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The Honda CA95 / Benly 150 Restoration The little brother to the CA160 in our family of Hondas

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  #1  
Unread 06-10-2007, 08:56 AM
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So here I'm going to walk through taking apart the spare engine from the red Honda 150 Benley that I knew I would be using for parts. The motorcycle was sold to me with the owner basically telling me that he didn't remember anything wrong with it and he even thought it should have turned over when he tried to move the kickstarter... ummmm yeah. In this thread you will see exactly why the kickstarter wouldn't budge.

Here is a quick explanation of what should be done (the minimum at least) in preparation of taking a small engine like this apart and some of my favorite tools that have never let me down.

A brass hammer is one of the BEST tools to use when working on engines as it is much more forgiving on the parts it comes in contact with. Not only the immediate surface but there is much less shock transferred throughout the object and fewer broken, cracked or sheared parts as a result. The inertia is still transferred to the part but the shock is much more gentle. Got it? Good. I have actually hammered a bent lip of an aluminum racing rim back into shape with this same hammer and it did not crack at all! Broken rare parts are no good.


If you are even thinking of taking apart an old engine such as this... GET YOURSELF A NICE NEW IMPACT DRIVER!! The bolts that hold this whole engine are mostly capped with phillips heads... and old ones made of a softer alloy than you are used to dealing with. If you already have one make sure and look at the tips and verify that they are perfect. If the bits that contact the phillips head are not perfect in form then they WILL damage the phillips bolt and you will have problems. The bolts will deteriorate quick and you might not be able to even use them once you wear out the head. Parts of the head will chip away as you hit it with the impact trying to free it and this is bad. PLUS people will be able to tell that the engine was worked on by a hacker. Get some new bits for the end of you impact and the bolts will back out much easier and you won't be able to tell that you wrenched on them. New bits = about $4.00! If you ruin a bolt where are you going to get another one?

Using the impact:
  • First select the correct sized bit so maximum surface contact is made in the phillips depression
  • Make sure the impact is set in the counter clockwise rotation when struck
  • Insert the impact on the bolt and twist it slightly so there is not rotational slack before it's struck
  • Make a mental note of exactly what degree the bolt is at so you can tell if it moved when you hit it
  • Give it a good and square hit in order to "pop" it free
  • A strong first hit to free it is much better than 3 whimpy hits :lol:
Also be super careful with your gaskets if you plan to reuse them. They will stick to one surface or the other when you pull them apart so make sure you have a nice sharp blade to cut around the gasket surface once you initially pop them apart. If you use caution you shouldn't have any problem. The gaskets are not under much stress when you re-assemble so you can basically use a gasket sealer if you do break one. I've done this and it holds perfect

I cleaned my engine quite a bit so that when I do start exposing the inside of it, there will be no contaminates falling inside. You want the inside to remain dirt free and this can only be done once you thoroughly clean the outside. Now let's see what makes this thing tick...
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Unread 06-10-2007, 09:48 AM
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Each side of the engine once the side covers were removed:

You can already spot some trouble with the shaft that actuates the clutch through the engine from the left to right side. It's located right in front of the sprocket shaft and it's not looking too straight (I pulled it out a little to inspect it).


Here you can see the oil level as it sat for decades, outside, with oil in it. Since it sat outside the oil was a good thing to have in it but what a mess. If the bike had at least a thick bedsheet over it the whole frame and engine would have been in much better condition. <_<
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Unread 06-10-2007, 10:43 AM
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This is the rust that results as the oil slowly falls away from the surface of the top of the gear over the years. This would not happen if the engine was covered or indoors. Amazingly this all cleans right off with a wire brush and leaves very minimal surface distortion behind.



Annnnd here is the whole reason this bike was decommissioned back in the day. The chain was thrown while doing a long wheelie on the dirt track. It then bunched up and deformed the shifting rod rendering the bike useless. Good for us since the beatings can't resume if the bike is parked!



Now if the bike was actually parked under something or inside I could just put a new rod in the engine and fire it up. BUT as you will see there is rust in the cylinder which basically ruins it as well as the pistons and rings. It could be fixed but I don't have more than one restorable ca95 so this engine will be a great source of parts for the primary engine in the blue Honda 150.
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Unread 06-10-2007, 11:00 AM
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Now the cylinder is freed up once you remove the top acorn and regular nuts from the top of the rods. That's the easy part. Now you need to remove the master link from the timing chain... not so easy if the cylinder is frozen up!!! If this is the case (as it is mine) then you have some work to do since you have to actually move the crank (frozen pistons and all) in order to get the chain moved to the point at which you can get to the master link in the chain. I was lucky enough that the master link was close enough. You can see it at the very bottom barely...



So if you take off the timing sprocket cover and don't see a masterlink on your chain then take the bolts out of the sprocket and wiggle the chain off in order to pull the head up just like this.
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Unread 06-10-2007, 11:14 AM
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This is what happens when any of the valves are open when you leave an engine sitting for years and years... The air is allowed to enter the combustion chamber which promotes rust. It's pretty obvious here that there is much more rust in the side that has the open intake valve. Thank goodness that the exhaust valves weren't open! Yet air still comes in and out of the intake side nonetheless. So the next time you store your bike for over two decades make sure and plug the exhaust and intake up with rubber balls. :P



Now the cylinder head rust isn't that big of a deal to me. I'll be taking the valves out and lapping the seats anyways. Besides the valve seats getting a little gritty from rust (totally fixable) the rust is basically just cosmetic. But the cylinders getting rusty is a HUGE problem. Keep onnnn readin...
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Unread 06-10-2007, 11:28 AM
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Before I move on here is how to move the master link on that chain in order to reach it and get the chain and cylinder head off. I needed to turn the crank which will move the timing chain. The piston was just rusted solid in the cylinder from exposure. It was really bad. Kicking it won't work as you will just break something else and the piston won't budge. Turning the large clutch assembly might have been a little easier but it's very fragile due to the lightweight properties of it and could break easily. You also lose a lot of the ability to apply direct force to the crank itself which is very important in order to "pop" it free. The other side of the crank has important parts on it that have to do with timing which are too important to damage with the unusual amount of force needed to break the piston free. What's left?? This is your last resort to apply a HUGE amount of force needed for the operation.



Throw a strong rag like a piece of Levi's type jeans around this shaft and grab your largest vice grips!! The crankshaft end can take a great beating so don't worry much. I had to really get crazy and grab directly onto it with the sharp vicegrips and I only recommend this as a last resort. When I was finished cranking it loose I could then go back with a small file and remove a couple burrs that resulted from the vicegrips. No big deal.
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Unread 06-10-2007, 11:36 AM
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This is basically what was needed to free the piston enough to get to my master link on my timing chain. As you can see my cylinder head was still on at this point and give a great place to push the engine from while I pulled the vice grip. The pair of vice grips that I used barely had enough grip on the slippery shaft. If I put more leverage on the vice grips it would have just slipped off. So I carefully pulled the vice grips and loosened the piston. It was not as easy as it sounds. My engine was nearly worst case scenerio so you shouldn't have as much difficulty if you are doing the same. If you have some large enough grips for the gear that goes onto the crank than I would try and use that option first. Space is limited so I went this route.

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Unread 06-10-2007, 11:58 AM
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Now that the piston is somewhat loose time to try and pull off the iron cylinder. This was impossible by hand in my case as the cylinder walls were a tad rusty. You want to pull the cylinder up and push the pistons down and out. I found a perfect solution... not one big hammer but TWO! I used the brass one as the object to place in the cylinder in order to provide a nice big target to strike with the big steel hammer. This worked great. To get the piston completely free and out you need to elevate the cylinder a bit because the intended stroke of the piston does not push it down to the bottom of the cylinder. So if you just leave the cylinder attached and start slamming the piston it will be at the bottom of its stroke and you're just beating pointlessly on the crank.



So find some wooden blocks of some sort to place under the cylinder to keep it up off of the engine cases. Use larger ones once you start making progress. And just to save yourself some time get some wood and have a saw ready to cut the appropriately sized blocks. I was in a hurry so stopping to take pictures was painful enough. The blocks need to be shorter but not too long to get a good fit.

I had to really hit mine hard, really hard just to move it and it took a lonnng time. I highly recommend filling both cylinders with some sort of "break-free / parts lubricator" solution and leaving it overnight. I had plenty in mine but if I let it sit for a day or two it would have worked better I'm sure. If you can spray some WD-40 or something underneath the pistons with the straw. There might be some exposed cylinder wall under the piston if you can wiggle the extension tube under the cylinder in order to get some spray around it.
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Unread 06-10-2007, 12:10 PM
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I wanted the Honda ca95 cylinder apart that day and I wasn't planning on needing this cylinder as this is the spare motor. If this happened to my only cylinder I would probably be able to fuse the piece back into it's original position and hone it back to operating status. This would be doable since it would be held together by the engine case and it's not close enough to the combustion chamber where the massive forces are present. This would be LAST case scenerio since this piece is so rusty I wouldn't want to spend the time to hone it out to the point at which it's acceptable then I would have to figure out which overbore size piston and rings to use... then I would have to find them! These cylinders are out there for sale so I would just buy another one.



Here is the timing side of the engine. Don't try and crank on this side in order to turn it over. Everything is too delicate to chance damaging and nothing was designed to hold up to such great forces on this side. You will snap the head of that bolt right off and make some real problems for yourself! You can see that these pistons were solid rusty and the rings were super packed as a result... remember the amount of rust from the clutch gear? It expands to fill the gaps between the rings. The little Honda 150 pistons look as if they were seized but that wasn't the case. That's just how nasty the cylinders scored the piston as I had to force them out.
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Unread 09-22-2007, 09:16 PM
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So now it's September and I today I needed to split the transmission cases. The good engine (that came with the blue frame) had a crack on the bottom engine case where the foot pegs mount. This was due to a crash of course and a previous owner had tried to cover the whole crack with a big glob of epoxy. He definitely tried hard to fix it this was since the epoxy was pushed in pretty good. The problem with this was that the crack usually never stops in aluminum so it cracked even more because of the stressful location. So the oil leak wasn't stopped.

I took it to a engine block welding pro who removed some material with a special chisel and showed me how far back around the crack actually continued. The only way to salvage the case would be for him to force the crack and remove the area that was damaged. Then he would weld in a new piece of material, drill and tap the thread that needed to be added and then just do a lot of finish work. Basically I would be using my spare engine for the bottom case. All the hassle for that piece just wasn't worth his time if I have a spare... and thank goodness I do!!
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Unread 09-22-2007, 09:39 PM
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So here is the engine since I was last taking it apart... my spare Benly motor.



Since i had just had carefully taken apart the main engine I really had the process memorized. I took of the few remaining items and had the cases apart in 3 minutes from this point. B)

Now the nasty part of all of this was cleaning it! The insides of the spare engine were completely caked in oil residue like it was neglected. I have a hunch that the spare engine was used far more than the main engine and they changed the oil very few times in it's life. It was a good thing that all I needed was the bottom case and the new shifter post/rod that was attached to it.



It's nasty but it cleaned up just fine! I have this floor stripper that is water soluable that I buy in 5gallon buckets in concentrate. I dilute it 3 parts to 7 with water and it cleans oil and dirt at the same time, very well.

So this is about as far as the spare engine goes. I'll loosely assemble the parts and just put it aside. If anyone wants to buy spare parts from it you can email me at dexxter050 at yahoo.com

There isn't much left but it's almost impossible to find random parts like shift forks or springs and stuff from anywhere else.
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Unread 09-22-2007, 09:48 PM
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Here is the lower case that had a crack in the bottom. It's clean but I couldn't use it. So I had to spend an hour cleaning the nasty black spare one that you see above. It wasn't fun.

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