Why is there a 1986 700 & 750? What are the differences?

Someone in my area is selling a nice 1986 RWB 700. When I first saw it I was thinking this guy hit the "0" instead of the "5" on the keyboard. I did a little searching and saw that some pictures of 1986 RWB bikes had the 750 on the fairing and some do not. How can you have different displacements within the same year? Am I missing something?

 

During that time the US had a steep tariff for imported bikes over 700cc. To get around the tariff Honda essentially shortened the stroke of the 750cc to made a 700cc.

 

Let's start with the story of Harley Davidson, a company who was (and still is) far too proud to admit their bikes (if you wanna call them real motorcycles) are total shit. Back in the mid 80's, HD realized that the Japanese bike makers were taking a big bite out of their bike sales here in the US bike market. HD lobbied congress, and eventually they passed a GIGANTIC tariff for any bike imported into the US with an engine size of 750cc or larger.

Enter the category of bikes that are now known as "tariff beaters". In 1986, the VFR750R was Honda's big, bad, competitive race mule. They imported a number of the 750's into the US, but at a great cost (due to the tariffs, of course). So to get a bigger bite out of the market, and to also take advantage of the VFR750F's raging success on the track, Honda also imported a 2nd, more widely built and sold version, the VFR700F and VFR700F2. The 700's did sell like nobody's business, which in a hilarious turn of irony, still took out just as big a chunk (if not bigger now) of HD's sales in the US market.

The sad thing is that Honda only imported the 750's to the US in 1986, and the only VFR's that Honda sent our way in 87 were the 700's.

As similar as the bikes are, when you get down to the engine themselves, there are VERY few differences, the biggest of which being the crankshaft and connecting rods, which made the extra 49cc that became the 750.

 

^^^ Yeah, what he said, fixed it for me. Ha!

 

Has anyone ever converted a 700 to 750? I wonder if its worth the effort? Thanks for the info guys. I always loved the look of the RWB 1986 bike. I am going to try and test ride it tomorrow. Hey Chris, is your 1987 700 similar to the 1986 700?

 

yeah in a nut shell.. they are the "Tariff beaters" of the 80's I like my 700

 

ok to answer these in order....

i dont know of anybody who has converted a 700 to a 750, BUT i have already acquired the parts (a 750cc crankshaft and connecting rods) necessary to do so. from all my research, the 750cc rotating assembly should work just fine in any 700cc motor.

the 87's and 86's are...id say....90% the same bike when youre talkin about the 700cc variation of either one. the differences I know of off the top of my head are shock mounting points, the 86 has a different ignition system (the 86 uses a "cam pulse generator" for its ignition, where the 87's ignition is a digital one), the CDI ("black box") is different between the 2 yrs, and believe it or not, I've found (from personal experience) that the connectors on the combo switch assemblies that go on the handlebars are different, so the combo switches ARE NOT interchangable between the 2 yr models.

as far as making a 700 into a 750, it looks easy enough, but you REALLY want to use the same year model of engine. (ie, it looks like too much trouble to me to get an 86 model 750 engine to work with the rest of an 87 bike).

 

I converted my 700 to a 750 by installing a nice low miles 750. It was a bolt in. Nice midrange increase. The bike went from having a engine with 50,000 to one with 7000 miles. Cost was 300 for the engine. There are differences in the engines on different years.
I used my starter, exhaust, front sprocket and carb assembly. It took more time to clean up the 25 years of gunk from the frame than for the actual install.

Now if I could find a way to cut off 100 pounds from the bike....

 

well yeah, that would stand to reason. if you have an 86 model bike, you can swap a 750 right into the frame (I'd probably swap the black box too) and barely skip a beat. good point, camo.

 

I would insist that you think about numbers here, and I'm NOT a math guy.

think that you have 700 of something. Say, girlfriends. Then you find that your neighbor has , oh, I don't know, 750 girlfriends.

Matter to you ? Hahaaaaa

 

i dont know about you, but the instant i got married, i realized that one chick is MORE than enough of a handful, and polygamists are just either total masochists, or just downright insane. 750?!?!?!? dude, that aaaaaaaaaaallllllllllll you!

 

Before the new tariff lobbying Hardley Abelson company came to be.... there was the hilarious AMF years, some friends that had them got fairly pissed to the point they wouldn't ride with us, just because we laughed at them when they wouldn't start (no estart) and when they blew up trying to keep up with us. Ahh the comradery.

 

I know this is an old post but figured that an update might be appropriate.

Have not ridden the bike in over a year. I want to sell it now that it is looking and running good.

I didn't see a forum for offering for sale.

Contact me for details
Thanks

 

Well make sure you advertise it right. The bike is NOT a VFR750, and the VIN will show that. just advertise it as a VFR700 with a low mileage 750 engine swap. It sucks you have to sell the old girl though. What will you be asking for the bike?

Oh and by the way, there is a classified section here on the board where you're more than welcome (and encouraged) to put your bike up for sale to somebody who would surely show it the love and care it deserves.