Let's Talk About "X" - Baby!

[Guest]

New Sunday go to meeting clothes.

That tail is screaming for a little red. I've seen some ES body work where the tail has a small patch of color on the side. I've seen a lot of other blue/white ES/ESD body work with just a white tail. No matter what's suppose to be there i'm trying to fiqure out how to get some red accent on the tail.

Working man clothes for the rest of the week. Just no "X".

 

[catfishk]

that is a very nice looking bike. love that red

how is that headlight mounted on there; what/where are those fork brackets from?

 

[Guest]

that is a very nice looking bike. love that red

how is that headlight mounted on there; what/where are those fork brackets from?

http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=111868

Catfish, Thanks for the positive comment. See last page of listed thread.

 

[80GS750]

that is an awesome looking bike man.... baby that thing

 

[Druro]

That is NICE!!!

Man, i hope my turns out as nice... basically doing the samething but all black and a flat bar.

Do you have any pics of how you attached the rear sets?

How comfortable is the bike with the different seating position?

Cheers man.

PS, NICE!!!!!!

 

[Sunburn]

That's hot, Very nice. I have the same pipe. Just love it.



I'm installing an oil cooler much like yours, am trying to figure out to install it the way you did, or the other way around with the inlets pointed down. If you had to do it again, whould you change anything?

 

[Planecrazy]

Niiiiiice bike!!! Make sure you submit it for "Bike of the month" if you haven't already!

Regards,

 

[chiphead]

Simply exceptional. Nicely done!

 

[Guest]

That is NICE!!!

Man, i hope my turns out as nice... basically doing the samething but all black and a flat bar.

Do you have any pics of how you attached the rear sets?

How comfortable is the bike with the different seating position?

Cheers man.

PS, NICE!!!!!!

Druro,

Thanks for the compliment. I'm sure yours will come out nicer than my humble make over. Keep in mine I've owned this bike for 25 years and have over 101K miles on it. Started the serious make over of the suspension and body work more than 2.5 years ago so I've taken my time and tried to get something I'd be happy with. Have to give Katman's build of his Katana on this site as the motivation that got me off my fat ass. The other thing that made things a lot easier for me was buying another primary bike (FZ1) in 2001. This freed me up to take my time on this make over.

I've had that Corbin seat since just about new. It changes the seat position so its a little lower and further back. The ZX12R rear sets and my attachment plates put the pegs about 1" higher and about 3/4" further back. I really don't feel any difference in terms of my legs getting cramped.

http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=111918 I posted some better photos in this thread on the ZX12 mounting plates. The shifter side is more complicated than the brake side. I liked the look of the ZX12 sets but if you check out Johnnay's thread it looks like GSXR rear sets are much easier to mount. http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=112979

If you are really serious about using ZX12R rear sets its going to get expensive to have plates like mine made unless you have your own machine shop or a machinist friend . The GSXR and Kaw rear sets themselves are surprisingly cheap and plentiful on Ebay. Let me know if you need more info.

My original plan was to just put 83 GS1100E pieces on my 82 but unfortunately the mounting holes are off by enough to be an issue.

 

[Guest]

That's hot, Very nice. I have the same pipe. Just love it.



I'm installing an oil cooler much like yours, am trying to figure out to install it the way you did, or the other way around with the inlets pointed down. If you had to do it again, whould you change anything?

Sunburn,

I've had that pipe for 25 years and have probably painted the header six times over the years. The oil cooler is an Earl's. It's probably over sized for the applications but as you know they (GS) run hot when stock. I set mine up to fill from the top so I would have some additional oil capacity. I think this set up gets oil flowing quicker since you don't have to fill the cooler at start up. The other positive to this set up is I don't have to over fill the sump to account for the additional cooler capacity. So when I look at my oil site glass its looks normal ie 3/4 full. If you go the other way your site glass will be full of oil and it may take an educated guess as to if your at the right level.

The down side is I have to remove the cooler and dump the oil out when I want to change the oil. Takes about 10 minutes. If you want to flip the cooler around to drain from the bottom it should be ok thats how Derale do it.

The cooler bracket has five pieces. The top rail is 1" wide aluminum bar 1/4" thk. that spans the width of the cooler and has two holes in the center to attach to where the horns use to mount. The vertical pieces in the back are stainless angle bar (90 degrees). They mount to the top cross bar and if I remember correctly have a horizontal component on the bottom that supports the weight of the cooler. The are two more flat pieces of stainless that tie the front of the cooler into the back vertical pieces and stop it from falling forward.

Let me see if I can't get you some photos. I have to change my oil soon anyway. Probably easier than trying to explain. The Derale type oil coolers solve the problem of having to come up with your own bracket.

 

[Sunburn]

I have the Earls cooler as well. I have all the parts, just got to get busy on it. Your information helps. Thank you.

Also, my pipe has not been painted, but it's a vintage Yosh like yours. People ask where you can get one. There are many left around. great pipe.


Thanks

 

[Sunburn]

What year is your forks from? What size rear tire did get?

I think a few more picture are in order :-D

 

[Guest]

What year is your forks from? What size rear tire did get?

I think a few more picture are in order :-D

Sunburn, The entire front end including tire is from a 96 GSXR1100. I had the fender painted and as you can see it matches both sets of body work that I have for the bike. The rear tire is from a Suzuki RF900. Its a 160 width radial. The rear brake, axle and spacers are from a GSXR1100

Others will tell you there are more tire options for 180 width and they are marginally right. I'm using up the Michelin tires that came on the rims but plan to switch to the new Bridgestone BT-021s radials. I have these sport turing tires on my FZ1 and they are awesome, awesome, awesome. The Michelin Pilot Road IIs are also available in 160. I'm not willing to spend $160 for a sticky tire that will only last 3000 miles. Check SWMoto for great prices. I think its like $219 for the pair delivered.

I have a 3/8" 530 chain offset front sprocket and I've turned the rear sprocket around to shift it more toward the rear tire to eliminate the need to have to notch the frame to prevent the chain from rubbing. The chain's is 116 links.

Thats a 98 Bandit 1200 swingarm per Katman's setup. A 180 width tire would have probably prevented me from getting the Bandit chain guard from fitting.
Even still that chain guard took a lot of tinkering to fit with the dual Ohlins shocks in the rear. The other thing that took a lot of trial and error was the Bandit rubber chain guide that sits on top of the swing arm near the front. If you don't have one of these guides I would think you would scratch the hell out of the swingarm as the chain bounces up and down.

On a different note (no pun intended) I switch out the Yosh slip on every now an then with a stock first gen R1 carbon fiber slip on. I had bought for it for $30 on Ebay to put on my FZ1 but never used it for that application. It will marry up to the 2" dia. collector on the Yosh header. The R1 canisters are massive in size and very quite but provide radically improved mid range punch mated up to the RS38 flat slides, ported head, Yosh Stage I cams, and Yosh 1135 pistons. Don't have a picture of the R1 slip on installed just yet and to be honest I think the GS looks much better and more appropriate with the Yosh slip on.

My seat of the pants dyno says the R1 set up has to be adding 5 hp to the mid range. It leaps into the air in second and third. The Yosh header set up got me to 120 hp on a real Dyno. I'm not really into loud exhausts and the Yosh is just barely tolerable especially after 6000 rpms. I'd like to find a longer, quieter, more modern Yosh or V/H can (not the current megaphone style).

If you look close you'll see I haven't addressed the rear passenger pegs. When I do that I'll add an auxiliary attachment point for the R1 slip on that's more secure than attaching to where I have the Yosh header mounted now, which is off of the rear brake master cylinder assy. The short Yosh header does not really strain the attachment but the R1 does. The wifes been complaining that she can't go with me on the GS.

I'll try to post some more photos next weekend to cover some of the details.

See also http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=111868 for some other details.

 

[Guest]

I have the Earls cooler as well. I have all the parts, just got to get busy on it. Your information helps. Thank you.

Also, my pipe has not been painted, but it's a vintage Yosh like yours. People ask where you can get one. There are many left around. great pipe.


Thanks

Sunburn,

Here are some photos that are a lot better than my memory of how we did it.

Shot from top showing bolts mounting horizontal bar to horn location holes

Shot from side showing horizontal bar is bent forward on ends to facilitate attachment of rear vertical piece.

Shot from bottom showing that rear vertical piece started out as flat stock at that width but on the back side it gets bent into the 90 degree angle you can see in the previous photo. If the cooler was removed you would see it forms an L and is all one piece.

View from front showing flat bar stock that stops cooler from falling forward. Note nylon lock screws everywhere and rubber gasketing to absorb shock.

Thats been on the bike for at least 70K miles and still working fine. I'm sure there are simpler ways to do it but it helps to see how others tackle things

 

[Commodus]

Nice pipe, nice cooler, nice shocks, NICE carbs.

Nice!

 

[80GS1000]

^^^^ What he said.

All in all NICE job. Very put together. So how's it handle now?

 

[Sunburn]

Did you run a thermostat with the cooler or does it just run all the time.

 

[Guest]

Did you run a thermostat with the cooler or does it just run all the time.

I'm in central New England and don't run a thermostat. Never been a problem for me.

 

[Zooks]

that is an awesome looking bike man.... baby that thing

I totally agree with the first part of that statement. As for the last bit?????.....................................................................nah, RIDE IT LIKE YOU STOLE IT!!!!!!!!!

 

[Guest]

^^^^ What he said.

All in all NICE job. Very put together. So how's it handle now?

Thanks for the kind words. It handles surprisingly well. The big wide GSXR1100 front tire steers a little slow, but its also very stable. I'm still running the rubber that came with the wheels and I think that when I can spoon on some new BT021 that should change significantly for the better.

I copied Katmans Bandit swingarm and located the shock mounts in the same place that he did which is directly over the vertical weld in the swingarm. If I were going to do it again I would have moved the mount forward about 1/2 inch to raise the rear a smidge, which I think would have sharpened the steering.

What my major concern was during the build was the fact that I had lowered the bike by about 1.5 inches with adding the forks and 17" wheels. I was fearing that I would strike the front of the header on a relatively low speed bump or worse yet ground the center of the header and lift the rear tire. So needless to say I'm extremely cautious when approaching these obstacles and haven't had any problems yet. As I've mentioned, I switch back and forth between my GS and FZ1 all the time and I have to be careful to remember which bike I'm on when the auto pilot takes over in my mind. Bt the way I also haven't had any problems with the engine case guards or pegs touching down in fast corners. I've got the chicken strips on the tires down to about 1/2 inch.

The USD forks have a lot less total travel which helps to overcome the fact that it's now lower. The bike seems more stable in turns, more compliant over bumps just better over all. Is it as good as the 01 FZ1? Not really, but its a ton better than where it was, and my original GS forks had all the upgrades you could possibly do to them. So I'm very happy with the handling.

Visually, what I like the most is the steeper angle of the forks which puts the front wheel closer to the engine. When I look at a stock GS1100, that big gap of space caused by the long forks sticking out so far has never looked right to me. Stock GS almost look like mini choppers to me. When I look at mine now it looks right to me, like a modern bike. I may be the only one that feels like that though.