Project 300 "this is not sparta"

[razor02097]

Give me a break I couldn't think of another creative title... I promise it will be the last 300 movie reference...

This thread is to track the project of bringing my little GS300L from storage find to road worthy. The direction of the project is to have a small stock bike that will get good fuel economy and is reliable. Modifications I do will be minor and must have a reason to be done. This is to keep me from tearing it apart for stupid reasons.

I found this bike on craigslist for $850 but I was able to talk the guy down. The reason I jumped on it was it is a running, riding bike that needed little more than tires and it was ready to take down the road. However I am not a person who will just do the minimum to get by... I'm going to do this right. The bike deserves better. With 4,000 original miles on it the bike is worth investing some cabbage into. There was rust and corrosion on the bike, can't expect perfection on a 29 year old bike. Especially for under a grand. Using Evaporust, Flitz and spray paint I am going to slowly restore parts. Since it is winter and I don't really have a garage to work from I started by taking off some parts and restoring them in my room before reinstalling them and taking more parts off to restore. Parts that can't be restored will be replaced such as consumable items. The oil in the bike looks new but I'm going to change it so I can start my maintenance cycles.

So far the list of replacement parts is as follows

Air filter element
Oil filter
spark plugs
H4 headlight upgrade
rear brake shoes
fork oil seals
fork dust seals
tires
stock replacement tools

Fluids include

10wt fork oil
5w40 T6 rotella engine oil

 

[razor02097]

The only before picture I can offer is the one the guy posted on craigslist... Yes I know it says 84. I found the correct year out before making the offer.

Not bad. The seat is perfect still and the luggage rack is a nice plus.

 

[GateKeeper]

Welcome to the site

Congrats on the newly acquired bike, and the rebuild your about to take on.

But we need pictures........and lots of them....

 

[razor02097]

Here is that luggage rack after I restored it. All it took was getting the rust off, treating a few spots and painting some of the hardware while replacing the rest with stainless steel hardware.

 

[razor02097]

Welcome to the site

Congrats on the newly acquired bike, and the rebuild your about to take on.

But we need pictures........and lots of them....

Thank you for the welcome

I'm working on an android tablet so please bear with me a moment. I will bring this thread up to speed as I have been working on this project this past week.

Here is a before shot on some parts. Try to imagine most of the restored parts have pretty much started as such.

This is the after shot from paint, polish and rust removal.

More on that headlight... it is a replacement from candlepower that uses an H4 style lamp instead of a sealed beam. It was a hit to the pocket book but it will be much easier to find replacement lamps if I ever need another.

Another batch of goodies restored and ready to bolt back on.

 

[razor02097]

More shiney to bolt back on. The shocks were a pain in the butt to clean up due to not being able to disassemble...

Last but not least this brings up to today when the new tires arrived! Kenda Challanger size 100/90 18 for the front and 120/90 16 for the rear.

The bummer is I've called around and all the shops want $25 to $30 per tire to mount! What a ripoff...

 

[GateKeeper]

There we go.....nice pictures, and nice progress

some really good work there, keep it up...

 

[brslk]

Wow! you did a pretty nice job of cleaning things up so far.
How did you manage to clean those shocks without taking them apart?

Bruce.

 

[razor02097]

Wow! you did a pretty nice job of cleaning things up so far.
How did you manage to clean those shocks without taking them apart?

Bruce.

evaporust got the majority of the rust off. The rest was just hand polishing with flitz using rags, 0000 steel wool and paper towls.

 

[Niklas]

More shiney to bolt back on. The shocks were a pain in the butt to clean up due to not being able to disassemble...

The bummer is I've called around and all the shops want $25 to $30 per tire to mount! What a ripoff...

Why dont you do it yourself? Its not that hard with some soapewater, a dull screwdriver and a very light touch. For balancing the wheel im sure there are small lead weights to buy. I did it with 5 gram weights i got from a local bikestore.

 

[razor02097]

Why dont you do it yourself? Its not that hard with some soapewater, a dull screwdriver and a very light touch. For balancing the wheel im sure there are small lead weights to buy. I did it with 5 gram weights i got from a local bikestore.

I might try it... I already have spoons from my previous job so I guess all I have to do is break the beads.


Update:

I reinstalled the parts I took off to clean. I have some shots for your viewing pleasure.

 

[brslk]

It's amazing how the small things make such a big difference.
Looks great man.

Bruce.

 

[7981GS]

Quite the sparkler now.
Great job!!!

Daniel

 

[razor02097]

Thank you, still quite a bit to do yet

I also got tags and got a quote for insurance.... it works out to be less than 8 bucks a month!

 

[Guest]

Mate I missed this... a twin project... how did I do that?

Anyway, that is cleaning up real nice indeed! Good work

 

[Smokinapankake]

Very very nice! That tank just sparkles!

 

[razor02097]

I'm grateful for the responses

I'm also amazed at the community here. As difficult as it is to find information about the 300 it seems I have yet to have a question not answered already. Which is nice.

It seems many parts are still in transit so I guess progress will be slow until they get here.

 

[Guest]

I'm grateful for the responses

I'm also amazed at the community here. As difficult as it is to find information about the 300 it seems I have yet to have a question not answered already. Which is nice.

It seems many parts are still in transit so I guess progress will be slow until they get here.

The good thing with most of these models is that Suzuki used the same parts and design in a lot of them, so you shouldn't find too much that is specific to your 300...

 

[mriddle]

Great to see. We have one of these in storage. Loved it when we had it out last.

 

[razor02097]

Well I took the front and back wheels off. Looks like the original brakes are still on... I first tried scotch brite because the front shoes had corrosion on them... After I noticed there were deep gouges from where the corrosion was...
I chickened out and ordered new front shoes. Also found the chain has a few spots the links are seized... I just decided to order new sprockets and bikemaster o ring chain. I'm in the process of restoring the hardware for the front and rear wheels.