Back By Popular Demand - The Three Amigos Ride Again!

[Mscb1100_imp]

Finally found a copy.
I think this is the color scheme of the one in the museum
The Flying Dragon
Don Stockett, the owner of this 1972 Honda CL350 K4, has spent considerable time tracking down the history of paint sets that pop up for sale under the name Flying Dragon. The sets consist of a gas tank and side covers to fit either a CL350 or a CL450 Honda twin, model years 1972 or 1973. The sets come in a box marked “Honda Japan,” with a graphic depiction of the tank, but in a standard scheme with horizontal striping. A part number (06171-456-810 for the CL350 version followed by a two-letter color code) is stamped on the box, which is lucky, because no one would believe that the Honda factory would come out with something like these paint sets without a part number to trace back.

So far, Don has been able to confirm that sets came in four colors: gold/purple, silver/purple, green/purple and blue/dark blue. Don only recently verified the blue/dark blue set after locating one in Florida. According to Bob Kelly, writing in the Vintage Japanese Motorcycle Magazine, the official publication of the Vintage Japanese Motorcycle Club, American dealers were notified of the availability of the paint sets in a parts bulletin. The sets were also supposedly mentioned in a Honda accessories catalog. Bob has been looking for the parts bulletin and the accessories catalog for some time, but has not located either item yet.

Don has also invested considerable time and effort trying to uncover the details of how the paint sets came to be produced. Despite having contacts with many retired American Honda employees, he has come up largely empty. The only sure things he has confirmed are that the parts numbers are genuine Honda Japan numbers, not American Honda numbers, and that the sets were probably the work of a special project team in the paint department. At the time, Honda had special project teams within each department. The projects these teams worked on were authorized, but the existence of the project would not be widely known outside the team’s department.

It is also unknown how Honda created the paint swirls, but period customizers created similar effects by spraying a base color on the part to be painted, then floating a second color on liquid and dipping the part into the mix. So far, the green and purple sets have been the more common sets to surface, and Don thinks the reason they’re most likely to appear for sale is that they were the least popular, and thus the most likely to be put back on the shelf, to be found in a back storeroom years later.