HONDA CD250U
Andy Hart needed a back-up old bike, a Vmcc-eligible machine which would start instantly if his BSA wasn’t available. Enter the Honda CD: the perfect machine for getting you there…
Andy Hart needed a back-up old bike, a Vmcceligible machine which would start instantly if his BSA wasn’t available. Enter the Honda CD: the perfect machine for getting you there…
You know how it goes. You’ve done over 80 miles on your old bike earlier in the week so it should be good to go for the Sunday run. 25 kicks later… it still won’t start! By the time you’ve cleaned the carb and finally got started you will have missed the others. I usually check where they are going so I can catch up, but I thought it might be nice to have a bike I could just put the key in and push the button.
The next wet day I sat down with good old flea-bay to see what I could find. This is where the filters come in handy. I could select between 25 and 30 years old to be VMCC eligible, but not too old; eliminate any ‘plastic projectiles’ or adventure bikes (at my age I can’t get my leg up let alone over anything that tall), then remove the over-rated air-cooled flat twins (because there is not the width available to get one in the garage) and definitely nothing ‘tractor’ related. The final criteria was that it would need to be over 200cc to be usable in 21st century traffic.
Unsurprisingly, this search did not give a multitude of choices. It did however come up with a Honda CD250U-K. I remembered seeing these in the late 1980s and early ’90s. A 250 twin, basically an overgrown version of the CD185 / 200. It had electric start, disc brake, five speeds and indicators and a top speed of 70mph – on a good day even 80mph. Fuel consumption was shown as up to 75mpg. It had wire spoked wheels which are a pain in the proverbial to keep clean but are at least repairable without specialist equipment. To top it all, the one on flea-bay was less than 15 miles from me.
A bid was duly placed, reflecting the fact that although the bike was generally clean and sound its spokes had gone rusty. Also the silencers had been replaced with a universal type because not only are the correct ones very expensive, they aren’t available anywhere. It came with six months MOT, had covered a little less than 100 miles since the test, and showed less than 18,000 recorded miles. I expected to have to bid a bit more than the starting price but turned out to be the only bidder and so won the auction. I used my trailer to collect it, despite it only being 15 miles away. The vendor wasn’t available until after dark and it wouldn’t be a good idea to ride something unknown in the dark.
He was selling the bike because ‘it didn’t go very well’, which I took to mean in comparison with the plastic projectile he had sat beside it in his well-lit garage. The CD started and sounded OK, so the deal was done. I fired it up when I got home and rode it round the yard with no cause for concern. The first thing to do before further use was to get the wheels out; it is much easier to clean the spokes with the wheel spindle clamped in the vice and at working height.
I was slightly baffled by Honda’s rear wheel retaining system because I did not have the handbook. You have to loosen the spindle then slacken off the adjuster bolts and swing them down out of the way, remove the
wedges trapped in the swinging arm, push the wheel forward, unhook the chain, and take the nut off the brake rod and torque arm then pull out the spindle to drop the wheel on the floor. Having got the wheel out I went to lift out the brake plate, but it did not want to come out. A little jiggery-pokery and wiggle managed to free it, but the cam spindle had to be persuaded out with the assistance of the hide end of a Thor hammer. As it was the middle of winter, I assumed the 100 miles ridden since the MOT had been on salted roads, causing this to stick. A few minutes work and a tiny bit of HMP grease soon had it working properly.
I won’t put anyone off by telling how long it took with a narrow strip of emery to clean up the spokes! They were then given a coat of silver paint and lacquer. I should now be able to just wash them off in future.
I managed to find the handbook online, but didn’t print it off as it runs to 89 pages. I found a reprint of the Honda workshop manual that I hoped would turn up before I actually needed it. With the front wheels it was a bit of a struggle to get the disc out past the pads and I noticed that the disc was a bit worn. With the wheel out I wedged a bit of wood between the pads so they couldn’t accidentally pop out. I gave the spokes the same treatment as with the rear wheel before putting it back. It went back in OK and the pads appeared to free off after a couple of revolutions of the wheel.
Freewheeling down a slope did not show any obvious problems with either brake and I had not noticed any difficulty when pushing the bike around, so a longer test ride was called for. I can make the hill out of the town at 45-50mph on my Bantam but the Honda found this a bit of a struggle. I wasn’t sure if this was because of my lack of experience with it or something else. It did seem to go a bit better on reaching the top of the hill, but would barely reach 60mph. I could see why the PO had sold it! Common sense, experience and online information told me that there was something not right.
Upon reaching home, I very cautiously felt the rear brake drum and the front disc. The drum was OK but the disc was red hot! Back on the bench. The workshop manual had turned up so I had the information I needed to strip and clean up the caliper and pistons. First I checked that new pistons, seals, unions and even a new disc were available before risking any damage getting the old bits apart. It helps if you know how much force can be applied, if needed.
Gripping the exposed ends of the pistons with the water-pump pliers was enough to get them out without too much trouble. They had obviously been out before as the outer dust seals were missing. The inner seals were actually OK but as I had new ones these were fitted. I used a shortened bit of the steel backing strip from an old car wiper blade, bent over and blunted, to get the grooves for the seals cleaned out. With everything cleaned up and suitably lubricated with the correct substance (supplied with the piston set), all was put back together.
Surprisingly the pads were not badly worn, but I did remove the location pins to clean and lubricate them. The new disc was fitted, using Loctite on the bolts, a new bleed nipple and union were fitted and the wheel put back in. I was not sure about the amount of movement in the brake lever at first, as it seemed to have more than I liked. Even bleeding it three times it seemed to make little difference. This settled down to much less movement after I had covered a few miles though, so I put it down to the old pads settling in to the new disc.
The performance was now up to what was expected. I could climb the hill in top gear at 60mph and easily reach an indicated 70mph – more than this with wind / gravity assistance.
A check on the CD’S MOT history confirmed the recorded mileage. It had travelled only 40 miles between 2009 and 2012, for instance. It failed in 2013 because of a worn rear tyre, and was advised of a worn front tyre in 2018 with 16,849 miles showing. It was tested again after less than 400 miles after in 2019. I find it hard to understand how at least three
testers had missed the sticking brakes. Only 75 miles had been covered between the test and when I obtained the bike, and I collected it from an address which was 25 miles from the MOT station. Surely the very worn – down to the clearly-shown bottom limit – disc should have been spotted? And why would a lightweight 250 have worn out a disc in less than 18,000 miles?
It has taken me a little while to get used to the higher revs of the CD250U-K. It seems quite happy to go from 25mph to 75mph in top gear, although it works better if I remember to change down! I get approximately 120 miles from full to reserve. The manual suggests this is around eight litres, so that’s just under 70mpg.
Most people think the CD is a lot older than it is when they see it. It suits me and does what I want. Despite the expense of the new brake bits it’s been good value. When MOT time rolled around, I wasn’t going to risk taking it to where the previous test had been done. I went to my usual tester who
found nothing wrong – in fact he liked the CD250U-K so much I had a job to get it back!
The time and trouble involved in buying and fettling the Honda felt justified the next time I went to take out my Bantam. I checked everything the night before and briefly started it. But when I got it out the following day, by the time I had put all my gear on there was a puddle of petroil underneath! I thought I would be wise and fill the float bowl while I was getting ready. Plan B: put the Bantam away for attention later, get the keys for the Honda, push the button and off we go.
The CD250U-K does what I wanted it to. It keeps up OK at 55mph, does 70ish mpg, brakes well and, at just over 300lb, is not too heavy to manhandle. It’s simple to service. It also has a full-size dualseat. I still don’t understand how it passed earlier Mots with its brakes stuck on! I wonder if some of its many previous owners would have kept it longer had the brakes been working properly. There was no sign of wear on the discs of other heavier motorcycles I have owned with higher mileages.