81 GS550T Full Rebuild...In Ohio

Thanks, Steve.

[Steve]

A quick Google search yields many pictures, this is one of the better ones.



That thin band above the piston, where the combustion chamber is smaller than the cylinder, is the "squish area" or "squish band".

.

The squish area is where the valves reside. Not sure what else you would call it, but I am sure there is something else.

Not sure of the term squish area either, but Yes, the cam chain guide stick comes right out you open it up. pops in , pops out.

[cowboyup3371]

A little over 22000; what is the squish area?

You are a touch rich, Scott, but not too much. Pistons, squish area look fine. How many miles?

[cowboyup3371]

Here are pistons 2 and 3:



Piston 1



and Piston 4



And finally the valves (cylinder 1 is on the right in the picture)



Do they look alright?

[cowboyup3371]

Started in on taking apart the engine today. Spark plugs look a little on the rich side I think.







Then removed the cams making sure i kept the same bolts with their caps. Tried to make an E with the marker pen but didn't do all that well. Both are marked only on the left side.





Each cylinder has its own storage bowl (4 foil bowls for a dollar at the dollar store)








As I started to remove the head, the plastic cam chain piece here came out with it. Is that normal?





More to come

Are those girls old enough to be seeing a Nakid bike?

[cowboyup3371]

After work came the real fun time tonight when I removed the right hand side frame mounts and loosened the mounting bolts. I thought by doing that, I could just lay the bike down and pull straight up. Nope, it took some doing and redoing and redoing but common sense finally prevailed and we got the engine out.

Here's us trying to fight with removing the mounting bolts to get them out AFTER we flipped it over INSTEAD of before:




But with some brains on the phone and the realization the left front motor mount had to come off to prevent the rear of the engine from catching on the lower mounting brackets that are welded to the frame, we got to this:





Because my daughter had drum practice I couldn't do anymore for the night. Surprisingly though, Charmayne decided she wanted to finish a couple of frame parts while I was gone. After spraying bolts down with WD40, and a phone call to me asking if that was okay, she resprayed everything with the Liquid Wrench. She was able to remove the side stand by herself but forgot to pull the cotter pins for the center stand so needed my help after I got home. I was very impressed with the job and effort she made.



Course she had to ham it up a little again...I think I'll have to take the camera away from her (she did this by herself too).



So tomorrow night starts the serious cleaning and we'll probably start tearing down the engine either this weekend or next week

hey hey, almost there, pull the motor and drop the swing arm out and you ready to start sprucing her up to look like new. Wooo Hooo
Keep the updates coming.

[cowboyup3371]

I'm almost there

The bike is now on the ground and about two hours from being completely bare frame; just need to find a suitable stand/seating for the engine. After getting the rear wheel and fighting to remove the handlebar grips (WD40 worked perfectly), we were at the point we could remove the front wheel and forks. But we had one problem - the rear end would lift up every time I tried to jack up the front, even with the jack barely under the oil filter housing. Even throwing my cargo straps up and over the rafters came up too short. However, I finally figured out my best counterweight of all and called Justin out to help pull the tire away from the bike (Cheyenne and Helena ran to the store because my daughter's growing up). Pictures below.

Showing Charmayne how to remove the circlip over the gear shift lever



Cheyenne caught me by surprise



Rear end on the ground



My great counterweight idea...and it worked beautifully



On the ground



Inside of steering neck



Upper steering bearing



Lower triple tree and bearing



Now to remove the crash bars, lay it down, and pull the frame up and off.

I did a frame up job on my 1100. One major thing I would do different is to have powdercoated the frame and a few other bits. I did Two coats of primer, 3 coats of paint and two or three coats of semi gloss clear coat. It looks very good. But there are sooo many angles to hit all the tubes and nooks/crannies, it takes a lot of product to be satisfied that you have covered it well.
I used rattlecan. It is NOT a very durable finish. So after all that work and effort, just fitting parts and testfitting stuff, it actually scratches way to easily. I plan on keeping this bike for quite a while. I hate to think that in a few years of seeing rust bubbles or rust where the frame has taken a few scratches.
On my next masterpeice, ie: bike I intend to do frame up that I intend to make REAAALLLY nice and own for a long time, I will definately powdercoat for long life and good looks.
We look forever to find a good bike for 5,6,700 bucks that we see has lots of potential and its hard to swallow the fact its gonna take a big chunk of cashola just to powder coat the bike and paint the body up real nice. haha Probably 2-400 bucks for all that. ha ha
Yep, we crazy.
Like I said, lots of paint and polish and you have most of what you need to have a great, completely fresh and clean bike.
STILL NEEDrings, flex hone, valve seals, engine gaskets, valve lapping tool/compound, other engine bits, engine paint, paint stripper, sanding supplies, abrasive tools, more tools, more gaskets, on and on. lol)
All those trips to the parts store for a little pack of spade connectors end up being 25 dollar trips. lol

[cowboyup3371]

Thanks Loud ET, not color schemes but of getting the work done and making it look nice, dreaming of painting it myself but then having the powdercoat look too. What parts and tools I should get to help out, etc.

Lookin good!
You are gonna kick a$$ on this rebuild. What you really have going for you is that the bike is not a rust bucket that has been sitting for 10 years. You will save a lot of time not having to remove gobs of rust and aluminum corrosion. Some paint removal and prep work and you will be painting and reassembling a rolling chassis before you know it.
As you said, you really like this bike and this will be the makeover you really wanted to do. Happy for ya
(are you laying in bed awake at night thinking of color schemes?)lol