New member from ohio

[innerpeacethief]

bike 9.jpgstill getting everything together

[innerpeacethief]

bike 12.jpgbefore the seat came in, i had to ride it on the airbox... boy was it uncomfortable AF!!!

[innerpeacethief]

bike 13.jpgquick little edit! gas tank is flat black for now, i really do enjoy the black and silver.

[innerpeacethief]

bike 14.jpgright after i got it, i was about to move to a new house, so it sat like this for a little over a week before i could really dig in and do anything

[Chuck78]

Hey dude... I hate to break it to ya & burst your cafe hipster bubble, but you castrated the back half of your frame and then welded on a death stop aka cafe hipster rookie hoop in the worst possible incorrect way...



You now have a cafe turtle racer, because if you hit any significant dip in the road or bump at speed, your rear tire is going to act as an emergency death slide brake, and lock up your rear wheel and induce a high speed rear end slide-out, which could potentially result in death to the rider and others.

Please IMMEDIATELY hacksaw off this rookie hipster art-bike mistake!!!! Or at minimum, use your oxy-acetylene torches and heat the weld area up cherry red and bend the hoop upward to give yourself 4.5" of vertical clearance or so to the tire, so you don't kill yourself trying to look like a sleek L.A. hipster on your cafe-art-bike attempt.

With your new found cafe fiberglassing skills, you can then fashion by hand a cafe hipster hump as your new tail, and can do so around the new lifted non-deathstop hipster hoop.

These bikes look best with a trimmed down stock seat and the stock ABS plastic type GS tail, even when those are modded a bit cosmetically. You will most likely regret butchering the rear of your frame in the future, especially in lieu of doing any real beneficial mods such as high performance tires, upgraded front brakes, upgraded fork valving and springs, upgraded shocks, 530 o-ring chain conversion, upgraded charging system, & ignition relay mod.
if you want an awesome riding reliable bike, look into what it takes to do all of those, on top of all the neglected maintenance that your new 36 year old bike needs such as valve shim adjustments, full carb rebuild, new airbox boots, etc.

And PLEASE rip off that ********* hipster cafe death stop rear wheel lockup device, BEFORE IT KILLS YOUI!

We are big fans of vintage bikes and vintage superbikes, reliable vintage bikes, upgrading vintage bikes for better reliability and ride quality, and helping people achieve those directions with their neglected old projects. Just trying to help out...

[Chuck78]

Once you fix all that and improve at least your tires, come ride with us in Appalachian southeast Ohio, the roads down there are KILLER, amazing twisties... you wont find anything like them in northern ohio, even near the PA border. Once you get south of Akron or Youngstown about 60 or 75 minutes to near Newcomerstown or so, the terrain gets A LOT more incredible for twisty roads and 2 wheeled thrills...

Hopefully I didnt scare ya off, hopefully just straightened out your hipster/non-motorcycle-mechanic cosmetic direction blunders. Tough love.

-Chuck in Columbus

[innerpeacethief]

Great opinion homie! Unfortunately, after spending hours and hours on this site, im confused at to what typer of roads u might be riding on.... If this were the case than boy i guess that little plastic inner fender would be chewed up huh? it's not a "art-project-hipster-cafe whatever the h*** u called it.... it was merely necessity as a cafe racer seat was only about $30 compared to the stock seat and hardware that was lost by the previous owner. even if the wheel hits the seat........... itll be for a split second then the springs will force the rear end back to road as intended..... Ever watch dirtbikes???? they do similar stuff!!! i understand ur point of view here but just cos it isnt OEM, STOCK, OR up to ur "specific vintage" standard doesnt make it wrong or usafe. Appreciate ur opinion!!!!

[Chuck78]

Great opinion homie! Unfortunately, after spending hours and hours on this site, im confused at to what typer of roads u might be riding on.... If this were the case than boy i guess that little plastic inner fender would be chewed up huh?

Not everyone has a plastic inner fender located close enough to the rear tire that big bumps would cause major rub...

Since you're confused, what I meant was a whole bunch of Appalachian SE Ohio roads like this:



I'm not sure what part you're confused about...
I go out on 10 hour 400 mile rides on almost all nonstop tighter twisty winding roads, with only the first and last 35-45 minutes to/from home being on roads that are not ultra-twisty....
I'm always trying to get more people to join.

it's not a "art-project-hipster-cafe whatever the h*** u called it.... it was merely necessity as a cafe racer seat was only about $30 compared to the stock seat and hardware that was lost by the previous owner.

A $30 new cafe clone seat? I don't think you'll be enjoying long rides on that thing... not even our short 3.5 - 5.5 hour twisties adventures...
So you hacked your frame and welded on it and bought a fancy cafe hoop to weld on, just because you didn't feel like looking for a $60 well used seat? & you were not doing it to look like every other hipster cafe racer hackjob?

even if the wheel hits the seat........... itll be for a split second then the springs will force the rear end back to road as intended..... Ever watch dirtbikes???? they do similar stuff!!!

BIG DIFFERENCE BUD! Dirt bikes are designed to come close but not rub as well... unless someone was modding things and miscalculated. There is a thing called a bumpstop on shocks... dirtbikes have them, too. Unless you are referring to all the mud that gets scraped off the inside of the fenders when the suspension bottoms out.
You actually think factory engineers and their lawyers would let these things be released to the general public if the tire would bottom out on the bodywork in stock form? You've got to be kidding.
You are talking to a dirtbiker, by the way...
And if a dirtbike had enough frame flex or suspension wear to hit the tire to the plastic fender, its a plastic fender with no significant structural tubing between the frame rails, and the bike is on dirt, where it's commonplace to utilize the loose and slippery conditions to lock up the rear wheel on purpose and slide... dirt provides mowhere near the traction that street tires on pavement do...
You dont see Supermoto racers locking it up in turns on the regular on pavement... only the most skilled stunt riders who are doing it predictably and controlled... where as your scenario would be an "OH $#!+!!!!" moment...

even if the wheel hits the seat........... itll be for a split second then the springs will force the rear end back to road as intended.....

i understand ur point of view here but just cos it isnt OEM, STOCK, OR up to ur "specific vintage" standard doesnt make it wrong or usafe. Appreciate ur opinion!!!!

This is where you are terribly confused, or rather gravely mistaken...
Give it just the right (or rather, horribly wrong) scenario, and you'll be ejected off of the bike in short order when you fail to gain control of the rear end abruptly sliding around and going into a high speed weave after being induced by a half second rear wheel lockup...


DUDE... YOU REALLY NEED TO RE-THINK YOUR ENGINEERING BRAINFART HERE, & SWALLOW YOUR PRIDE...
FIX THAT HORRENDOUSLY DANGEROUS "COSMETIC" BLUNDER...
Unless you plan to put on some KZ or BMW length shocks there to jack the rear sky high. Then you will be welding an extension on your kickstand, and adding a motocross chain guide and chain tensioner due to the ultra steep swingarm angle of beyond 13 degrees.


To clarify - I'm not trying to run you off here or start a fight, but rather trying to keep your family from visiting you in an early grave, or the family of whoever owns the bike next from having the same unfortunate experience.

This is a dangerous situation you have garage-engineered into your 68hp 530lb 4 cylinder bike...

[dorkburger]

Chuck has offered sound advice. If you have ANY intent of doing anything beyond in town putting around, reconsider your set up.

Somewhere along the way "Cafe" morphed from a performance enhancement to primarily a "look".
Yes, the original Café bikes had frame hoops and bump stop seats. But take a minute and Google up some vintage images. The hoops of days gone by were out beyond the highest part of the tire combined with the the hump for........ clearance.

We just want you to be safe....

[innerpeacethief]

Listen gentleman, i appreciate the advice and the concern and everything, i didnt mean to be rude or snippy. I was mildly offended at the whole hipster art junk **** i was being called but i get ur guys's point of view. Just remember you catch more flies with honey than vinegar! I'll spend some time and get it to loop up a bit more. Thanks for the concern and time. I hope i can bring it out to SE ohio sometime within the next year or so

[ddaniels]

Yeah, Chuck78 was being a bit overly rude in his comments, unnecessarily so I think, but his intent was pure in that he doesn't want to see you killed, or kill anybody else. I hope you look beyond the biased opinions and take to heart the wise intent.

[Chuck78]

Listen gentleman, i appreciate the advice and the concern and everything...

I was mildly offended at the whole hipster art junk **** i was being called but i get ur guys's point of view.

I'll spend some time and get it to loop up a bit more. Thanks for the concern and time. I hope i can bring it out to SE ohio sometime within the next year or so

Good... Thank you.
Sometimes it's hard to get the point across as most people who have already done this "mod" (downgrade /Suzuki defamation / desecration) are very hard headed about going back and cutting it off and welded on the proper way in order to make it a safe and roadworthy bike that is not putting their life at risk.

I am always offended when I see a good classic example of KZ or GS with an integral part of the frame butchered off, if that helps understand my point of view a little better on the rudeness side.
These bikes are starting to get a little more scarce in the past year or two, but luckily there are still enough out there to go around. The increase in eBay bike dismantlers and the increase in demand in Japan for these bikes to be exported from the US back to be imported in their country of origin have both severely put a hit on the availability of these bikes to us on American soil...

I never mind if I see a GS L model turned into a cafe racer, as they generally are not sought after so much, same with the KZ LTD models, and are more the cosmetic bling cruiser type of thing... vs the classic standards and sportier models.


All of that aside, please indulge yourself heavily in the technical advice and resources available on this forum. Upgrade your regulator rectifier to a used OEM Polaris 4012941, and the wiring layout for the charging system, add an ignition coil relay mod, make sure you do a valve adjustment to your bike and add a new top cover gasket when doing so... Those are just the beginnings of the initial and critical mods that need to be done, just basic maintenance and reliability upgrades for starters.

And put some really good sticky tires on it, Avon Road Riders if you do a lot of straight and Flat Road riding. Bridgestone Battlax bt45 if you want better grip but a decent wearing rear tire. Shinko 230 s if you want an awesome gripping tire for cheap and don't care so much about how quickly the rear will wear down. Those tires are awesome!


Probably going riding again this weekend and next down in Southeast Ohio. The roads are always awesome there... It always impresses everyone that I take there, even people from the Pennsylvania hills....