1979 Honda odyssey revival

[WisconsinJohn]

Bought this for $300, was told it had spark and it had a rebuilt motor. It does have good compression, but even though the kid had a brand new coil...no spark. Tore it down and found someone attempted to replace the ignition stator coil...wrong one though! I found this guy on e-bay 530scott from CA who rebuilds the 6v stator. It was a new plate, new points (honda) new or rewound coils, and a new plug came with it. This guy does some nice work! Any how, after a little paint, new front tires, seat cover and a little motor work, my kids (and I) just scored a great christmas present. I drove it today, it was awesome!

Before

After

[jb2wheels]

That will be a great Christmas present! I got a '79 for Christmas in 1981 I was 12... We eventually had two. Lotsa fun for years!

Hard to tell but looks like you even have the stock tank and air filter and pipe and stuff. Well done!

[WisconsinJohn]

Yes they are stock, came with a brand new uni air filter and coil. I wire wheeled the air cleaner and steering wheel. The seat is a rust bucket, it was tough to recover. A little great stuff foam goes a long way! Thought about sanding the plastic back to stock yellow, maybe later when I have more time. I had to drill out and re-tap (broken bolts) just about every thing on here! Ordered an exhaust heat shield, and I might mod some fenders for it. Parts for these are more rare and more expensive than trike stuff...

[jb2wheels]

I bet parts are harder to find. A lot of one-off parts for the hard tail Ody's. I think Maier makes or made fenders for them - not sure if they still do. I haven't paid much attention to the Ody's in a while.

Every once in a while I see one for sale locally and I'm tempted but I have no place to store one and I'd need a trailer. Although, my dad brought home our first one in the back of our 67 Chevelle wagon. As I recall, he pulled the back roll bar off and let the air out of the tires, then the nose stuck out the back on the tailgate.

We had two for a long time and had a lot of fun with them in the sand. Lots of great memories. Maybe I'll buy one or two someday anyway.

Have fun. Buy (and make the kids use) some wrist and ankle straps. It's a natural reaction to fling an arm out and try to stop a rollover but all that does is snap an arm.

[Jon Boy]

yep, they can get expensive pretty quick. good idea to keep an eye on the drive belt for wear and the stock tank runs out faster than you'd think too. if you do run out of gas you can pull it, but unhook the drive belt. honda made it so you can do it by hand which is nice, just push the belt to one side while rolling forward and it pops right off.
looking real good, you keeping it totally stock original? you can do some nice little hop-ups fairly easy.

my buddy's 80 fl250, just changes the tires for the job needed.

mud
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all around
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flat track
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EDIT: X2 on the arm straps, not sure if they made ankle straps, but i really don't know. 5pt harness with a highback race seat is a great upgrade as well and i recommend you add padding if needed. which it looks like you don't have to worry about that right now.

[jb2wheels]

Have you been here yet:

http://www.pilotodyssey.com/

A lot of focus on the 400 and 350 versions but some good 250 content too.

[Jon Boy]

yeah, my buddy has been to every site he could find. that's the best site he has found. he's been looking for a pilot quite some time now.

edit: just noticed your sig, it says your 70 is lighter than you. should check out how light a zinger is, 110lbs.

[jb2wheels]

There's a good chance my 200x and 250r are lighter than me too...

There was a nice Zinger for sale here locally a while back but my kids have outgrown them.

Now I'm searching for Odysseys again

[WisconsinJohn]

Cool, thanks for tips. That is the second time I have heard about adding a 5 point harness. I did think about adding the extra rollbars like on the later versions. Where did your buddy get that seat?

[WisconsinJohn]

Ran into a bit of a problem...Looking at the emergency brake (cause this thing takes off when it starts, tried pushing a rancher around) I noticed no bearing on the axle. So I start taking it apart and I cannot get the brake drum off. Juiced it up, heat, beat and repeat. Removed the axle and even tried a bottle jack/press method. So, after purchasing a new bearings, carrier, and e-brake setup on E-bay, I proceeded to cut this thing off. This thing took me all day.



After all of that, today I modded some beat up/partially melted 84 200x fenders to fit the front. I heated them up and molded them to have a 90 degree lip. Now they can be bolted to the front. I have 7 days till xmas...no pressure!

[web3wheels]

odyssey rear.jpgodyssey side.jpg
thats great man, i didnt read all the comments but when i saw the black foot pan it reminded me of one i fixed a few yrs ago. i had $1700 in it and sold it for that. i thought id keep it forever, but the steering sucked and it bounced like crazy. it was a blast on the street in the snow since it made for a smoother ride.

[WisconsinJohn]

Yea, it will see more flat and sand riding.

[JasonB]

thats a cool new toy! MOAR PICS! Great work so far on getting it put back together and running

[jb2wheels]

That old X fender came out pretty good. Very Nice.

[Jon Boy]

Cool, thanks for tips. That is the second time I have heard about adding a 5 point harness. I did think about adding the extra rollbars like on the later versions. Where did your buddy get that seat?

he got his seat here locally, but they can be found on e-bay. got his harness off e-bay.

hey i like the 200x fender. looks really good on there, better than the stock originals even IMO. sorry to hear you had to hack the drum off, but with stuff this old...

web3wheels: nice oddy, clean and basic. i like it.