Here's the 1986 700F2. replacement for my 87. It's ROUGH.

First the obvious. Anything not broken is missing, LOL. What you can't see is the fact that this beat old bike starts, idles, goes, and stops better than my 87 did when it was 7 years old with 1800 miles. No lie. It is silly smooth. The gentleman I purchased it from rescued it from a field here in MT where it sat for 5 years after the crash. NEW fluids. ALL of them. New chain, new sprockets. The carbs are synched as well as than can be. He claims 45-49 mpg. We will see. Hell my 87 only was good for high 30s, but the way it was ridden thats prolly par for the course. This guy was good. By trade he is a mechanic, transmissions, transfer cases, etc...He loves motorcycles, this was the first one he bought to fix. It's ugly, but it rides soooo good. I am attaching pics, the ones with the nice lookin bike, and the punk kid are me, and mine, from 94-97. Here goes, let me see if I can handle this. You cant miss the straight pipes. It is Loud! I am glad he still had the F1s. I liked the stock system mine had. This one has new packing, and rivets..I am gonna take a break, but I will be back. I am saving this bike. It was so cool it was delivered. Hell, it was at my house before I got off work saturday Morning.

 

Cool! Looks like the perfect project bike....all the important stuff sorted and just the fun superficial stuff to work on! Keep posting

 

A perfect project. Nice looking bike..

 

Thanks for the support. I am so pleased with this bike. There will be some hunting and gathering, but it will be so fun. It is snowing sideways here today, so I am going to concentrate on finding some more pieces, and removing the rest of the bodywork. It's just a little dirty underneath, it was a rider the last couple seasons. Damn, he had balls. I rode it and wrung it out really good, but I was always thinking I would get pulled over for leaving the scene of an accident LOL. I made a list, and have a few things incoming. One of the first things will be to clean up the F1 exhaust, and lose the straight pipes. I will take pics, and keep everyone up to date. I will be hitting the forums quite a bit. There is a bunch missing from this, but it is just bodywork related. I definately want to find helmet lock/gas cap/ignition keyed alike. I let a set go last week, because I didn't know I would need it yet. I don't know what else to say, except Thanks! very warm welcome here. I love this ratty bike! I didn't know what I was gonna do with it, but I decided to make it as much like my old one as I can. Make it look like it did.

 

Progress! I have gas cap/ignition/helmet lock, and choke cable incoming. Got my front fender yesterday. The lot of hardware is on it's way. Search continues for the tail section. To pass the time I may cut up the broken parts, and see if I can fab my own. I can't do any worse than the pop rivet/fiberglass/chicken wire that's there. I can buy an upper and the lowers at will from Beasley....but I am sitting on my hands waiting to hear from a few members I PM'ed to see if anything is still available. My trailer is blocking one of my garage doors, tying that stall up because of my car in there, and I have enough snow to not wanna try to move it right now, plus it's single digits now, so I have the itch to do something, but am excercising some patience. Pretty soon tho, when I have more parts to put on, I will, and get this project rolling. The more time I spend with the bike I get happier. Looking past the cosmetics this is SWEET!

 

I just got off the phone with Beasley Composites. 4 bills and change later, I have an upper and the lowers ordered. I was told I would have them by next week. Hey, buy the ticket, take the ride, right? Might as well get this stuff on the way, and put it together. So, back to the garage, and off comes the rest of the broken stuff. I will take some pics when this thing is naked. Give it a good clean, and see what else I am missing lol.

 

Took the front fender off, the remnant of the upper, and the tail fairing. As bad as it looked, the only thing I have noticed bent or bummed up is the radiator, oil cooler(from the headlight just a couple bent fins) and the left front footpeg bracket. I will get some pics taken, been bouncing back and forth from the garage to the computer to the daughter, and back lol.

 

Tiny progress report. Installed ignition,gas cap,and helmet lock. Nice having one oem key! After less than an hour of posting a wanted ad, my tail fairing is on the way. I could save my mirrors, but will buy a pair when I see them. I am waiting for fairings. I am either gonna make my own brackets, or buy the only one I can find right now and keep looking. Havent touched my cobra exhaust yet. Rode the bike yesterday, nothin but the seat on it. Smooth and lovely, but the straight pipes are not my favorite. Have a good weekend everyone!

 

Had to put the family on a train this morning, family emergency, and this is 9th consecutive working day, heading for 13, BUT in the midst of all this, tracking numbers say my bodywork will be here Thursday the 14th. And, I just purchased from Pegasus wheel/tire conversion to 17" running a 170 rear tire. Thanks Sean! Supposed to see 60s here soon. I may have to drop everything and get home for a funeral within a week, but I am gonna make this happen. I always wanted to upgrade wheels and tires on my 87, and since I have this second chance I am jumping in with both feet. Gonna source a Hurricane front mag and go that route. Researching a few options and opinions on suspension too. Love the forums! I never realized how skinny a 130/80 18 was til I have one in front of me again. Be cool everyone! I am waiting on so much cool stuff to show up on my doorstep right now. I love it!

 

Your not gonna want a hurricane front rim. Although it's an easy swap, it is 2.5" wide and will force you to run a bias ply tire. (Edit: There is at least one radial in 110/80/17 that will fit this rim the Avon Azura AV45.)

I don't know exactly what rear rim your getting, but a 170 is definitely a radial tire.

Your gonna want a 3.5" wide front rim so you can run a modern radial tire in 120 width.

The cbr600f2 front rim is 3.5", fits the stock speedo drive and only needs the brake rotor mounts machined down. It's not difficult. The big issue you might have is that it's a 6 spoke rim and might not match a 3 spoke rear rim.

There are other front rim options in 3 spoke, but you will need to swap the front sprocket cover or else modify it to run your speedo from there.

 

Thanks JasonWW. I haven't decided one way or the other on the front. I absolutely overlooked that a 600 Hurricane front wouldn't support a radial tire. My original Interceptor was bone stock all the years and near 20k miles I had it. I always wanted more rubber under me in the rear, so that's what I am starting with. I am still waiting on four packages, and since I may have to jump a flight anytime I haven't done much in the garage. No pictures recently either, because the camera went with the family. I have been taking pics with my phone, but they aren't very good. I have to decide which panex, or dzus fasteners I want for my fairings. Once all this stuff is here, I am gonna follow my list, and get this done, documenting it with my camera too. So far everything involved in this build was delivered to my door. Including the bike. That is pretty sweet!

 

I forgot, the rear I have coming is from a CBR 1000f. It currently is wearing a 170/60 Metzeler M3. It has been road tested 10k miles on a 87 700F2. It uses the VFR sprocket, and rear brake, custom arm for the brake tho. From the pics I have seen I think it's well done. I would like to machine something myself for this bike, but I feel like I made a good purchase on the rear radial conversion.

 

If your budget allows, a full front end swap is possible. The extra grip of the radial front exerts a lot of additional stress on the stock front end which us under sprung and under damped. Press out the steering stem from the stock bike and press it into the triple trees of another bike and your in business. You get a stronger setup, better brakes and better damping all in one fell swoop. It would also let you get a matching 3 spoke front rim as well.

Just something to think about.

 

There are lots of options when considering front end swaps for the first gen VFRs and the best solution will likely depend on your budget, your personal sense of aesthetic and your intended usage of the bike.

The CBR600F Hurricane front rim is an entirely viable option as a radial tire fitment upgrade to the stock front forks. There are radial fitments for the 17x2.5 inch rim, and many Hurricane owners have been running radials on their bikes without issues for many years now. You’d need to track down a 110/80R17 front radial, and you’ll find that these mostly fall in a manufacturers line of sport touring radials. The more common 110/70R17 fitment seen with sticky sport/track tires isn’t recommended for the narrow Hurricane rim due to the shorter sidewall height – something to keep in mind I you go the Hurricane route. That being said, if you intend to ride the bike mostly on the street and don’t plan on running fast days at track days routinely, you’ll probably be entirely happy with the matched radial combinations you can source for the Hurricane front/CBR1000F rear rims. The only other front rim I’ve personally seen fitted to the stock front forks is a machined down CBRF2 front rim (3.5 inches), but then you’d have a mismatched 5 spoke rim on the front (Again, your personal taste will determine whether you care).

JasonWW makes a couple of very good points – you’ll want to look at upgrading your stock front forks (fork brace, suitable springs and if you can stretch to it cartridge emulators) to get much benefit out of any radial fitment to the stock front end. With those upgrades, your stock forks will basically be as good as they can get, and the cost associated with that set-up will still be much less than a complete front fork swap.

IMHO, the best (relatively easy) front fork upgrade for the first gen VFRs is the YZF600 front fork swap – I’d call it a half step beyond the popular CBRF3 swaps due to the YZF setups better brakes. I ran that fork set-up for several years on my VFR and loved it. It’s definitely the best option for a 3 spoke front rim fork upgrade but, again, the cost is quite considerable and you lose the ability to go back to your stock configuration (if that’s at all important to you).

Just some more thoughts to consider as the snow melts and the warm weather moves in!:smile:

 

I found one radial tire in 110/80r17 the Avon Azaro Sport Touring AV45. It will fit the 2.5" rim. It's not a sticky sport tire but a longer lasting sport/touring.

I've been looking at the radial tire options for my bike as well so I'll report back if I find any more info.

 

I finally have everything I need to put the body on. And a corbin gunfighter like I used to have. Spent a bunch if money! Sold my car today. Working 60 hours. Buying another car saturday....stay tuned. Got my garage space back