$270 '78 GS1000EC Project (Frankenstien Re-build)

[Mr.Midas]

Shop atmosphere last night after re-working the chain buffer with the side-grinder and dremel tool. One less nasty step done!

It's actually kind of ironic how past projects match up to each other in an inverted sense.

When rebuilding my car, I was focused on the internals/drive-train and never changed the exterior's appearance... and I had a complete motorcycle to ride while the car was down.

 

[Guest]

that 1st pic above is like from the "Twilight Zone"...

 

[Mr.Midas]

Quick note on fitting shock mounts to the Bandit swingarm,
I think I finally have a handle on where and how the shock mounts go. Checking and rechecking positions/alignments... I really don't want to redo any welding on the swingarm.

I was mistaken about slanting the mounts inward. Basically, the mounts need to be centered on the weld-line joining the swingarm end to the box tube arm. The ~8deg angle is to match the taper of the cast ends. I've already had the mounts made(without the angle), but I'm sure we'll find a way to make them work without compromising strength. Should have them welded up this weekend at my brother's.

Small diversion:
I liked the Idea of fitting a tire hugger(in case I decide to remove the inner fenders), so, I found a Hugger/chain guard from a 09 Yamaha YZF-R1 @ $18 that looked like it would fit with not to much work... just needed to be narrowed up about an inch.


Cut, sand smooth/flat, rejoin, and burnished the sharp edges.

Looks almost factory made.
It won't mount perfectly centered on the wheel, but I figured if Suzuki engineers could make a swingarm with an offset, then why can't I setup a little fender the same way?

 

[Mr.Midas]

So the past weeks haven't really gone as planned. Work, family obligations, the holiday weekend(100 mile bicycle ride), more work, and our friend's welder was down for repairs(and now he's out of state for a week)...

Anyway, I did make some progress. Rebuilt the MC, spared a few minutes through the days to work on the seat... just put the finishing touches on the seat cover!

It's a basic semi-flat black marine vinyl remnant which cost about $5(the half-yard of headliner foam I picked up cost me more). I used a trusty old pfaff sewing machine(which belonged to my grandmother) to join the three panels and do a simple top-stitch seam.
I sized my patterns for the panels before adding the last layer of upholstery foam to insure a snug fit.

I think I like the look so far.

I really need to get cracking on this project!

 

[7981GS]

You do great work! If you weren't so far away, I would be sending a couple of seats your direction.

Daniel

 

[traviseckley]

Did you get that crack in the engine case fixed yet? I had the exact same crack on my case. I cleaned it up good and patched it with JB water weld, so far so good, it has held up great. I thought about getting mine welded also, but I heard it was 50/50 chance of it holding and the small, cramped area that it is located, I decided to try the water weld first.

 

[loud et]

awesome seat man. I am 6'2", so I wanna redo my seat to move the hump back a lil bit. also wanna lower the passengers hump some to streamline the look, so the rear of the seat lines up with the rear cowl instead of being about 2" higher (now). Hey, its ripped now anyways, thanks for the pics, nice job

 

[Mr.Midas]

Belated thanks for the compliments.

Without going into too much detail, my reasons for absence include the death of a loved one(grandfather), helping family with different things, and unplanned work obligations.

I have been able to get the shop pretty much cleaned and reorganized. The frame is just about ready to be stripped, blasted, and painted... still waiting to get the swingarm shock mount welding done.

I have finally started with the motor:

Finally fixed the crack with JB-weld reinforced with a piece of aluminum(from a beer can) sanded bare and perforated with a hole punch. I used a dremel tool to clean up the crack area and then used a torch to work the oil out of the crack.

I cleaned the oil that wicked out with brake cleaner and let the cleaner evaporate before heating it again and cleaning the area a couple more times.

Only time will tell how effective the repair has been.


Painted the Kawasaki front calipers. (gotta love rednecked shop ovens)

Oh, and I've popped the valve cover off(snapped a bolt in the process) to do valve clearance checks. The cam lobes look great, but several shims had less than 0.0015" of clearance. I think I can get three of them to work, and hopefully I can exchange the others in the GS shim club.

 

[Mr.Midas]

Okay, Making some decent headway now... If I push hard to make time, I could definitely see this thing rolling on it's own wheels within 2-3 weeks.

Most of the past week I was very sleep deprived... work as a self-employed contractor by day, and then bike mechanic after the sun sets.

Progress pics:

Rebuilt front calipers RTA

RM Stator installed(The starter gear and dowel shaft were pulled out and placed into the case before reassembly, and I used Hylomar on most gasket surfaces... in case anyone was wondering)

Hand-cut clutch cover and oil/transmission pan gaskets. I use variously-sized spent brass/steel bullet casings for hole punches(from .17 to .40 calibers so far... wish I could get my hands on some .45 & .50 cal brass to complete the collection... it's always way more fun when I'm the one "unloading" them too.:-\\\ray

Ray fixed me up with shims from the shim club, and I was able to get most valves to .063mm after the second attempt(#4 exhaust was so tight when I began, that I decided to give it extra clearance,.089mm, in case there is carbon build-up on the valve/seat that will reduce the clearance when it dissipates from the now fully closing valve... #1 intake was similar, but not quite as bad, so I gave it .076mm)

The clutch hub nut was loose, all the discs were glazed, and the damper springs were rattling... The driven discs actually had more of a rust patina than glazing; they cleaned up great with a rollock disc on my die-grinder. The plates were given a light wet oil sanding on a flat table top and still specked at 2.9mm afterwards.

The loose damper springs were fixed the flyingbanana way... no need for me to really beef-up the clutch just yet. Maybe next year, or when/if I get around to a top-end rebuild/rebore.

While I had the clutch out, I went ahead and pulled the oil pump; checked it, tightened the end float a smidgen, and ported/radiused the inlet/outlet transitions from the round holes to the final shape of the rotor-facing cavities.(the o-ring and inner flat surfaces remain the same)

To facilitate the 50lb torque-down of the hub nut, I welded a stopper bar(piece of scrap steel tube) to the old drive sprocket and put the motor in 5th gear. Hooray for custom made free tools!

Blah blah blah... all the usual seal replacements, tensioner rebuilding, head nuts re-torquing, mechanical advancer cleaning & Dyna S ignition, some shots of VHT header & engine paints, and SS fasteners.


Pretty much ready for reinstallation. Hard to get clear pictures late at night, or early morning. (The important stuff is what's inside anyway, right?):

Also finished putting the forks back together; I used a flat honing stone over the inner tubes to dress-down the pits and then rubbed wax into them... felt smooth enough for the seals when I was done. I cut 50mm off the springs and made new pvc spacers, giving the springs about 10mm more pre-loading as well. To protect the fork tubes from pitting again or rusting from the old pits, I coated the tubes with some silicone grease and fit them with gaiters. I also whipped up a couple tube-wraps to cover the tubes between the headlight mount rings.

And... The frame is now at the sand-blaster's, AND, the shock tabs are finally welded to the swingarm!

 

[7981GS]

She's going to be sweet!

Daniel

 

[Mr.Midas]

I hope so! If not, I guess I could try scrounging up different parts to adapt to it.



Got the frame back from the sand blaster...

Was able to wash and etch-prep it before having to seek shelter from the rain and lightning. This part of the South really needs the rain, but I wish I could have gotten some primer down... the phosphate etching and metal wash I used should keep it protected from flashing, but I don't want to find out how long that protection will last.


The swingarm cleaned up nicely.

VHT Cast Aluminum caliper paint looks pretty good! Had to temporarily expand the redneck shop oven's capacity to fully/properly bake it. I liked how the swingarm turned out so much that I used the same color on the handlebar as well.

I should have everything to do the carbs up right, when I can get started on them. Only major problems with them that I can tell are the few messed up pilot air screws(should be fun enough getting them out).

 

[Mr.Midas]

Update!


Shot the frame the evening before last after going over it with a red scotch-bright pad and medium/fine sand paper. (it was etch-primed a day before.)

Four very light coats down, 2-4 more to go this evening/tomorrow. I'm using Valspar Anti Rust Armor with an 8:1 Paint to hardener ratio, and then thinned 2:1 with naphtha. (I'll probably reduce the amount of thinner for the final coats).

I was thinking about using more rustoleum marine topcoat, but the valspar was $6 a quart @ the local Ace hardware going-out-of-business sale.

From what I've been able to gather the anti rust is basically the same paint as the valspar tractor and implement line of paints, which have been tested and proven by several budget painters. Check out the results this guy had with it!

Both the rustoluem and valspar have a super slow, minimum of 7 days, cure time. After using both brand/types of paint, I'd say they both level out very well, but with the Rustoleum topside paint thinned with xylol it seemed to level slightly better(the cooler weather then probably helped too), while the valspar seems to be kicking/curing off somewhat faster(probably the combination of warmer weather, hardener additive, and faster evaporating naphtha thinner)

I forgot to take some pictures of my spray rig: It consists of a Harbor Freight pressure tank spray gun powered by an old constant delivery HVLP air pump(the kind usually used with a texture-finish hopper gun) which pumps through a decommissioned 80ft^3 scuba cylinder converted into a giant oil/water separator before going through a final disposable moisture absorbing filter. Sprays pretty nice @ 20-25 PSI, and keeps up with demand the whole time.


Oh, and I must have spent six hours last night cleaning up corrosion, sharp tool marks, and chain wax while prepping the wheels for new bearings and paint. :-&

 

[Mr.Midas]

Still making good progress...

Cleaned/dipped, painted, and setup carbs with Dynojet stage 3 kit. I've never worked on a worse set of carbs... every tube/orifice was severely plugged and all the floats were frozen in the closed position(whoever worked on them before thought they could shake stuff loose with a hammer to the outside of each float bowl :hand:*IDIOT*)


Drum roll please... And now, what I have been patiently working towards for over a year...

Assembly has begun!:dancing:

I've got the swingarm and rear shocks back on the frame to stay. Couldn't get pics because my phone was dead, but I'll be back in the shop in a little bit...

But now I have some sad news to report... I've managed to loose the steering stem nut!*smacks forehead* Called around and no one has one in stock. The pn is 51631-28000 and it crosses over to a vast number of other newer bikes, but even a big cycle shop an hour away doesn't stock it...

So, while bike sits as I wait for a new stem nut to arrive(or the old one to turn up), I'll shift my focus to the wire harness... Fixing faulty wires/connections, Coil relay mod, headlight disable-when-cranking relay, horn relay, and an updated, blade-type fuse box.

I was planning to mount up the forks so I could get the wheels aligned and appropriate rear wheel spacers made, but I had to go and loose a necessary part this late in the game!

 

[Mr.Midas]

Found the stem nut... It had walked off in a pair of pants I hadn't checked well enough before tossing them in the clothes heap next to my dresser. Doh!

I would love to have this thing up and running in 4-5 days... we'll see how much time I can allot for it.

I seem to develop an excited/apprehensive/restless-ness toward the end of certain projects. It helps keep me focused when I'm turning the wrenches three O'clock in the morning. :-$Bike-building ninja-style... that is until I hit the starter button.(worst thing I've done is fire up a rotary engine for the first time after rebuilding, without the header or mufflers attached... *VrrrrrrAAAAAUUUUmmmm, POP POP POW, POW, POW!*

 

[Flaming Chainsaws]

Wow. Very nice.

 

[Mr.Midas]

Sorry I failed to keep the updates going.


I've been a very busy boy the past couple-few weeks! :dancing:

So busy, in fact, that I failed to even get pictures of certain progress or even decent shots of the finished product. Hopefully tomorrow the weather will be nice enough to take it out for a final few spins to double check the tuning, and some decent photo's for the big reveal.

I had issues with fouled plugs in the beginning with the Dynojet stage III kit, but now I'm just a little concerned that I might have gone too lean with the needles now set on the first groove with adjusting washers on top(using APE pods and Supertrapp 4-into-1... Still, once I fixed the fouled plugs, my expectations where literally blown away when I moderately cracked the throttle open for the first time - HOLY SMOKES! This thing can fly like a bat outta H-E-double hockey sticks! Power delivery is now smooth and only increases incrementally with throttle position, and braking is clean and crisp with the Kawasaki twinpots up front with DOT 5.

I'm even more surprised that my seat-handlebar-rearset arrangement is as comfortable and natural feeling for me as it is.

Even with the stock wheels I felt very well planted in the few little bends I took it through... the rear suspension could be on the stiff side. Time will tell if I'll need to look for softer springs for the ZRX 1100 rear shocks. I should note that I decided to go ahead and get a set of progressives for the front before even trying out the original cut & spaced front springs.

This is a heck of a lot more bike than the 90's model Yamaha seca XJ600s I owned previously... almost no comparison.:lol:


A few things that I did document:

From just after sorting most of the wiring/electrical work out. I picked the Xenon headlight(along with a compact Wolo air horn and some cheap mirrors) from JC Whitney.

After further consideration I've decided to also install a ballast resistor to insure a margin of safety for the 2.7 ohm VT750 coils hooked to the Dyna-S ignition which calls for no less than 3ohm coils. Right now I figure the system could pull ~10amps, but it hasn't blown the fuse or appear to overheat...Still, I don't need every available ounce of spark energy from the coils at the possible expense of sacrificing coil/ignition life.

And of course my TSCU was toast. I couldn't find a writeup or definitive info on this particular model/year TSCU system, but it was very easy to reverse engineer the with a DVM and wiring diagram.

To set up manual canceling signals I removed the centering spring in the control switch and replaced the unit with two electronic 3-wire flasher relays wired into the re-purposed TSCU harness. The old 2-pin flasher is removed/no longer in a functioning circuit.

After taping and sealing the new arrangement up, it fits perfectly where the original unit was before.(Wiring the flashers into the tscu harness was a piece of cake... the wire pairs from the 4-pin connector go to + and L terminals on the separate flashers(striped wires are hot, solids to Lamps) and the blk/wht ground wire from the six-wire connector feeds the - terminals of both flashers. The rest of the extra wires were shielded with shrink tube.

The front fender is one of only a few parts to receive a shiny, hand-polished paint job.

 

[Hoosier Daddy]

Congrats! I just got caught up...
How about standing back and get a pic of her so the rest of us can enjoy, Eh?

 

[Mr.Midas]

Had a little more time to test & tune today... actually still running on the rich side. I put in 20-25 miles out and about, cruising, accelerating, climbing hills, ect. Started out feeling really good, but slowly began to experience fouled plug symptoms again.

I barely made it to the local parts store where I bought and installed new plugs. Everything was great again on the 14-15 mile ride back, but the plugs were already sooty black when I checked them.

I guess I'll go back to the stock needles and see what happens before ordering some smaller jets... this is my first time rejecting carbs, so I'm still working the learning curve.

Apart from carb problems it looks like I managed to install an improperly geared speedo drive unit which is making the speedo read ~10 mph faster... there were two units in the box of parts, so I'll check to see if the second one has a higher ratio and swap it in if it is.


For some reason the auto-focus of my new Droid phone isn't working... glad I grabbed my trusty old 5.1mp Fujifilm camera!

 

[steve murdoch]

Lots of great looking bits on your bike, Mr. Midas.
Even the muffler brackets look trick.
What are the rearsets from?

 

[Mr.Midas]

Thank you.

Rearsets are from 03-04 GSXR1000's. Passenger peg brackets came from an 08 ZX10 Ninja.

I've been meaning to compile/organize the final list of bits a pieces that went into this thing(for example, the rear SS brake line came from an 08 Aprilia Tuono for $8.95 + shipping)