YAMAHA CS3C
The more you dig the more you discover, as Scoop finds out to his cost.
Scoop talks spares and bits and pieces on his Yam.
For the moment we’ll neatly sidestep the issue of the recalcitrant rotor detailed in last month’s missive, simply because I’m still sulking about it. Instead (while grumbling, cursing and muttering various obscenities) I’ve opted to look more closely at the running gear and peripherals instead. Knowing that the project wasn’t turning out as nicely as I’d hoped the entire paintwork set has been removed, cleaned and packed off for a nice fresh coat of Candy Green. Finding someone who has empathy for older bike panels is key to getting the finish needed: lots of firms claim to be able to do the job but if you look on social media the threads seems to feature as many grumpy bunnies as happy ones. Having come to the conclusion that (a) you gets what you pays for and (b) it’s up to us to make our needs and requirements plain to the people doing the spraying, I think I may actually have located a firm that will do the work to my requirements. My prerequisites were: “No blasting grit in the tank please, ditto no high build primer or paint inside either thanks, and finally please can you not spray beyond the vertical position of the filler neck so petrol fumes won’t creep under the fresh paint.” Judging by some of the responses I had you’d think I was asking for the moon on a stick. It’s amazing just how rude some of those who make a living out of us lot can be; I honestly struggle to understand why. I should say here and now that our normal CMM go-to people aren’t of that ilk but were hellish busy; some of the other so-called specialists were simply downright rude. Knowing that the finished paint kit can make or break any bike I opted to use a firm not too far from me and I’ll be reporting back in due course. Speaking to the people doing the work, meeting them in person, seeing what they do and not relying on emails or grainy pictures is a good rule of thumb. Prior to dropping all the panels off I did have a quiet word with a bent headlamp bracket and I’m rather pleased I was able to take out a fairly serious bend. Moving on to the frame I’d actually remembered where the bash plate was for the bike. This had been an ebay purchase made after the bike arrived from Canada and I’d noticed there wasn’t one fitted. Rarer than hens’ teeth, I found one in the Mid-west and for sensible money. Of course being a bash-plate it was, well, bashed, so this also got a good talking to with the dead blow mallet and is now back in usable condition.
With my plan to only refresh the parts genuinely in need of sorting I’d naïvely hoped I’d be able to touch up the frame here and there and was still blithely going down that route when the centrestand pivot pin refuse to budge. This, allied to concerns about the swingarm’s integrity, led to a serious reappraisal of the job in hand. Dragging what was left of the street scrambler’s carcass outside revealed an already seriously high level of rattle can overspray on pretty much everything including the coil pack and perfectly decent zinc plate. With a reluctant sigh and some considerable profanities uttered the inevitable was inevitably accepted – my mechanical overhaul and light cosmetic refresh was now going to be yet another full restoration: why do we lie to ourselves? Does anyone know? To be perfectly truthful it didn’t take more than half an hour to strip off the remaining components and the wiring loom, then it was game on. With a heavy application of my best gas torch, some strategic percussive attrition and general bullishness the centrestand pin gave up its vice-like grip on the stand’s main tube. Careful filing off of any hammer-induced burrs saw frame, pin and stand all divorced from each other. My concerns regarding the swingarm were unfounded as what looked and felt like a substantial crack in a weld was simply heavily compacted dirt engrained with oil; one less thing to worry about then. From here on, it was but a morning’s work with Jizer and pressure washer to clean all the blackwork of oil, dirt and poorly applied rattle can paint. I’m sticking to my plan to use this bike as a rider so it’s all going to be painted using Cerakote which should be long term resistant to just about anything.
Even if the engine is yet to give up its rotor (more of which next time) there’s still work that can be done to progress the job. The spare barrels and heads that came with the bike will be sorted ready to go on the rebuilt engine. The original units are damaged in places and as previously detailed one of the exhaust flanges is also seriously mangled. What I wasn’t expecting was for the inlet stubs of the spares to be physically different to the ones on the engine. Ignoring the Bakelite insulation sleeve it’s apparent that the ‘spare’ cylinders run a cast steel inlet whereas the originals are made from alloy… confusing or what? Investigations revealed that Yamaha had manifold issues (sic) with the alloy inlets cracking, fretting and transmitting heat to the carburettors of all CS models so early on in the CS3’S life they swapped them out for the steel ones: which may explain why there’s a glut of NOS alloy inlets on ebay! Inspection of the spare barrels revealed that they’d seen serious use and they’d already outlived their second oversized re-bore from who knows when. Having been a serial collector of all things Yamaha 200 parts for donkeys I’d have liked to have thought my cache of pistons and rings would have come to the rescue but sadly not. Although not listed in the parts books Yamaha offered +1.00mm oversized re-bore kits but of course these aren’t easy to track down now 48 years on. My good mate and ex-pat Simon Neil purchased everything required on my behalf and sent it all over but I have to say I was shocked by just how expensive parts are now in the USA. Our colonial cousins have certainly cottoned on to the value of NOS! So both the frame and the panels are away being painted; the chrome is with the platers and I’m busily cleaning and stripping off the fixtures and fittings that need to be re-zinced. Was I kidding myself this was only re-fresh? Yes of course. Is it going to be expensive? What do you think? Am I getting bored? Not a chance and that is probably why we do it.