Hello, I have not had a motorcycle in 24 years (I just turned 60). I happen to be browsing Face Book Marketplace and can upon an ad for a Bike.. IT had the picture below and the only text was "1982 Honda Silverwing Interstate. No spark. $200"
I grabbed my trailer and drove 1 1/2 hours. The owner had a medical issue and could not use it. It has been sitting since 2016. He wanted to get rid of it because it was in a tent and he wanted to lose the tent before the snow falls. The battery was dead but I could see the engine was not locked up and the title was clean. I gave him $200 and put it on the trailer when was very had because the seals in the calipers were seized up. Luckily my trailer has a winch.
I got it home and determined it had oil and topped off the coolant. I sprayed some starter fluid and it fired up. I drained the gas, bought a new battery and it started!. I saw one exhaust pipe was cold. I found a used plug in the trunk and now it runs on both cylinders.
My plan is to clean it up and take ride it this Spring. So far, I bought a new battery, front caliper rebuild kits, and a master cylinder rebuild kit. I am going to do all the maintenance. It has 23K miles.
I see it has a trunk relocation kit. I would like to return it to stock so I can swap out the trunk of the back seat.
Here are some pictures. I have not cleaned it before the pictures. I cleaned the tank today and it is perfect. I did not see a scratch!
Is exhaust rechroming a thing ? What is a ballpark cost?
Is this the same general drivetrain as the.....CX500? I think that's what I'm thinking of. I'm a bit ambivalent about the wing chassis and bags and alm that, but it's a cool drivetrain.
Yes, those are a CX500/650 in a frock. Completely different chassis compared to a contemporary GoldWing.
It's an extremely long lived drivetrain if looked after.
Re rechroming exhaust pipes - it's possible but chrome places hate to do that in general as the deposits in the exhaust tend to mess up the baths. Expect it to be very expensive. I'd try to find a set of good used ones first or even new ones from a place like David Silver Spares or CMSNL.
For $200 you can't beat it. 
From the picture it looks like the mufflers are in decent shape but the header pipes are rusty - maybe you can replace just them and reuse the mufflers. CMSNL sells the pipes for 110 euro each, or $122. It would most likely cost more to get the originals replated.
That is a cool bike and a dang good deal! I didn't know about the CX500 relation. Love those Comstars...
Good score! Keep us updated.
ShawnG
PowerDork
12/22/19 3:59 p.m.
Great bikes, reliable as gravity.
One thing about the Comstars - keep an eye on the tire pressures as these like to leak air. My '79 Goldwing (also with Comstars) needs the tires topped up very regularly.
Nice!
Try to bring the chrome back with 000 or 0000 steel wool before giving up on it, but this is from the era when Honda chrome wasn’t the greatest.
Go into the fuse box and clean all the contacts with a small wire brush or file. Too much resistance in there will melt out the back of it. Clean every ground.
Ahh, one of my past favorites. I bought a CX500D brand new back in '79 and I just recently sold a '82 Silver Wing Interstate similar to your find except that it was in top condition. Great drive train but there are some weaknesses to watch for. Cam chain stretches and you can run out of adjuster travel if it goes too far. Make sure you keep good fresh coolant in it and watch the hoses. The water pump runs off the back of the camshaft and there is a very expensive and hard to replace seal at that interface. On almost all of these bikes the hard rubber intake manifold boots have cracked and will cause hard to discover vacuum leaks. The boots are unobtainium but I have a good fix if you are interested. Keep the valves adjusted, it is a 10,000 RPM pushrod motor. It is VERY busy at highway speeds and you will constantly look for another higher gear, but you won't find one. It doesn't care though, loves RPM. The ignition system isn't the best, but since you have a '82 you have the best system that came on the motor. Like a lot of motorcycle engines, the ignition system and alternator are intimately linked, and the stator is prone to failure. A bad stator means pulling the engine out and apart to fix it. Good thing is that parts are available.
One thing you should hope is in good condition is the mono-shock for the rear suspension along with it's accompanying linkage. Parts of the linkage are very heavily loaded, and there is no provision for lubrication. It's almost certain that it will have to come apart and be cleaned and lubricated. If it squeeks, it's crying for help. If the pro-link shock is leaking your in trouble.
While these bikes were pretty popular in the US, Honda sold E36 M3 load of them in Europe, especially in Britain and there is a huge community of fans. Lots and lots of great information here: https://cx500forum.com/forum/forum.php
Congrats on a good find. If push comes to shove you can part it out and make at least 5X your investment.
The CX 500 series were almost criminally underrated when they came out. Fantastic bikes if kept up!
stukndapast said:
The water pump runs off the back of the camshaft and there is a very expensive and hard to replace seal at that interface. On almost all of these bikes the hard rubber intake manifold boots have cracked and will cause hard to discover vacuum leaks. The boots are unobtainium but I have a good fix if you are interested.
One thing you should hope is in good condition is the mono-shock for the rear suspension along with it's accompanying linkage. Parts of the linkage are very heavily loaded, and there is no provision for lubrication. It's almost certain that it will have to come apart and be cleaned and lubricated. If it squeeks, it's crying for help. If the pro-link shock is leaking your in trouble.
I plan on addressing the water pump seal and cam chain tensioners before spring. I will check out the mono-shock.
What is the fix for the manifold boots?
In reply to Mark L :
Can an Admin move this to the Motorcycle section ?
In reply to Mark L :
For the boots, remove them, clean them making sure all oil is off them and then use this self-vulcanizing tape. Wrap them with a continuous strip of the tape, stretching it as described in the instructions. Make sure the correct side is facing down. One good continuous overlapped layer will seal the boots completely and permanently. The tape cures to a single impervious rubber membrane. Good stuff.
For the Pro-Link, Honda calls for their Moly 60 lube. Use no other, and don't scrimp on it or you will be redoing it over and over again, guess how I know. Some people have drilled and installed zerks on the linkage. I have never tried that, but I could see where it could be useful if you can get the grease to where it needs to be. There are several pivot points.
Enjoy it. Great bike and you have some pretty rare accessories too.
Update:
I love this motorcycle. I did the water pump seal, and cam chain tensioner. I removed the bracket that extended the rear trunk. I am not planning to ride 2 up and I like the backrest.
The mufflers were very rusted so I bought 2 new Harley takeoffs for 22 bucks!
Need tires and then I would ride this thing anywhere.
