Hi, I'm Harry I work here at the shop at The
Bike Shed, and this is my Custom Honda CB550 Four. So I bought the bike back in 2014 when I was
looking for a you know classic, vintage, cafe style bike, and I came across this thing online. The Honda CB550 Four. This bike was originally imported into the
States back in 1979, where someone must have used it for quite a bit and then Robinson's
Speed Shop took it on over here in the UK and they customised it over into a Japanese
Brat-Style custom, basically the essence of what I was looking for, and that's the foundation
of what you see here. So I've got 19" Firestone tyres, the deluxe
champion addition. I went for that sort of, you know, blacked
out look, sort of military style. I've got fully anodized spokes and rims there. Annodized forks with the gaters on, chopped
front end, fender here. Another thing a lot of people ask is a 7"flat
style headlight. It's not stock, something a little more set
back than the original. And it works great because I've put it into
this little box here with the integrated led. The Daytona speedo here this is a nice addition. A lot of people ask about the switches, these
are just standard button push switches I found on eBay online, and they work great in this
little box style here. Nothing fancy there but they work. So you've got left indicator, right indicator,
the bar is a standard Renthal 7" bar which we've flipped upside-down and I capped off
and put on these beautiful bar-end mirrors. So a little on the small side but they work,
especially around London commuting. Moving on to the tank, this is a nice metallic
sort of brown/black kind of sparkle glint in it, done by Robinson's before I bought
it. Moving along into the seat here, nice diamond
etching on there and it fits beautifully with the frame here. Going down into the carbs, these are not the
original these are from 1976 Honda, I had to swap out the original because they kept
leaking which is a big problem with late 70s Hondas specially if you swap out the airbox
or pod filters. When doing a little research about the Carburettors
here, the ones I needed I matched up the engine and frame number and found out they were all
from different bikes. So the engine is from a 78, but the frame
and the tank is actually from a 76 Honda 550K which is an entirely different model, but
they all fit. Moving on - down to the exhausts here. These are just standard heatwrap exhaust,
megaton mufflers, which I'll talk about a bit later when I show you the sound, but these
are just standard cone-end mufflers you can find them on eBay super easy. Now, as a commuter bike I wanted something
a little more practical and when I bought it there was this big space under the seat
which these cafes have. I'll take this off here for you, the guys
at Untitled motorcycles Adam, had this beautifully shaped aluminium cubby hole put in for me
keeps all my chains, oxford alarm lock and a cover and spare reg plate, which is great. all tuckes away neatly with just a little
plate here. I also got a really neat Malle tool kit which
ties really neatly and is easy to put around. Now the shocks are not stock, I had the shocks
put in by Hagon, they are custom built so they don't bottom out, and that was a big
problem I found before they couldn't take the weight especially when carrying a pillion. Hagon shocks, they work brilliantly. They are custom made to measure and they're
super reliable as well. Now going into the subframe this was not original,
fits beautifully with the bike it cuts off quite neatly here but it still has enough
room to fit the pillion which is great. Locked off nicely with a single LED red bulb
here. Naughty little reg plate, but let's not talk
about that, no comments in the comment section please! Again, rear Firestone tyres, 19" as well,
blacked out rear hub and spokes just to give it that old blacked out feel. Yeah, why don't we take it outside and see
how it sounds. Yeah the mufflers do sound really really great
on this. IT's not too overstated, but you can hear
it, you know it's coming.
