For the first time in nearly twenty years, my 1982 champagne GS1100E was on the road again last week. After a pretty substantial teardown and rebuild (at one point pretty much the only thing left on the frame was the engine and gauges) and much cleaning, I took her on a shakedown run of about 100 miles on Sunday the 15th. Everything checked out so I declared her ready to be introduced to the world at the Dave Davis Memorial rally centered in Farmington, MO.
Pics and a report on how she did to follow, but first, the backstory.
My brother is the original owner. He bought the bike brand new in the fall of 1986. Yes, that bike sat on a showroom floor for almost five years, gathering dust. It was at a small town Suzuki/Kawasaki dealership, and most of the sales at that place were four wheelers, dirt bikes, and L/LTD street bikes.
He bought it primarily because I had recently purchased my GS700ES, my best friend Mike had a 1982 KZ1000J he bought from the same dealership in 1986 (same story on holdover models), and my brother was riding a Honda GL650 Silverwing. It wasn't a bad bike, but as for trying to keep up with Mike and me on backroads, fuggedaboudit. We gave him a lot of crap about riding his "Pokey Cruiserette". Eventually he'd had enough of it, and one day came home on the GS1100E. We couldn't run and hide from him anymore, so that pretty much put an end to the Pokey Cruserette jokes. He wasn't a real agressive rider by nature, but every once in a while he'd whack open the throttle and go ripping by us at 130 mph.
He rode it off an on for the next ten-twelve years or so, putting 14,000 miles on it. He preferred his Honda for commuting, due to the fairing and seating position, so he rode the big GS on weekends. It remained bone stock except for a set of M/C Enterprises case guards and a Lockhart oil cooler. In 1999, the bike stopped charging, the local dealer wouldn't work on it due to its age, so it got parked in my mom's garage with 14,060 miles on the clock. There it sat until 2015.
That year, I finally convinced him to let me take it home with me while I was visiting our mom during Thanksgiving. We rolled it out of her garage, dusted it off, and loaded it up in my truck. Here it is fresh out of Mom's garage (notice below it the remnants of the mouse's nest I dug out of the airbox):
The agreement was I would give him an estimate of what it would take to make it roadworthy again (plus a little something extra to me for the effort) and he'd decide if he wanted to invest in it to get it on the road, sell it to me for an as yet undetermined price, or let it sit and rot in my garage for perpetuity.
It sat in my garage for nearly four years, until this past August he finally decided that he'd send me the title. He didn't want to spend the money to fix it up. It would be mine, my price was the $1300ish and labor to make it roadworthy. But he would have first right of refusal if I ever wanted to sell it. Fair enough.
I worked furiously on this bike for two weeks. He had never washed it, not even once. The tach cable seal had started leaking at some time or other, covering the front of the bike in an oily dust. It was filthy. This pic was taken August 30th:
I'm going to do some more work on cosmetics (there are a few small details that need to be addressed here and there) then probably submit for B.O.M sometime soon.Pics and a report on how she did to follow, but first, the backstory.
My brother is the original owner. He bought the bike brand new in the fall of 1986. Yes, that bike sat on a showroom floor for almost five years, gathering dust. It was at a small town Suzuki/Kawasaki dealership, and most of the sales at that place were four wheelers, dirt bikes, and L/LTD street bikes.
He bought it primarily because I had recently purchased my GS700ES, my best friend Mike had a 1982 KZ1000J he bought from the same dealership in 1986 (same story on holdover models), and my brother was riding a Honda GL650 Silverwing. It wasn't a bad bike, but as for trying to keep up with Mike and me on backroads, fuggedaboudit. We gave him a lot of crap about riding his "Pokey Cruiserette". Eventually he'd had enough of it, and one day came home on the GS1100E. We couldn't run and hide from him anymore, so that pretty much put an end to the Pokey Cruserette jokes. He wasn't a real agressive rider by nature, but every once in a while he'd whack open the throttle and go ripping by us at 130 mph.
He rode it off an on for the next ten-twelve years or so, putting 14,000 miles on it. He preferred his Honda for commuting, due to the fairing and seating position, so he rode the big GS on weekends. It remained bone stock except for a set of M/C Enterprises case guards and a Lockhart oil cooler. In 1999, the bike stopped charging, the local dealer wouldn't work on it due to its age, so it got parked in my mom's garage with 14,060 miles on the clock. There it sat until 2015.
That year, I finally convinced him to let me take it home with me while I was visiting our mom during Thanksgiving. We rolled it out of her garage, dusted it off, and loaded it up in my truck. Here it is fresh out of Mom's garage (notice below it the remnants of the mouse's nest I dug out of the airbox):
The agreement was I would give him an estimate of what it would take to make it roadworthy again (plus a little something extra to me for the effort) and he'd decide if he wanted to invest in it to get it on the road, sell it to me for an as yet undetermined price, or let it sit and rot in my garage for perpetuity.
It sat in my garage for nearly four years, until this past August he finally decided that he'd send me the title. He didn't want to spend the money to fix it up. It would be mine, my price was the $1300ish and labor to make it roadworthy. But he would have first right of refusal if I ever wanted to sell it. Fair enough.
I worked furiously on this bike for two weeks. He had never washed it, not even once. The tach cable seal had started leaking at some time or other, covering the front of the bike in an oily dust. It was filthy. This pic was taken August 30th:
And this was taken September 2nd:
All she needed now were the brake lines I had ordered from a local shop, and a carb synchronization (I hoped). What looks like a tear in the "Suzuki" decal is simply a reflection of light from the shop light overhead. She shined up real nice.
Final completion was a week or so later. Everything checked out fine.
She performed admirably over this past weekend, amassing 742 miles in 2 1/2 days of spirited riding, with no mechanical or electrical issues. There was one thing that had to be addressed - a handlebar vibration that started at 5,000 rpm, and by 5,500 rpm was unbearable for any length of time for my left hand. By 7,000 rpm the buzz was bearable again, and completely gone at 7,500 rpm. Unfortunately, that buzz zone is right where all the fun is to be had on back roads in 3rd and 4th gear. I suffered through it the first day, but twenty minutes into the ride the second day, had to beg off and return to the motel to figure out what to do. Bummer, the day was partly cloudy and going to hit a high of about 80 F, perfect riding weather.
Once back at the hotel, I iced down my left hand (it was completely numb and my arm felt dead from the elbow down) and contemplated my options. The local powersports dealer didn't have any grips I could try (still was using the hard, ribbed OEM grips), so I decided there wasn't really much I could do to eliminate the buzz.
I went out by myself on what became the world's heaviest GS550E. I limited rpm to under 5,200, and it became a game for me to run curvy roads between 4,000 - 5,200 rpm, trying to maximize my speed. I ended up having a pretty good day, using roads with lots of 60 - 75 mph sweepers. I put in 185 miles that way, and didn't suffer any tingling or numbness at the end of the ride.
Here she is that day at the Pilot Knob Battle Memorial:
All she needed now were the brake lines I had ordered from a local shop, and a carb synchronization (I hoped). What looks like a tear in the "Suzuki" decal is simply a reflection of light from the shop light overhead. She shined up real nice.
Final completion was a week or so later. Everything checked out fine.
She performed admirably over this past weekend, amassing 742 miles in 2 1/2 days of spirited riding, with no mechanical or electrical issues. There was one thing that had to be addressed - a handlebar vibration that started at 5,000 rpm, and by 5,500 rpm was unbearable for any length of time for my left hand. By 7,000 rpm the buzz was bearable again, and completely gone at 7,500 rpm. Unfortunately, that buzz zone is right where all the fun is to be had on back roads in 3rd and 4th gear. I suffered through it the first day, but twenty minutes into the ride the second day, had to beg off and return to the motel to figure out what to do. Bummer, the day was partly cloudy and going to hit a high of about 80 F, perfect riding weather.
Once back at the hotel, I iced down my left hand (it was completely numb and my arm felt dead from the elbow down) and contemplated my options. The local powersports dealer didn't have any grips I could try (still was using the hard, ribbed OEM grips), so I decided there wasn't really much I could do to eliminate the buzz.
I went out by myself on what became the world's heaviest GS550E. I limited rpm to under 5,200, and it became a game for me to run curvy roads between 4,000 - 5,200 rpm, trying to maximize my speed. I ended up having a pretty good day, using roads with lots of 60 - 75 mph sweepers. I put in 185 miles that way, and didn't suffer any tingling or numbness at the end of the ride.
Here she is that day at the Pilot Knob Battle Memorial:
As for the buzz, when I asked my brother about it, he said, "Now that you mention it, I do remember a vibration that came and went during high speed runs. I hardly ever rode it that fast for a sustained period of time, so it wasn't much of a deal."
This bike probably spent more time over 5,000 rpm the last 840 miles than it did during its first 14,000 miles.
So I ordered the softer, lower ribbed 1983-1986 style Suzuki grips, and fished out some GS1150E handlebar weights I had in a parts bin. Each one of these weights weighs 15.5 ozs, so I figured slinging a pound of lead on each bar end couldn't hurt. I powdercoated them last night, and installed them tonight. Turned into a bit more of a production than I had anticipated. When I removed the grips, I discovered that the ends of the bars had been filled at the factory with mild steel plugs, probably for (ineffective) vibration damping. I had to drill them out with a 3/4" drill bit to get the bar end inserts into the handlebars. Here are the before and after pics:
Before:
After:
We'll see how it goes tomorrow. If there's still some overly-annoying buzzing, I may try sync'ing the carbs again, but at 6,000 rpm instead of 4,000 rpm to see if that helps.
In any event, I'm glad she's (mostly) done, and now I can turn my attention to building my hybrid '82/'83 1100E parts-bin special into a fire-breathing street monster.
Thank you for your indulgence.
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