How to tell in CCT's have been replaced.
 

Hi Guys, New to the forum.

I am looking at buying a Firestorm (Australia) at the local dealer. I have owned a few bikes so am fairly cluey on what to keep an eye out for.

I have been trawling through the site looking for advice on buying a Superhawk and have seen alot of the recomendations of the new CCT people have been putting in.

Is is possible to spot the new CCT's and what distinguishes them from the OEM. I only ask as i place no trust that the dealer knows what the F*$K he is talking about and would rather hear the opinions and advice of people in the know (like yourselves) rather than a guy who is set to gain financially. . . .

Also where are the CCT's located? Inside the V or outside and can u seethem without removing plastic? Same question for the R/R.

Bike has about 50,000km ( 33,000mi) and is going fairly cheep (Should be able to pick it up for around $4500 AUD) with high rise Staintunes.

Also, one last question, did the Superhawk/Firestorm only come out in matt black or did it cme out with a standard metalic black as well?



Thanks

Different years in different countries had some variations in available colors, there was both a matte black and a standard black (not metallic AFAIK) of different years...

The R/R is a bit hard to check without removing the plastics... It sits under the tailfairing basically below you right butt cheek... You can probably spot if it's been changed out from the non-finned version to something with fins, but to know what, you would probably need a better look without plastics...

The rear CCT is located by the rear header, and is fully visible just by standing next to the bike... A stock CCT is a grey metal tube, slightly tapered with a small bolt sealing the end... An aftermarket manual one is usualy, bot not neccesarily a colored alu piece with a much larger bolt sticking out, that you can thread in to increase pressure... Ie exposed thread...

My pics from the R/R change...

(Big one is Yamaha, small Honda 2nd gen finned R/R)

Left After market, Right OEM.
Attachment 26275

In Australia Firestorm's are selling from on average $4,000 - $9,000.
So $4,500 from a dealer is at the lower price range.

Mine is a 2002 & was Matt black.
Below are some of the year colours,
1997 Gloss black
1998 Gloss black
2001 - Red, Yellow, Blue, No black.
2002 Matt black
2004 Matt black
2006 Gloss black
2007 Gloss black.

Thanks guys.

I bought the bike today, Matt Black (though am thinking i will respraw it gloss black) 2002 with 45,000km and Staintune high rise pipes. Talked in rego, road worthy, new pads etc for $5500.

They had one with 15,000km asking $8,900 but i rode them both and couldnt tell the difference, both started from cold straight up, no smoke, no rattles etc etc. The one i bought actually shifted alot nicer than the one with lower km's, to be expected though i guess.

Pretty happy with it, cant wait to pick it up on Monday.

neither bike had had the CCT's replaced so that will be on the list up frst along with new oils and filters, suspension refresh and prob some braided lines.

What no pics?

Havent picked it up yet. . .

I am actually going to be painting mine Matte Black because I love that look so much. I have a silver one now. The only thing that I will miss is the awesome glossed over factory decals.

The paint on the one i just bought is a little scuffed, nothing major but wuld def look better with a fresh coat. I like the matt black to, though a friend of mine put a clear over his matt black and it looks quite nice. Halfway between the black and matt black

I am interested in this thread, a "not so mechanical guy" question, is there any way of inspecting the CCT's? can you pull them out and check them out? or does that require lining them back up with TDC and all that?

A bit like having your prostate examined - yes you do have to drop your trousers

Not too sure what you guys are looking for- inspecting an OEM CCT won't tell you much about whether or not it will fail. The spring inside breaks without much warning, and looking at the spring doesn't give much indication of how weak it is (at least I wouldn't imagine that it does).

A few posts up is a good pic of what a manual CCT looks like vs an OEM one. These are by far the most common- a few people on here have modified their OEM CCT to become a manual one- basically by using the stock housing and putting their own threaded bolt in. Bottom line is, find your CCTs, look at them from the outside to determine if they're OEM or not. You can see the rear one very easily from the right side of your bike. Just look under the back near your shock and it's mounted to the engine block. Your inspection is done at this point.

If you have manual ones, you don't need to worry about anything else. If you have OEM ones, they can fail, nobody knows when or exactly why, so your options are to leave it, replace it with another OEM one and keep doing that to avoid failure, or replace it with a manual one...

If you want to pull them to "inspect" them you need the piston at tdc on the compression stroke. And if you are going to go through all that work to get them out you might as well change them, you would be half done the procedure anyhow. You could inspect them, they could look great, reinstall them, take the bike out and next ride they could fail. There really is no warning. If you plan on keeping the bike for a long time then just switch them to manual CCT's. I was a "not so mechanical guy" when I did mine and as long as you follow the instructions on this site, read twice and make sure you understand then you will be fine. Get the pdf printed off that is in LAZN's sig line and just take your time. Its not that bad. If you have any questions don't be afraid to ask. Alot of knowledgable guys on here who are willing to help out.

Right on, well time to start reading up on CCT changing, I am going to plunge into it this spring. Ive read the PDF and between the gear head old man and me, we can pull it off, im sure of it!