Are GS1100E bikes more common than GS1100G bikes?

[Guest]

Maybe its my imagination, but the E seems way more common. The E is 16V, yes?

I would think the 8V would have been more common, but every time I go to look for any parts for my 1100GL, I have to sift through page after page of E parts to find that the G parts don't exist at all.

 

[rphillips]

Yep, the shaft dr. wasn't very popular in those days.

 

[Guest]

Yep, the shaft dr. wasn't very popular in those days.

But wasn't that the only way the 8V was available, at least at the time of the 1100?

 

[Rob S.]

But wasn't that the only way the 8V was available, at least at the time of the 1100?

You are correct, sir. 16 valve means chain, twin swirl combustion chambers, all the newest performance goodies.

The 11G was just an enlarged 1000 motor.

 

[Guest]

You are correct, sir. 16 valve means chain, twin swirl combustion chambers, all the newest performance goodies.

The 11G was just an enlarged 1000 motor.

What I have read is that the 1100 is incompatible in almost everything with the 1000 and that the only bike it shares any powertrain parts with is the 750.

But my point is that the 1100G is the "base" model, whereas the E was the fancy expensive sport model. In general, the fancy expensive sport model sells fewer units than the base--but that does not seem to have happened here.

 

[RichDesmond]

That's not how it was back then.

 

[Rob S.]

But my point is that the 1100G is the "base" model, whereas the E was the fancy expensive sport model. In general, the fancy expensive sport model sells fewer units than the base--but that does not seem to have happened here.

The E was the flagship, but it was also the base model in that it was the newest, most recently designed engine. Cycle World, in their review of the 1982 11E, said that the '80 and '81 11Es (16 valve) were Jack of all trades: king of the dragstrip, yes, but also a favorite of tourers due to it's size and low end grunt, and great commuters due to it's amiable slow speed characteristics.

The problem? It just didn't look like the world's fastest motorcycle. It didn't cause the same visual excitement as Kawasaki's GPz 1100 or Honda's CBX.

So they redesigned it for '82, with some cues from the Katana school, which back then was rather radical, with no middle ground: people either loved it or hated it.

So the 11E was "freed" (rear sets, lower seat, etc.) to be a world-class Superbike, and an old 8 valve motor was enlarged and mated with a shaft drive to appease the 'reasonable' riders.

I'm just not sure of your original premise, that the E is more numerable than the G. It seems to me, on this site, at least, that shafts are everywhere and Es are the rare birds.

 

[earlfor]

I've probably seen 15-20 1100E's on the road for every 1100G. Just my observation though.

 

[Nessism]

The E was a cutting edge performance bike. Very popular. The G was shaft drive and more sedate; touring oriented or for less frenzy paced riding. Not the same market. This is not to say the E was a better bike because that's not necessarily the truth. Different strokes.

 

[Steve]

Which one is "better"? :-k

That depends on how you plan on using it.

The E made more power. Because it had a chain for final drive, the gearing was easily changed. Because it was a Suzuki, it worked very well.

The G model was just a bit larger than the 1000G it replaced. Slightly different styling, as well, but nothing earth-shattering. Dead-reliable, and had a shaft drive to reduce overal maintenance. Because it was a bit more sedate, it was more popular with the touring crowd, but was hardly a competitor to Honda's Goldwing.

I don't have a clue about sales numbers, but I'll bet it was at least 6 or 7 Es sold for every G.

What specific parts are you looking for? We might be able to help you locate them.
You have my number, give me a call. :encouragement:

.

 

[Rob S.]

The one thing I did switch as part of the deal was the 160 mph speedometer.

Don't you mean 140?

 

[Grimly]

Don't you mean 140?

Depends if it came off a red bike. Red ones are faster, as you know.

 

[bwringer]

Regardless of production numbers, the 1100E was and remained popular with drag racers to this day. So 1100E parts have always had a lot more value. There's always been a ready market even for non-running or crashed parts bikes, and there are tons more aftermarket goodies available. More 1100Es got crashed, of course, but I suspect a far smaller portion than the Gs got pushed behind barns to simply rot.


There was also a widespread and mistaken notion that the shim valves in the 8V engines required expensive, mysterious, deep magick wizardry to adjust, so lots and lots of them were simply ignored as they slowly got harder and harder to start. One day, with anywhere from 12,000 - 24,000 miles on the clock, the clearances had narrowed to the point the engine wouldn't start before the battery died, and the bike was pushed into the barn (if it was lucky) or worse, behind the barn.

Decades later... "ran when parked" was the story, and/or "no time to ride". "Easy fix", "just needs carbs cleaned", "no title", etc.

Even in the early years of this very forum, too many were utterly terrified of opening the valve cover and mucking with shims. It used to be common at GS rallies for several riders to head out to the parking lot about 15 minutes early, spend five minutes wearing out the starter and then ten minutes warming up and filling the air with smog just to get their bikes to run that morning.

Lots of people just figured "old bikes" were expected to be hard to start and supposed to be unreliable.

It took a while to get the word out that a GS, any GS, should start with a quick stern glance at the starter button, and that shim valve adjustments can be accomplished by mortals. And are mandatory...

 

[earlfor]

Which one is "better"? :-k

That depends on how you plan on using it.

The E made more power. Because it had a chain for final drive, the gearing was easily changed. Because it was a Suzuki, it worked very well.

The G model was just a bit larger than the 1000G it replaced. Slightly different styling, as well, but nothing earth-shattering. Dead-reliable, and had a shaft drive to reduce overal maintenance. Because it was a bit more sedate, it was more popular with the touring crowd, but was hardly a competitor to Honda's Goldwing.

I don't have a clue about sales numbers, but I'll bet it was at least 6 or 7 Es sold for every G.

What specific parts are you looking for? We might be able to help you locate them.
You have my number, give me a call. :encouragement:

.

Better is subjective to application. lol A hammer is great for driving nails, but less than wonderful for trimming a hedge. eh

 

[Rob S.]

A hammer is...less than wonderful for trimming a hedge. eh

Wrong! Incorrect! Inadmissible!

If you can't fix it with a hammer, you're not using a big enough hammer. If that's good enough for my surgeons, it's good enough for all of us.

 

[wymple]

I don't know about everywhere, but I ride my 850 shafty a lot, and I see just as many or more shafties than chain drives. But I generally stay within 400 miles of home in SE Iowa. Maybe riding styles leave the shafties with more survivors?

 

[bobgroger]

Regardless of production numbers, the 1100E was and remained popular with drag racers to this day. So 1100E parts have always had a lot more value. There's always been a ready market even for non-running or crashed parts bikes, and there are tons more aftermarket goodies available. More 1100Es got crashed, of course, but I suspect a far smaller portion than the Gs got pushed behind barns to simply rot.


There was also a widespread and mistaken notion that the shim valves in the 8V engines required expensive, mysterious, deep magick wizardry to adjust, so lots and lots of them were simply ignored as they slowly got harder and harder to start. One day, with anywhere from 12,000 - 24,000 miles on the clock, the clearances had narrowed to the point the engine wouldn't start before the battery died, and the bike was pushed into the barn (if it was lucky) or worse, behind the barn.

Decades later... "ran when parked" was the story, and/or "no time to ride". "Easy fix", "just needs carbs cleaned", "no title", etc.

Even in the early years of this very forum, too many were utterly terrified of opening the valve cover and mucking with shims. It used to be common at GS rallies for several riders to head out to the parking lot about 15 minutes early, spend five minutes wearing out the starter and then ten minutes warming up and filling the air with smog just to get their bikes to run that morning.

Lots of people just figured "old bikes" were expected to be hard to start and supposed to be unreliable.

It took a while to get the word out that a GS, any GS, should start with a quick stern glance at the starter button, and that shim valve adjustments can be accomplished by mortals. And are mandatory...

I am contemplating doing a valve adjustment on my C14. It makes the 8V GS look trivial. After you take off all the fairings, you remove the valve cover and check clearances. Then you remove both cams and the lifter buckets to get to the shims. Replace shims as needed and reassemble. Book time is 8 hours but it takes most people an entire weekend.

 

[gs11ezrydr]

Back through 1980-1983 at the dealership in Chicago. I would un-crate and assemble and service as many as 6 a day of the GS1100E and some ES models and we could not keep them in stock.Maybe just a fad in that area?? Where in our area in Chicago the G models collected dust unless someone was looking for a reliable touring bike.To this day I think the 850 G models were the work horses of there time..