns out that he had bought the bike the previous year on ebay from a motorcycle shop in Greenville, SC. The same shop I used to take my old bike when I was in high school. The same shop I was going to be taking this one to get running again. I don't really believe in coincidences so I know there is some reason I ended up with this bike.

Well, he towed her back to my house and that weekend I started messing around to try to get her to run. I jumped it off of my car and the starter button worked fine. The motor turned over but didn't run. All of the lights and the horn worked. I was in business. I took the spark plugs out and they were very black and sooty. I bought some new ones and stuck those in. It fired right up and ran for about 10 seconds. I had brought her back to life! It was awhile before I got her running well enough to ride, but I was very happy I had not bought a piece of junk (although I think my wife has a different opinion).

The day I brought Nixon Home

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I'm so stoked for an update! Thanks!

Jake Good said...

Excellent looking bike! I just picked up a 70' CL450 and am going to cafe it out...

Shoot me an email, I want to talk some shop!