Hi - sorry for the late reply, I've only just joined and I noticed your question..
The CL and CT250S are the last of the line with this motor and are rare - there are only about 30 of them left in the UK - I have a CL250S.
The CL had a twin saddle and was mostly sold in Europe. The CT had a single seat and was widely sold in Asia-Indonesia and Australia.
It was intended as a go-anywhere, do-anything wide-ranging farm bike, that bridges the gap between trials, road and mountain farming.
Honda's tough little 4-valve, 5-speed, single engines started with the SL (cam chain on the left, no engine balancer) and was redesigned by shifting the cam-chain to the right and fitting a pair of balancer shafts, driven by a chain on the left... That cut vibration so much that they could use a much lighter frame.
This engine was widely sold, and loved, as the XL250 and CB250RS - essentially the same engine with different gears and alternators.
Then, for the early 80's, Honda did an interesting re-design. Keeping all the same engine casings and main components, they dropped the rear balancer (which ran on the gearbox input shaft, and used just a single balancer shaft at the front of the motor, driven by gears.
This gave them a gap on the gearbox shaft, which they used to fit a 6th gear! Brilliant!
Two 6-speed motors were built - the CL250S and the XL250R, between 1981 and 1983 - being the same motor with different gear ratios.
The XL-R had a competition-spaced 6-speed box, the CL & CT had a wide 5-speed box with an extra ultra-low crawler 6th speed which is so low that you can't get into it without pulling a release lever built onto the outside of the clutch lever.
The electric start can be a bit sticky, but is a completely self-contained system which can be swapped straight onto a K/Start CB250RS or XL250 engine, swapping starter motor, alternator and cover and alternator flywheel. You can fit a kickstart to the CT/CL but it means splitting the crankcases...
So - most engine parts are the same as CB250RS, apart from the gearbox internals. If you have a serious blow-up, you can drop an XL250 or CB250RS engine straight in...
Some daft people even stick the 500 version of this engine into the CB250RS, which just makes it heaver, shakier, but not really much faster, and looses it's brilliant agility...
Incidentally, there was another version of the CL250S for Germany only, that had restrictors welded into the exhaust headers to cut maximum power by about 20% to meet the German 17PS regulations - otherwise identical. So German magazine tests only talk of how gutless it is - not surprising really....
I hope that some of this helps!
ps - change the oil very, very, very regularly - like every 1000 miles!
