I was at a friend’s house helping with her tractor. I looked in the back corner of her garage and noticed a tire sticking out from under some packing blankets. I investigated and saw a Honda 3 wheeler sitting there. The tires were flat and she was dirty but looked over all pretty good. I showed it to my son, 12, and told him what it was. The lady told me it was her deceased husband’s bike and he parked it there long ago, i.e. the late 80’s.

She mentioned that every man and his son need a project and if we wanted it we could have it for ours. A few weeks later I put air in the tires and rolled it out of the garage and put it on a trailer. It had set for nearly 30 years and only has 950 miles on it. Could be fun.

We started by cleaning it up and pulling the gas tank. The tank was pretty rusty inside so we started off treating it with dilute muratic acid. It worked pretty well and removed tons of scale. We did notice a few patches of rust and bought rust remover and used it next. It cleaned it even better and tank is nearly free of rust. Hopefully the manufacturer is right and the rust inhibitors will work.

Next we drained the fluids from the bike. The final drive oil looked pretty good but the engine oil looked kind of watery. When I pulled the oil filter there was some slug in there and I assume the oil was watery because the heavier components settled out. I am guessing the bottom of the engine case has some slug in it too. I thought about putting some kerosene in there to dissolve it but was concerned that the vapors would remain and could potentially cause some kind of flash back in to the crank case which would be bad. I bought synthetic ATV oil to hopefully break up the sludge and plan to change the oil quite frequently the first couple times. Any suggestions here are welcome.

Next we put a new battery in and started checking the electrical system. We get head lights and tail lights but it won’t crank. I have checked the fuses and many of the connectors. I notice that the neutral safety switch light isn’t lighting so it might be an issue there. I have jumped the starter solenoid and the starter spins fine. I am giong to pull the cover off the neutral/reverse/oil pressure switches and check them for grounding. I hope this is the problem. Hope to spend some time on it this evening and maybe Friday.

I have bought a rebuild kit for the carb but want to try it as is. The throttle lever moves freely and I can hear the piston moving up and down well in the carb. The choke also moves easily so the carb might be okay. Hope to find out soon. I will probably check the spark too before trying to start anything. Hopefully the fuel system doesn’t need much.

I bought 3 new mud tires for the bike but haven’t replaced them yet. Want to get it running first. I am amazed the old tires are still holding air pretty well. One was a little low after sitting for a few weeks and I asked my son to put some air in it. I told him to just make it round again. We I don’t know how much air he did put in but it must of been close to blowing the tire. The dry rot cracks were quite large and made me freak out on him a little. I am still amazed he didn’t blow that one, Kids.

If anyone can think of anything else I should do to help bring this back to life I would be glad to hear it. The project is moving along. My son’s eagerness to ride it keeps growing.

Thanks for letting me join the forum.

Regards,
Vince