GS1000 streetfighter idea w/ picture

[80GS1000]

It's a standard GS1000 V&H street pipe. http://www.vanceandhines.com/c107.html

[80GS1000]

The welding and smoothing of the bracing and monoshock mount is done. Just needs paint now. The X shaped bracing will help take the load of the rear suspension into the frame, and provide torsional strength. The smaller bracing above the footpeg mounts will help keep the frame from being pulled together from the added leverage of a wider rear tire and offset front sprocket.



The battery will be hidden in the seat. To do this, a section of the seat pan had to be cut out, and enough foam removed to hide the battery. Next time around, a couple of new tabs will be added to the flap that was cut out so it can be bolted shut. It'll be a snug fit all around once the flap is bolted on and the battery compresses the foam. Enough room was left to run the battery wires out through the hole in the flap.




Once the flap is bolted on and the battery's compressing the foam, there's no way the battery can vibrate or move.


Standing the bike straight up, there's about 3.5" of ground clearance under the lowest part of the header. Wonder if this is enough clearance or if I should start modifying that Hindle 4 into 2 into 1 header I bought....

[CA180]

Good looking project you got there.... Post lots more pics!!!! I love pics!

[80GS1000]

One more pic....skeleton view.

[brveagle]

that's awesome... your bike is really growing on me..

[steely]

Not my cup of tea, but very nice. I am really enjoying watching this bike come together! \\/

[80GS1000]

Well, one of my original concerns in this build came to pass - ground clearance is terrible with the V&H 4 into 1 exhaust, only about 3.5". I'll have to try the Yoshimura 4 into 1 and see if it's any better. Looking for 5+ inches of clearance ideally.

Don't really want to muck with changing around the steering geometry too much as it's set up reasonably well right now in my ignorant opinion () - 24.5 degrees of rake, with a 53/47% front/rear weight distribution and 8" of clearance under the lowest part of the frame. Any more raising of the rear end of the bike will unfavorably upset the forward/rear weight distribution ratio and make the bike more prone to tankslappers and other handling nastiness.

So it looks like the best way to go about this is to either (a) get a new full custom exhaust system made up, or (b) bastardize the 4 into 2 into 1 GSXR 1100 exhaust by cutting it to fit the GS motor (the downpipes are too long but the exhaust port spacing is perfect) and welding on the flanges from the V&H so it'll fit at the head. The Gix 1100 collector is at most 2.5" tall, so we'd end up with 5.5" of clearance, which should be plenty.

Any ideas or input are welcome.

[Cassius086]

Quick update-

For giggles and grins, I measured wet weight with the tank, seat, exhaust, and battery on the bike. 450 pounds, with a full tank of gas and the oil filled up. Woohoo! Almost 90 pounds lighter than the stock wet weight of 536 pounds, and on par with the wet weight of a modern GSXR 1000.

What all did you do to reduce weight, if I may ask?? I dropped a touch under 30 lbs. just by getting rid of the stock exhaust, and going with a Mac header and Holeshot can. I am sure I dropped a few more lbs. with the rims and forks from the gsxr. Looking for more ideas.....thanks for any more ideas...and your welder/fabricator does AWESOME work!!! Looking good!\\/

[80GS1000]

What all did you do to reduce weight, if I may ask?? I dropped a touch under 30 lbs. just by getting rid of the stock exhaust, and going with a Mac header and Holeshot can. I am sure I dropped a few more lbs. with the rims and forks from the gsxr. Looking for more ideas.....thanks for any more ideas...and your welder/fabricator does AWESOME work!!! Looking good!\\/

In terms of saving weight, I tried to maximize weight savings by removing anything not absolutely necessary and by using the lightest components possible. Weight savings IMO is like free HP - less mass that the engine has to accelerate.

Let's see...

Monoshock conversion. All the GSXR parts (swingarm, rim, brake assembly etc etc) are MUCH lighter that their GS counterparts, being made of aluminum instead of steel. A single shock weighs less than two shocks. The whole GSXR 1000 rim/tire/swingarm/rear brake assembly only weighs 50 pounds. I almost throw my back out trying to hoist the stock GS1000 rear wheel.

GSXR 1000 front end. I measured this as being 15 pounds lighter than its GS counterpart - again, all aluminum, no steel.

520 chain conversion - 520 weighs less than 630 for the same length chain.

Odyssey 310 battery - 5.9 pounds instead of the 11 pounds for a stock battery.

Aftermarket 4 into 1 exhaust - like you said, almost 30 lbs. saved by ditching the stock exhaust.

GSXR rearsets - the GS footpegs weigh a ton by comparison.

Pod air filters vs. stock airbox. 4 pod filters weigh less than an airbox/big single filter assembly.

Ditching the huge and heavy stock turn signals for Gixxer signals.

Stripping off every single unnecessary tab/piece of metal including the passenger footpeg mounts and stock exhaust mount. Steel is heavy, the less the better. Getting rid of the unused tabs also cleans up the looks as well. I didn't however remove the stock rear shock mounts so that the bike can be returned to dual shock sometime in the future.

A few pounds of steel was added for the monoshock mounts and bracing, but there's no way around that if you want to go mono.

[first timer]

take a look at this post on the sv forum

http://www.sv-portal.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25269

one of the guy fabbed up his own exhaust using pre-bent ss tubing and a tig welder. if he can do it on a SV (nightmare exhaust routing) then a I4 should be simple.

[Cassius086]

My 82 has an aluminum swing arm, and I did not want to do any permanent mods to the frame, so I used it with the gsxr rim and spacers. My 1100 swing arm was actually lighter than the bigger gsxr unit. I did not take the time to measure weight differences in the forks and such; Thinking of dropping by a metal recycling place to ask if they will weigh the bike. Any other ideas for access to a scale big enough for the bike? What did you do/where did you go?

[80GS1000]

My 82 has an aluminum swing arm, and I did not want to do any permanent mods to the frame, so I used it with the gsxr rim and spacers. My 1100 swing arm was actually lighter than the bigger gsxr unit. I did not take the time to measure weight differences in the forks and such; Thinking of dropping by a metal recycling place to ask if they will weigh the bike. Any other ideas for access to a scale big enough for the bike? What did you do/where did you go?

So did you already swap out your rear rim for a GSXR one? I bet you dropped at least 30 pounds with your running gear mods.

Got a pic of your bike? I'd love to see it.

I used the super-scientific () bathroom scale to weigh the bike and front/rear weight bias. Just rolled the front and rear wheel onto the scale and did the math.

[YoshiJohnny]

Hey PJ,

Ditch the tailpipe and you should be fine.... your downpipes look very similar to mine and nothing on mine grounds out (mt tyres are worn to the edges!!). Check out the racers for their exhaust shape, aint no good fitting a drag pipe to a bare knuckle streetfighter dude!! get a bit of pipe bent to fit!!!

YJ

[Cassius086]

Yeah, front and rear gsxr rims, brakes and forks are all mounted up. I will try to get some digital pics this weekend, and I need to open an account with photobucket so I can post pics....

I used Duplicor black bed liner spray for the rims and the swing arm and the lower fork legs. The textured 'semi gloss' looks awesome, in my opinion!! \\/ Did some polishing on the aluminum case covers, and repainted the valve cover "cast coat aluminum"--very close to the original engine color!!


The bike looks kinda cafe up front with the clip-ons and that 8" freight train headlight. Had to fab some brackets for the ignition and the gauge cluster, but all the other stuff was bolt on, with the exception of juggling some wheel spacers on the rear. I am sure the racetech'ed gixxer front end is going to reveal the weakness of the rear shocks... so Vipex, or custom Moto CD (a friend's business) shocks will be in order. I also think I might get some Votex clip ons with 1 1/4" risers. Doing a 530 conversion...will be done with that this weekend, and will be installing pads and bleeding the brakes thursday.

[80GS1000]

Hey PJ,

Ditch the tailpipe and you should be fine.... your downpipes look very similar to mine and nothing on mine grounds out (mt tyres are worn to the edges!!). Check out the racers for their exhaust shape, aint no good fitting a drag pipe to a bare knuckle streetfighter dude!! get a bit of pipe bent to fit!!!

YJ

YJ-

I've had a pic of your Yosh replica as my computer wallpaper for about 6 months now - love that bike, and it's been a huge inspiration to do mine up. :-D

(http://forum.oldskoolsuzuki.info/yab...b-article3.jpg)

How much clearance do you have under the lowest part of your header? I agree the V&H 4 into 1 isn't well suited to this application. I'd love to wind up with a 4 into 2 into 1 with a Yoshi canister on the end.