• Required reading for all forum users!!!

    Welcome!
    Register to access the full functionality of the GSResources forum. Until you register and activate your account you will not have full forum access, nor will you be able to post or reply to messages.

    A note to new registrants...
    All new forum registrations must be activated via email before you have full access to the forum.

    A Special Note about Email accounts!
    DO NOT SIGN UP USING hotmail, outlook, gmx, sbcglobal, att, bellsouth or email.com. They delete our forum signup emails.

    A note to old forum members...
    I receive numerous requests from people who can no longer log in because their accounts were deleted. As mentioned in the forum FAQ, user accounts are deleted if you haven't logged in for the past 6 months. If you can't log in, then create a new forum account. If you don't get an error message, then check your email account for an activation message. If you get a message stating that the email address is already in use, then your account still exists so follow the instructions in the forum FAQ for resetting your password.

    Have you forgotten your password or have a new email address? Then read the forum FAQ for details on how to reset it.

    Any email requests for "can't log in anymore" problems or "lost my password" problems will be deleted. Read the forum FAQ and follow the instructions there - that's what we have one for...

  • Returning Visitors

    If you are a returning visitor who never received your confirmation email, then odds are your email provider is blockinig emails from our server. The only thing that can be done to get around this is you will have to try creating another forum account using an email address from another domain.

    If you are a returning visitor to the forum and can't log in using your old forum name and password but used to be able to then chances are your account is deleted. Purges of the databases are done regularly. You will have to create a new forum account and you should be all set.

1981 GS450E Rebuild

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
  • Start date Start date
So this was waiting for me when I got home today :D



Tonight I finished the electrics tray off and I used an oversized drill bit to smooth down the edges of the holes:



Mounted:



Forgot I had an un-insulated 12v bullet connector that needs replacing with an insulated one:



Fixed, and yes, stripped, tinned, crimped, soldered:



Not tightened down or anything yet and I need to get shorter mounting bolts for the components as they're way too long at present.



And from underneath:

 
Then I pulled the bits down I painted with the Blackcote as they should be cured considering it's been three days since I did the second coat.

Exhaust bracket mounted:



I'll be able to bolt it up securely once I tighten down the header bolts and compress the exhaust gaskets a bit.

Centre stand bracket assembled again and back on the bike:



And where it belongs:



And the taillight bracket taken down as well along with the front brake line bracket:

 
I test fitted the seat tonight... d'oh! The new tray is mounted higher than the old one, so the harness needs to come in from the side and I need to shuffle the indicator relay and consequently I need to move the main fuse holder.

So I shuffled things around and it looks nice and neat on top:



Underneath is still pretty good too:



But here in lies my frustration:



I really need to do something with that mess, but it's a little difficult without the battery there so I know what length positive and negative cables I will need to make up and how I can route them etc.

Once I sort that, this will be the next big pain:



That's what causes grief with the Dynatek coils and getting the valve cover off at the moment. Really need to sort something properly for them.

And, finally, every ground terminates together on one side of the starter relay mounting bolt which should be good for a reliable ground:



Really hoping the battery gets here soon so I can get that side of things taken care of and finish the electrics up...
 
Got my battery and charger today and, well... I'm positive the auction said maintenance free...



Not that I'm particularly fussed, but it would be nice if the info on the auction was accurate...

So yeah, lost a bit of time tonight filling the damn thing with acid. At least I've got it on charge and I'll leave it overnight.



I also picked up a fresh roll of insulation tape today. The initial plan with the Dynatek was to use a strip of exhaust wrap I got as a sheath to protect the extra oil pressure switch wire. However the exhaust wrap is white, and it was gonna be a PITA to wrap it neatly. I figured this morning I'd be best just wrapping it with insulation tape, so that's what I did:



All to protect this guy:



And then I got the Dynatek back in and partly routed the wiring:



And, finally, I got the exhaust bolts tightened down so I could mount it with the freshly painted bracket.



Crossing my fingers I'll get a good amount of time on Saturday to get into the sanding and polishing....
 
Hey Pete, I was in Jaycar today and noticed they have a heap of options for cable wrap.
Might be worth a look for you.
 
Leigh said:
Hey Pete, I was in Jaycar today and noticed they have a heap of options for cable wrap.
Might be worth a look for you.
Click to expand...

Thanks mate, yeah they do... already wrapped the Dyna in insulation tape though :rolleyes:

Definitely keep that in mind if I ever get up that way though, it's a little way out of my usual travels.
 
Agemax said:
you must be able to buy it locally, its cheap as chips too:)
Click to expand...

Yep sure can and I know where, but I have to make a special trip. Would rather use that time to get my paint sanded/polished and start on things like wheel bearings and so forth that I have sitting here waiting to be installed :)
 
Had one of those days today... lost a couple of hours doing taxi duty for my wife, didn't get the polishing finished because I wasted too much time trying to polish by hand, couldn't get vacuum or breather hose, and the headlight doesn't fit with the standard headlight ears...

Firstly, I did get a little bit done last night. Sat the seat pan on with the foam and adjusted the levers to the right height, mounted the front indicators, and put the mirrors on:



Got my headlight this morning along with some hand grips:



The problem with the headlight is simply that the bucket is a bit deeper than the stock bucket, so it actually butts up against the bottom of the ignition switch.

I should just be able to get a pair of those universal after-market ones to drop it maybe half an inch or something to fix that. The only downside of course is that I need to remove the 'bars and top triple clamp to get the stock ears off...

I then managed to get some 8mm ID fuel hose although contrary to what the place's web site says, they didn't have 6mm for the vacuum line or 12mm for the breather hose...



And then while getting the polish I picked up a 60/55W H4 bulb as the headlight isn't supplied with one, although it does have a parker bulb in there and the plug as well:



The rest of the day was the aforementioned polishing time... well attempted polishing time anyway...

And tonight I made the discovery that the headlight wouldn't fit so I made up a new positive battery lead and the associated lead that runs from the starter solenoid to main fuse:



I think I figured the routing out for the harness for the trickle charger too so I should be able to get the battery and everything hooked up next time I get some time in there.
 
pete said:
and the headlight doesn't fit with the standard headlight ears...

Got my headlight this morning along with some hand grips:


The problem with the headlight is simply that the bucket is a bit deeper than the stock bucket, so it actually butts up against the bottom of the ignition switch.

I should just be able to get a pair of those universal after-market ones to drop it maybe half an inch or something to fix that.
Click to expand...

Is there some way that you could put the factory-type dent in the bucket so that it fits?

Daniel
 
7981GS said:
Is there some way that you could put the factory-type dent in the bucket so that it fits?

Daniel
Click to expand...

Good idea Daniel, and I did think about that but didn't want to void the warranty.

Having said that, looking back at those brackets on eBay it looks like I could have some issues mounting the indicators to those brackets.

It would only need to be a relatively small dent to get enough clearance... but I don't want to distort the whole headlight shell as such.

I'll have to look again and give it some more thought...
 
Ok, far more successful night tonight... well mainly anyway.

First off, I decided I'd go the denting the headlight shell path rather than finding headlight brackets, waiting for them to ship, then figuring out how to mount the indicators... blah blah blah...

Looking like it'll be a relatively easy job although it's not exactly pretty given I'm just using a ball ended hammer and I'm not panel beater. Also, the chrome on this thing is incredibly thin so it's splitting and peeling off... at least that part won't be seen!



That's the start of it, but it's a little noisy and awkward at night so I'll have to finish it another time, might even get a few spare minutes on Tuesday as we have the day off for the Melbourne Cup. It just needs to go a little larger in diameter and about another quarter of an inch deep and it will clear the ignition switch easily.

Anyway, then I got on with getting the battery connections sorted and routing the wiring around that area properly.

I decided to do the ground properly and instead of tying from my frame ground to battery negative and relying on that to ground the electrics tray, I went straight from the tray to battery negative, so one new ground cable made up:



Battery connected:



I moved the screws to the front of the terminal blocks for a specific reason which I'm not revealing yet... gotta keep some mystery about things! Ha...

Electrics tray is sorted with the new ground lead straight back to battery negative:



The loose plug there is for the harness for the battery charger which is tied in with the rest of the wiring and connected to the battery, just haven't decided what to do with the plug yet.

And some of the wiring, reasonably neat now:



Then the moment of truth. Turn the key on and see what happens...

Result is that it all works nicely :D

I hooked up all the indicators and the tail light and all works exactly as it should which is excellent.

I also figured out the pinouts for the H4 bulb for the headlight, but I think I should look at running a relay for that as high beam is nearly twice wattage of the stock bulb (60W vs. 35W) so I'm not sure I should be putting 5 amps through the stock headlight switch :eek:

I also have to replace the bullet connectors for the parking bulb as they're really tiny bullet connectors that don't sit in the stock ones properly.

And I finished up the night with some voltage checks...

Ignition key off and across the battery terminals reads 12.56v.

Ignition key on and reading is the same.

Kill switch on and reading at the coil plugs is 12.55v... awesome! :D

It'll be interesting to see if that changes once I have the Dyna and coils plugged in, but so far it's looking real good.

Oh, that 12.55v is also the same on the sense wire at the R/R.

I will have to go and revisit those voltages though as I just realised they were all measured with the negative probe on the negative battery terminal. I should have measured using the grounding point at the same point in the harness I was measuring the voltage...
 
So reading around the shop here and other places such as Andre's (Matchless) guides, seems I don't necessarily need a relay mod for the headlight if I'm sticking with a 55/60W bulb which makes things even easier.

I'll double check the voltages at the headlight connections but it sounds like I should be good to go if there's good voltage there.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top