What year engine ?

[Guest]

I have a gs850gl Title says it's a 1980 but the exhaust is different it does not have the H connector. It looks like an exhaust from a 1979 gs850. My engine vin # is GS850-117837 any help is appreciated.

[hampshirehog]

It's a 1980:

http://www.ozebook.com/compendium/suzi/engine-nos/page3.gif

[Steve]

I don't have the tools right now to look up an engine number, but there are several other things you can look for, if you are just trying to verify the engine's year.

1. The exhaust doesn't really matter. The H connector rots out, not everybody knows you can replace it with a couple pieces of 1 1/2" exhaust pipe. I have done that on at least four 850s, so far.
2. The exhaust is really easy to change, you can't use that as a dating criteria. As an example, my wife's '82 850L is currently wearing the stock pipes (minus the H connector), but will soon have a set of '79 850G pipes, as soon as I get them back from having the header pipes ceramic coated.
3. The '79 850 was the only 850 with a kick starter, also had a different head that had smaller ports for the VM carbs.
4. The '80 and '81 engines still had the hump at the rear of the clutch cover where the kick start lever lived, but there is no hole in the cover.
5. The '82 and up engines did not have that hump, they were straight up and down at the back of the clutch cover. The cover was also shaped differently to match up with the different crankcases. The old covers were pretty much the same width from front to back, the new ones have a decided wedge shape.
6. Some time in the middle of the '82 production run, the head and valve cover was changed to have 19 bolts, instead of 16.

.

[ceh3523]

OK thanks for the info.