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Poor Handling Bike. GS1100E

  • Thread starter Thread starter Anonymous
  • Start date Start date
I have a gs850 with exactly the same problems. It is unstable and can be frightening at low speed cornering.

I have tried everything that you have, new shocks, rebuilt forks, steering head bearings, wheel bearings with no effect whatsoever. The guys in the UK owners club keep saying 'tyres' to me and telling me to get onto some metzelers........

.......... however, the problem is that I have another gs850 of exactly the same year which handles loads better (they never handle that well anyway) and it's used the same tyre mix as the earlier one.

Not much help, was I ? I just wanted to let you know that I have the same problems and have been through the same list of things.
I am going to swap the wheels on the two bikes to see what happens and I'll post here with the results (it will have to wait until the weather gets a bit better first)

Madoc
 
This is a little late perhaps and I'm certainly not nearly as knowledgable as some of the others in this forum but for what its worth a piece of info I just got from a fellow enthusiast.

He was looking at my 84 1150EF and noted that the front forks had a brace built into the front fender connection to the forks. He mentioned that earlier models didn't have this and would produce some scary wobbles at higher speeds. (I don't think this was isolated to GS's alone).

It's hard to tell, but it appears there is no brace on the photos you posted.

It may be a clue.

By the way, nice job on the restore, it looks great.
 
I've been going through the same problems myself. The pogo stick effect was fixed by putting in 1.5" spacers in my 400s forks. If I could muscle in longer ones I would, but what I really need are new springs.

Now when I pass people at 120 km/h my bike doesn't wag its rump all over the place. The rear shocks are still causing some bad handling as they are spent too.

None of the dangerous handling turned up for me until I put on new tires. The rear tire on my bike was worn flat across so it kept me from leaning in turns.

Steve
 
Poor handling 1100

Poor handling 1100

Mike,

If your into spending some money, get street tracker aluminum bodied Works Performance shocks 1/2'' longer than stock. They're about $400 and well worth it. May as well get the dual rate forks springs from Works or the Progressives work well too. Lower the front end in the triples a few mm and make sure if you have a steel fender support or fork brace that they aren't misaligning the forks.

If you buy the springs don't run any air.

Toss the cheap shens, they're probably the main cause coupled with sacked out suspension. Also the chain alignment notches on the swing arm aren't always aligned from the factory.

I've ridden a stock RF 900 and I thought my 83 Kat handled better with the suspension mods. The RF front end was horribly soft and vague.
Good luck and don't sell it. Carter Turk
 
I?ve had the exact same problem on my 83-1100esd when I bought it. It had Metzeler Tires on which were almost new so I was lucky. But going past a car in the left lane at about 80mph and cutting in front of it always made the bike wobble. Searched everything you guys mention but couldn?t find anything wrong. After 1 season the front was replaced with a 16" wheel making the bike lower in the front. MAde the steering quicker and much mor funny at twisty roads but the wobble remained...
After a while the rear tyre was used up, so I purchased a AVON tire. When the old one was taken away I noticed that it had a inner tube -BAD. Also the rim had remains of rubber from previous tires on each side. I removed all remains and mounted the new tire without a inner tube, and VOILA! The wobble was gone. Very important to have clean stuff, and you can?t rely on the tire-man being always 100%. Nowadays I have a widened (4,5") rim with a 160-60/17 Michelin Pilot ROAD on. You dont have to ask what that does to an old bikes handling. If you consider it I think that Peter has the story on his site www.biker66.com. It requires a conversion from 630 drivechain to 530 and offsetting it for about 5mm. Thats it. And modify the rear brake tensionarm a little. Its worth every penny, I promise you.
 
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