CT90 Restoration Adventures

Product Review - Harbor Freight/Haul Master Motorcycle Carrier use with a CT90 A few months ago I picked up a Haul Master motorcycle carrier from Harbor freight to use to haul around CT90's that I own. The carrier normally sells for $124.99, but it was a holiday weekend when I bought the carrier and Harbor Freight had a special 25% off coupon so the cost was very close to $100.00 out the door which I though was a pretty good deal.

I was working on a post about dynamically timing CT90's recently and decided to make a clear plastic cover like the one in the picture below so that I could view the timing marks while the engine was running and not have to worry about the small amount of oil that splashes out.

Product Review - Audew 150 psi Heavy Duty Double Cylinder Air Compressor This is a review of a small portable 12 volt air compressor that is unique in that it is configured with a single motor that drives a piston and cylinder located at each end of the motor to where the combined output for the two cylinders is up to 150 psi.  While not directly related to Honda CT90's, a compressor like this is a handy device to have available if you take your CT90 out camping, Hunting, etc. and need to top off your tires with air. I want to acknowledge upfront that I received this compressor from the manufacture in exchange for doing this review.

I recently had a number of CT90 main wire harnesses that I had to do some minor repairs on, so I thought I would do a post to share some detailed information that might be beneficial to someone else  working on their CT90's wire harness or maybe even someone wanting to build one from scratch. At the beginning of this post I'll explain some of the differences between the wire harnesses and then later in the post I will show the 1971 version of a CT90 harness completely disassembled so you can see what the individual wires look like and I will detail the process I follow to reassemble that harness back into an installable configuration. I also included detailed information on the measurements related to the harness and a table of how long each of the individual wires are in case someone decided they wanted to build a harness from scratch. Wire harness Differences Here is a picture of the three harnesses I was working on.

One part on the CT90 that can degrade with time and also cause a variety of issues that don't seem to have an obvious cause is the rectifier. Links to Related Posts CT90 Rectifier Upgrade Basic Test of a CT90 Condenser Basic CT90 Ignition Coil Check If you have an old CT90 that you are trying to bring back to life, I would recommend just going ahead and upgrading your rectifier to a newer more modern solid state design and I made a post here on how to do that yourself .  But if you would like to use the rectifier that came with your bike or if you are really trying to restore your CT90 back to the original configuration, I'll show you how to test your rectifier to see if it is good or bad as it's really a very simple test to do.

One item often overlooked on a CT90 when trouble shooting is the condenser that is mounted with the ignition coil.  The primary function of the condenser is to prevent arcing at the ignition points when the points open which results in a spark being generated at the spark plug.  The condenser also to a lessor degree, helps maintain the spark at the spark plug. Links to Related Posts CT90 Rectifier Upgrade Basic CT90 Ignition Coil Check How to Test Your CT90 Rectifier Unlike CT90 ignition coils which can be 50 years old and still be in great shape, a condenser is really just a capacitor and capacitors can and will degrade with time, so its always worthwhile to take the time to test the condenser, especially if you have gone to the trouble to remove the coil/condenser assembly from your CT90. There are a couple of different ways you can check your condenser to determine if it is performing correctly. The first approach is to make a couple of subjective observations o...

I had a cylinder head where the threads for the spark plug hole had stripped out and needed to be repaired and I decided to use a Time-Sert to repair the treads.  This was my first time using a Time-Sort so I decided to do a post here to share the process that you go through and what the final installed insert looks like.  I have used Helicoil's in the past to repair damaged threads on other bikes I have owned so I first started to look for a Helicoil repair kit and the ones I found were around $48.00 dollars which sounded high and while I find Helicoil's fine for most repairs, for a spark plug hole they are not really idea in my opinion as you'll be removing the spark plug on a regular basis and I would prefer something more robust and permanent. In digging around on the internet I came across Time-Sert thread repair kits that use a very robust looking insert which I liked, but I was shocked at the price of the kits where the cheapest I could find was still around $88.0...