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Just this past week I was comparing the on paper 390 Duke specs and performance to the RD 400. The are pretty comparable performance wise and the RD is almost 50 years old. Of course there have been advancements in frames and suspensions etc. that the Duke has, but it's kinda a testament to how good the RD was for it's time.   

Very cool and amazing story. I don't guess I had ever heard of her before now. She was quite accomplished!

My calipers and internals are like in horrible shape. Really rusty and corroded compared to the ones in the video, which by the way look new compared to mine. I will try several things, but I doubt the video method will work. Thanks for the suggestions.   

I pulled the heads and cylinders off my project bike. The pistons showed no damage, and the cylinders looked fine. One of pistons is marked 64mm. What cylinder measurement determines boring and
moving up in piston size? One head had way more very hard carbon in the combustion chamber than the other. Also around the combustion chambers shows uneven wear. If I drag a nail around where the chamber was cut the shallow lip kinda disappears like it was worn away.     

The ultrasonic cleaner got one of my carb slides unstuck after about 2 hours with diluted super heated simple green. Caliper halves stayed in 2.5 hours. The pucks are still stuck. I've tapped with a hammer. They are soaking in WD-40 now. Any tips to get stuck pucks out? 

Thanks, I guess I'll take them apart and take a look. I'm thinking pretty hard about going and buying an ultrasonic cleaner anyway. 

I'm wondering if it's better to just buy replacement calipers and master cylinders vs. rebuild on a bike that is 46 years old, and has been sitting 30+ years. Also the stock calipers weigh a ton. Are the replacements lighter weight? Everything is there on the bike I bought but even though it looks to have been kept in the dry all that time the parts don't look great once you take them apart. 

These maybe dumb questions, but I only have the very basic mechanical knowledge.
1. The throttle cable that is wrapped around the pulley on the oil pump. I can't figure out how to remove it. There appears to be a tiny pin that keeps the cable from coming completely off the pulley. Like you would have to remove the pulley to get the pin out. Am I missing something?

2. The left hand carb with the choke. The slide/throttle valve is stuck in like a bottomed out position. The choke lever was also stuck, but I unscrewed it and removed it from the carb. Is something physically holding the slide down? I thought it might be just gummed up bad, but I can't get it to budge after spraying with WD-40 and gently trying to lift it out. Who knows whats going on?

So is the VIN stamped into the side of the neck stem. The actual label with all the info with manufacture date, weight of bike, etc. has part of it worn away. You can see the Vehicle ID and the last six numbers of the printed sticker match what is stamped into the frame. As in 1A1-352XXX.

Scully yes that's the one I saw on ebay. It fits the RD 400's?

Looking for info on if the LC or RZ front fenders fit the 78 RD 400?

Thanks for the compliments on the find. I have the seat off and cleaned up. Other than the strap which had damage and will need replacing I think the seat is in great shape. The little bolts and nuts holding the seat trim on are very rusty so I have applied oil and I am going to let it soak in before trying to get the seat trim off. I have the battery box and air box out. The air box has been cleaned up. The battery box will need to be sand blasted and repainted. The fuel tank had a little rust in it. Nothing horrible. I have it off and it's on it's second dose of vinegar now. The oil tank was very cruddy. The oil inside had turned to sludge. I cleaned the tank out with gasoline. It took a lot of work to get the crud off the oil tank itself. There was a thick layer of crud on it. The internal parts look okay. The oil tank will have to be repainted for sure as well as the tank, seat trim, and side cover. This is going to take awhile. I'm shooting for a year.   

Thanks, I bought an RD repair/shop manual off ebay this morning. I'm going to start disassembly this weekend. Can anyone recommend someone to rebuild the crank or other 2 stroke engine work?

Oh really, well if you put that 1K in front of 800 is how much I paid. I was thinking I got a decent deal, but maybe not. Yeah it's going to be a money pit for sure I figure.

I've found a diamond in the rough I think. I've always wanted a RD 400. A buddy of mine had one when I was a teenager and we used to ride all over the place on it. Of course back then they were out of my reach. My parents weren't keen on motorcycles either. In the last few years I've had the bug and watched lots of videos and searched for bikes for sale. Even now while not exactly out of reach I did not want to drop big bucks on a restored bike. I thought maybe I can find one to fix up, but then again finding one is near impossible. I hired a kid not long ago who is into motocross and I mentioned RD 400's and always wanting one. He said "I know who has one". Oddly enough the guy who had it even used to work at the same place we currently do. I knew the guy was into bikes, but I had know idea he had many classic bikes in various states of disrepair in storage. I reached out and he said he would sell it to me. I was sworn to secrecy about who he is and what he has stored. About the bike. It didn't run when he got 30+ years ago. It has a shifter issue. It's not locked up. It has 13,284 on the odometer. Inside the tank looks pretty clean. The tank does have a dent. The steering stop is broken probably how the tank got dented. I am planning to do a complete off the frame restoration to pretty much stock. Anyway how much would you guys have paid for this bike?