Motor Swap: 1150 into an 1100EZ

[CivilRock]

1980 Gs 1100e built to 1230cc walk around,start up.RS flatsides; not sure about the pods though. start-up is at 1:50
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGJZndZRCGM

That thing sounds Wicked!! dude should have either shut the door or rolled it outside. The lighting is horrible; can't see a thing. That bike is really f-ing cool.

Didn't notice the oil cooler on that bad boy. Where's it hidden?

No oil cooler. Stock motor. Oil temp gauge works. I live in Oregon and ride year round. I only saw the oil tem get up over 180 one time, and it was in the summer when it was +100F. Otherwise it's pretty much always pegged on cold. I will be watching it with this 1150 hot rod.

Good Looking Bike you got there, I like it . solid muscle bike stance!
If you want to keep the ground clearance the term semi/competition will have you weighing compromises. I got to ask, Civil Rock have you thought of what stage level of performance are you are going to be satisfied with?

Here is my STAGE I list - If I wanted to spend my money wisely for a 85%/15% semi/competition 80's era bike.

#1 Get the rs36' mikuni and nice filters - extra jets will help too
#2 set of drop in .348 cams and manual adjuster
#3 put money into the clutch - better basket, modified inner hub, snowflake lock up.
#4 bunch of sprockets 15/ 47~42
#5 tune it , ride it , know it

The head work and bigger displacement higher compression can wait, I just spent $1500~$2000 of your money.
Best news is if you go this route these parts will work great all the way up to 1428cc -- you can make impressive power with the basics.

.................. after the basics come exotics -- with similar costs.

I really appreciate all of this advice Trippivot. I think this is the bike version of late 60's muscle cars. And in that same vein, I'm going for that look and feel. Oh, and this is a total copy of solosuzuki's bike that was BOTM in like 2003 or something. See if you can find it!

#1 Agreed. (I have no carbs, so that one is easy. I need something.)
#2 Interesting. Another vote for cams only.
#3 Agreed - except a hand clutch is for me.
#4 Already have 45 and 48. I need a couple links to move my axle back now.
#5 Totally Agreed.

I too would like to savor every step of the way.

I must have removed the carbs no less than 40 times getting this bike running right when I first built it. If you look at the pic, you might see my blued headers. I was so tired of trying to get it right, I went on a ride completely leaned out with the choke acting as my throttle. And if you've ever removed the stock airbox and all the crap that goes with it, you know what a PITA it is to do. with pods and Mikuni flat sides, I feel like that process will be cake. I know most shy away from that aspect, but I like it. I might live to regret that claim, but right now I'm sticking to it.

As far as what I will be satisfied with? To be honest, I'm already blown away with this bike's performance at the stip. I'm already satisfied. I have no desire to race competitively, I'm in no rush, and I really just like tinkering with it and making it even more killer. If I had to put a number on it, I'd be happy with 160 HP when it's all done. But I don't want to get there too fast... because then I'll have nothing else to do... right?

-Kevin

[CivilRock]

Motor is on the Truck

Finally palletized, weighed, and on the truck. It will be at the dock for me on Monday to pick up. For future reference, the motor and pallet together was 238lbs. I'll weigh the motor by itself once I get it in my hands.

Anyone have a set of good used RS36 carbs kickin' around they want to get rid of?

-Kevin

[posplayr]

Im intrigued at how a different r/r would reduce oil temp....Less heat in the stator?

What do you figure the temperature of a stator is that has had the epoxy powder coating burned off by a Shunt R/R?

400-500 degF maybe?

So yes a drop in stator temperature does reduce the heat load on an engine.

I even saw a drop in temperature from oil spraying the stator. Power in the stator goes as R*I^2 and (IIRC) R is proportional to temperature so if you can keep the stator cooler you are also reducing the heat the stator generates.

Guys ridding 550's won't see much difference but an 1166 or bigger it is a pretty big deal.

[CivilRock]

So I picked up the engine Monday and drove it straight to Larry's house. I only know larry from some in-laws who are a couple of brothers that have known Larry for decades, and used him to build motors for dwarf cars and drag bikes. I had no idea that his "garage" shop at his house was so huge. It was amazing. He built this suburban house around a garage/shop in the basement. It's a full on machine shop with everything there to build very wild machines. There was a bone yard corner that had about 50 blown up Suz and Kaw cases. I guess back in the day he had a huge shop with 15 employees. Now it's just Larry and one assistant.

He only does top end, big money builds. Here I am with my little budget street rod. After I realized the history and level of expertise this man has, I realized some of my early questions were not even in his arena. He builds $50,000 motors and I'm worried about $50 extra for an ignition part or something. Sheesh. I realized he's doing me a favor just to break open this motor and make sure it's not crap. I think I'm in good hands.

Hopefully he'll sell me some of the carbs he has sitting around. I was watching a set of RS36 on Ebay and set an automatic sniper bid at $300 and they went for $306. D'oh! Why would someone set an auction to end at 2am on Sunday morning? WTF? http://www.ebay.com/itm/121257536965

Probably need to find an oil cooler, and I need to buy a Dyna 2000 to run the thing.

I'm going to have to pull my 1100 motor, carbs, airbox, etc. and sell it just to pay for all this stuff.

The seller of the engine said there's some broken fins probably from a drop. I think it was a little more than that, and I hope that all the stuff on the stator side of the motor is OK under the cover. It's obviously been replaced, and there's a new head gasket too. Makes me nervous.

-Kevin

[Guest]

So I picked up the engine Monday and drove it straight to Larry's house. I only know larry from some in-laws who are a couple of brothers that have known Larry for decades, and used him to build motors for dwarf cars and drag bikes. I had no idea that his "garage" shop at his house was so huge. It was amazing. He built this suburban house around a garage/shop in the basement. It's a full on machine shop with everything there to build very wild machines. There was a bone yard corner that had about 50 blown up Suz and Kaw cases. I guess back in the day he had a huge shop with 15 employees. Now it's just Larry and one assistant.

He only does top end, big money builds. Here I am with my little budget street rod. After I realized the history and level of expertise this man has, I realized some of my early questions were not even in his arena. He builds $50,000 motors and I'm worried about $50 extra for an ignition part or something. Sheesh. I realized he's doing me a favor just to break open this motor and make sure it's not crap. I think I'm in good hands.

Hopefully he'll sell me some of the carbs he has sitting around. I was watching a set of RS36 on Ebay and set an automatic sniper bid at $300 and they went for $306. D'oh! Why would someone set an auction to end at 2am on Sunday morning? WTF? http://www.ebay.com/itm/121257536965

Probably need to find an oil cooler, and I need to buy a Dyna 2000 to run the thing.

I'm going to have to pull my 1100 motor, carbs, airbox, etc. and sell it just to pay for all this stuff.

The seller of the engine said there's some broken fins probably from a drop. I think it was a little more than that, and I hope that all the stuff on the stator side of the motor is OK under the cover. It's obviously been replaced, and there's a new head gasket too. Makes me nervous.

-Kevin

That's ugly.
I hope it does not affect cooling.

[CivilRock]

That's ugly.
I hope it does not affect cooling.

Yup. It is ugly. Seems like everyone agrees it will hinder the cooling about .003%

When Larry does my 1230/cams/port he said he'll grab one of the blocks from the shelf with good fins. He pointed to a shelf with a dozen of them sitting there. I might try and repair the fins on the head, but we talked about it and it's a hard job to do.

He's already gone over the motor and it's all good except both cams were retarded by 1 tooth. It was also missing a washer under the rotor bolt. I'm damn positive I would not have figured out either of those.

-Kevin

[Guest]

Yup. It is ugly. Seems like everyone agrees it will hinder the cooling about .003%

When Larry does my 1230/cams/port he said he'll grab one of the blocks from the shelf with good fins. He pointed to a shelf with a dozen of them sitting there. I might try and repair the fins on the head, but we talked about it and it's a hard job to do.

He's already gone over the motor and it's all good except both cams were retarded by 1 tooth. It was also missing a washer under the rotor bolt. I'm damn positive I would not have figured out either of those.

-Kevin

.003%
nice

[Rob S.]

CivilRock rebuild

Kevin,

I just went through your complete 1100EZ rebuild on your website and enjoyed it immensely. Can't count how many times I was in the garage holding the iPad and comparing it to my bike. Especially liked your idea of lowering the frame around the engine.

Curious about why you decided to stay with the stock airbox; was it just a case of 'not broken, don't fix it'?

[CivilRock]

Airbox vs Pods

...Curious about why you decided to stay with the stock airbox; was it just a case of 'not broken, don't fix it'?

Thanks Rob. This bike has been a lot of fun over the last 10 years.

I actually tried it with some pod filters for a couple months. Honestly, it was just to make it look cool and to make it easier to pull the carbs for adjustments. But I returned to the airbox for better performance.

Here's my belief: I found that the gains for wide open power (if any) were not worth giving up low end consistency. Now this is a highly debatable subject, and my "gut" feeling and experience could be somewhat attributed to placebo effect, poor tuning ability, or random chaotic chance. But I believe the air entering the carbs needs to be uniform, stable, and laminar to effect smooth low RPM (small throttle openings). That is achieved with a controlled (and long) airbox before the air gets to the carbs. With the pods, air is a swirling and turbulent mess behind the engine providing inconsistent airflow to the mouth of the beast.

So riding around on the street was less pleasant because I do spend 95% of the time at 0-25% throttle, and those throttle openings demand the most stable air entering the carbs. It's less (or zero) important when you're WFO, and you just want the least restricted airflow possible.

I am going to ditch the airbox with the 1150 swap. But I'm counting on the RS carbs and their fine tuning range, plus the assistance of a master mechanic to ease my way back down the path of the POD.

-Kevin

[Guest]

I checked out your link.
Very cool history!

[CivilRock]

An 1150 motor weighs 189 pounds.
No oil or counter sprocket.

[CivilRock]

Motor is in

I stayed up until 2am last night swapping the in the motor.

It all went pretty smooth to be honest. I hit 2 speed bumps that pretty much ended my night:
1. The exhaust header bolts are smaller on the 1150 so I couldn't bolt on the exhaust.
2. Theres some interference between the Counter sprocket cover and a frame element.

New bolts are easy, but the only solution I see for the CS cover is to trim it down a bit. The 1150 cover won't go on and that "ear" that I plan on trimming blocks the last engine bolt that I need to put in. Pictures probably tell the story better than I can with words.

-Kevin

I set the fuel tank and seat back on the bike just for safe keeping:


Here's what's stopping me from putting on the cover:


This is my plan of attack on the trim. I'll make it line up with the cut line on the tranny case. Hopefully it won't look too weird.


So this is basically Phase II of my master plan, and along with the 1150 motor I'm putting in some other goodies:
1. 1992 Bandit 400 clocks. (done)
2. 2003 Burgman handlebar controls. (there's a reason) (shipping)
3. Dynatek 2000 ignition/coils/wires (sitting in a box)
4. 1995 Katana 600 oil cooler. (shipping)
5. Mikuni RS 36 or 38 Carbs. (not sourced yet)
6. Digital Temp/Fuel/Volts gauge (not sourced yet)

It took me 9 years to get from Phase I to II. But Phase III someday will be:
1. .348 Cams
2. 1230cc Big Bore
3. Mild/Street Rod Head porting

Hopefully I'm not in my 50's when that happens.

[posplayr]

Boy, I know that pictures can be pretty deceiving about heat marks on headers, but that header looks like it really got hot.


I dont know the details but I would figure that you could swap in a GS1100E sprocket cover. There is also a discussion on shift rods I believe. So before you start cutting wait on those inputs.

[rapidray]

Use your 1100 countershaft cover. Ray.

[CivilRock]

Boy, I know that pictures can be pretty deceiving about heat marks on headers, but that header looks like it really got hot.

When I first got the bike running and put on the V&H 4-1 it was super lean and blued the headers while I was tuning it. It does look like they're super scorched in the picture, but it's not that bad in real life. They're really dirty/dusty and look even white in the picture. I was pretty bummed about it when it happened to the brand new pipes, but se la vie.

I'd really like to keep the correct cover on the 1100 that I'm now selling. But I'll have to weigh my options. And I'll make sure it's going to work before I start cutting. I did some eyeballing before I put the motor in and it looked like there wasn't going to be any issues with the shifter length.

Yes, I appreciate the advice. I'll make sure I don't dive in and start cutting without really thinking it over. The bummer is that I can't even get the 1150 CS cover in place to check the shifter rod clearance. I'll have to do some test fits with the 1100 cover and compare notes.

-Kevin