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GS1100 engine JUST NOW locked up

  • Thread starter Thread starter Chopperjake
  • Start date Start date
C

Chopperjake

Guest
Hello GS gurus,

I have been restoring/rebuilding a 1982 GS1100gk that I bought in january 2014. The previous owner told me that it ran, but he couldn't get it started the day I bought it. (probably should've been a red flag, but it was like minus 5 degrees that day and I fell in love with the bike at first site). The next warm day I did turn it over with a car battery, but never did get it to start.

So I put it down into the lower garage and it sat for a while, but this spring I got a hair up my @$$ and got to wrenching on it. Compression test was good, checked and changed out all the shims on the valves, totally disassembled and cleaned the carbs (they weren't very bad), sealed the airbox (PO was running pods), installed the relay mod for ignition coils, replaced the rectifier with Honda one (thanks duaneage), new O-rings and hardware for the carbs boots (removed all the gasket goo the last genius had in there) and probably some other stuff that I can't remember right now.

Well, sure enough I get it re-assembled (except the tank was off and I was using accessory gas tank) and after only a few seconds of the engine turning over, it FIRED RIGHT UP! I thought I was good to go. It ran for probably 3 minutes and then my tank was out of gas. Over the next few days, I started it a couple of times, adjusted the idle to around 1050, tightened up a couple things here and there and thought it was getting ready for a test drive.

So finally I put the tank on, hit the starter and "KA-THUNK". I thought that sounded weird but didn't know what to make of it. Tried starting again and it hear the starter (not just the solenoid) start to grind for less than a second and then nothing. I (mistakenly) thought maybe I'd run the battery down, so charged it up, but same thing. (Somewhere in there I also mistakenly thought it was the starter motor or starter clutch, so I pulled those covers off too in my rage and frustration, but don't think it's those). If I remove the idle gear the starter spins like a champ with a little voltage and the starter sprocket thingy will spin one way easily (clockwise?) but locks up going the other way, so I think they're good).

Finally I pulled off the right-side timing cover and then I knew I had a real problem. I could turn the engine over a wrench on the timing bolt, but only about 90 degress or less, back and forth (I know someone will chime in and say not to turn it counter-clockwise with the bolt).

I pulled out the plugs and I can see all 4 cylinders moving, but only about the distance of one stroke - which is to say I can see it move UP and then I turn the engine the other way and see it go DOWN.

So what I'm asking is "does anybody have an idea what I'm up against?"

I was thinking maybe a valve was hanging, but unless it was on two different cylinders I would think I could rotate 180 degrees one way or the other.

With the valve cover off, the cam chain looks to be fine (it moves the short distance with the cylinders like it should).

Any ideas?

thanks for your time.
 
Any chance something fell in the cylinder thru the spark plug hole? I did that once. It was just a small nut for an aftermarket coil connector, but thats all it took.
 
"With the valve cover off, the cam chain looks to be fine"

ok, but has it skipped on the camshaft sprockets? Best to check camshaft to crankshaft timing- a few teeth off and a piston might be getting intimate with a valve.
 
thanks for the help.

I guess i can't be 100% sure something didn't fall through the spark plug hole, but I don't THINK it did....

Tom203, I think you might be right. I did take off the valve cover and the cam journals? (things that hold the cam shaft down) as well as the cam tensioner and now I can crank it over with a wrench on the timing bolt. Not sure if that means that the tensioner was binding something up but I think with the journals off the cam shaft it gives it enough wiggle to turn over and I can feel the buckets pushing up on the cam shaft when I turn it over.

So once I figure out how to set the cam timing, I'll see if it will turn over with the journals locked back down.

thanks for the ideas guys.
 
definitely seems to be the cam chain. seems like it is too loose and binding up. i'm going to start a new threat about cam chain slack and manual vs automatic chain tensioners.

thanks everybody for the help.
 
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