GS850G Novice Compression Questions

[Big T]

Assaf,

Did you ever receive your Megawelcome?

Lots of information and a factory service manual for your bike in there

[BassCliff]

Hi Mr. Assaf,

It seems I've been remiss in my duties and have not given you the full "mega-welcome". There is LOTS of information in the links below. You'll be reading for days and days. Go through the maintenance lists and take no short cuts. Do all the necessary maintenance tasks up front and do them properly so that you and your bike can be insanely happy.

Let me dump a TON of information on you and share some GS lovin'.

I just stopped by to welcome you to the forum in my own, special way.

If there's anything you'd like to know about the Suzuki GS model bikes, and most others actually, you've come to the right place. There's a lot of knowledge and experience here in the community. Come on in and let me say "HOoooowwwDY!"....

Here is your very own magical, mystical, mythical, mind-expanding "mega-welcome". Please take notice of the "Top 10 Common Issues", "Top 15 Tips For GS Happiness", the Carb Cleanup Series, and the Stator Papers. All of these tasks must be addressed in order to have a safe, reliable machine. This is what NOT to do: Top 10 Newbie Mistakes. Now let me roll out the welcome mat for you...



Please click here for your mega-welcome, chock full of tips, suggestions, links to vendors, and other information. Then feel free to visit my little BikeCliff website where I've been collecting the wisdom of this generous community. Don't forget, we like pictures! Not you, your bike!

Thanks for joining us. Keep us informed.

Thank you for your indulgence,

BassCliff

[Assaf]

Ok, thanks folks.
The advice is clear.
Will do as directed.

Bass, dinnae fret you weren't remiss in ur duties.
You welcomed me a cupla months ago on a previos thread

[robertbarr]

Assaf,
I strongly advise you to first adjust the valves, then ride the bike, and ride it hard, before you go off and spend a bunch of money on parts. It will take some miles before the bike starts to show you it's true condition so don't jump to conclusions.

Yep, that's the best advice you can get.

Perform the routine maintenance, cover the basics (valve clearances, intake sealing, clean fresh fuel, etc), and then ride the daylights out of it. Put a season on it. Unless the performance is poor enough to cause driveability problems, just enjoy the bike. Shift at redline on a routine basis and put some long highway miles on it. If it's still running sluggishly after a thousand miles, well, OK, tear into it.

[Assaf]

tkent02, indeed it is cylinder 2 that is low.
Why is that 'dreaded'?

[Nessism]

tkent02, indeed it is cylinder 2 that is low.
Why is that 'dreaded'?

If the petcock fails raw fuel gets dumped down the vacuum line and into the engine though the #2 cylinder. This excess fuel can gum up the piston rings causing them to loose their seal to the cylinder.

[tkent02]

tkent02, indeed it is cylinder 2 that is low.
Why is that 'dreaded'?

If the petcock fails raw fuel gets dumped down the vacuum line and into the engine though the #2 cylinder. This excess fuel can gum up the piston rings causing them to loose their seal to the cylinder.

What Ed says, and if the engine is run a lot of miles with the failed petcock diaphragm, the excess fuel can prevent the oil from protecting the cylinder and rings, and the piston itself, they can wear. In this case the compression may take a lot of miles to come back up, or maybe if the wear is bad enough, it won't come up at all. But it can't hurt to try. Riding is good.

[Assaf]

OK, thanks.
This could indeed have happened b/c the petcock was faulty when I bought the bike. Fuel leaked into the carbs (and out of them) when the engine was off. I immediately replaced the petcock and fuel valves, but who knows how many miles it had been run like that.

[tkent02]

Ride it and see.