134 posts and it appears that you have never looked through your megawelcome
Read this. If you read it before, print it out and check off the items as you go
http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=171846&highlight=top+newbie+mistakes
Looks like 1,3.7,9 and 10 should be on your agenda. And don't forget 13 and 15
1A) (NEW) Trying to diagnose running problems on a bike with an unknown maintenance history is an exercise in futility until a baseline is established through proper maintenance. Things like clean carbs, properly adjusted valves, sealed intake system (airbox, carb boots), a clean gas tank (no rust), and a properly functioning petcock are 100% mandatory for the bike to run properly. It's best to perform all the bikes maintenance when you first get the bike, and then if problems show up you will know what the problem is not.
New gas tank, sealed; rebuilt airbox; valves lapped; piston rings replaced and filed to tolerance; petcock checked and working just fine.
I put off the valves and the boots because I don't have several hundred dollars laying around to throw into the wind without just cause. Now that it is a necessity, I can start putting money aside. I have the new boots and o-rings, and plan on installing these tonight.
1B) Incomplete carb cleaning. A proper carb cleaning requires a full tear down, soaking the parts in carb dip, and reassembly with fresh O-rings (cycleorings.com). Pilot jets, choke tubes, and pilot circuit passages in particular need a proper cleaning before the bike will run right. Even if the bike seems to run right, if the O-rings are original they are sure to be hard and brittle thus problems could be right around the corner. This is a link to a carb tutorial that you may find useful... http://www.mtsac.edu/~cliff/storage/...d_Tutorial.pdf
Done, quite thoroughly. Replaced all o-rings, one tee, and dipped and even used the 'special tool' called for cleaning the tiny orifices. Replaced one choke plunger and one idle mixture screw.
3) Not adjusting the valves. The valves tighten with mileage, and once all the clearance is gone the valves hang open and burn. Not good. If you wait for your bike to misbehave before performing this critical maintenance, you may damage the engine. If your valves have no clearance, you will need a thin checking shim in order to properly calculate the needed shims for your engine.
Yeah, working on that now.
7) Waiting for the charging system to fail, instead of cleaning up the old wiring. Many a battery have been boiled dry after the grounds corrode. Running a dedicated ground to the battery, or a solid frame attachment point, is strongly advised. Suzuki also botched the stator wiring by routing one leg up to the now discontinued head lamp switch. This needless wire path often overheats and damages the harness in the process. Do yourself a favor and rewire your charging system: run the stator wires directly into the R/R, make sure your R/R has a solid battery or frame ground point, and run the positive (power) R/R output either straight to the battery (with 20A fuse in-line) or though the regular fuse block after you check for resistance in the circuit and repair as needed.
Oh I've most certainly cleaned up my wiring system and connectors, I just didn't follow through with the mods involving relays. When I did this I wanted to keep to original specs as much as possible. Now that I'm more comfortable with altering my electrical system, I'm evaluating my options.
No, I have not yet rewired the R/R. I have attached 2 additional grounds. One from battery to frame, and one from frame to electrical panel.
9) Search out the information about your upcoming wrenching tasks before going off unprepared and possibly damaging something. Search using "Advanced Search" and then click "Titles Only" to quickly hone in on the topic at hand. Almost every possible question a newbie could ask have already been answered. For example: there are tons of threads on how to avoid broken exhaust bolts and float posts. Sadly, most newbies learn these tricks AFTER they damage their bike.
I'm familiar with the search function, thank you.
10) Buying a 30 year old motorcycle because it was cheap without any mechanical knowledge and no interest in learning. Paying a shop to work on your 30 year old motorcycle is not advised unless you have lots of money to spend and know for a fact that they are trustworthy.
I purchased my bike with a decent background in mechanics, just not motorcycles. My work usually centered on Mobil Drill rigs, geoprobes, AMS power probes, hydraulic systems- that sort of thing. I bought the bike, and indeed a second bike for the sole purpose of learning to wrench on bikes. We all start somewhere. If I wanted to **** away my time and money there are surely many better ways to do it. I may be young but I've been working on and with machinery since I was 15, until the company I worked for went under in 2011.
As far as maintenance history, the fellow who sold it to me just changed the oil, filters, bulbs, whatever happened to go wrong. In other words, he didn't replace gaskets, didn't want to get too deep into it because he didn't know how, and didn't want to. He didn't know anything about its maintenance history before he got ahold of it.
And finally, I've benefited a great deal from Basscliff's website and his accumulation of information and guides, I'm actually working through several of these right now. As always, I appreciate assistance, but not when somebody leaps to the assumption that I don't give a goddamn about what I'm doing, or that I'm too stupid to follow ****ing directions. I had questions, I had an open thread already, so I asked them. And for the record, I didn't argue about the advice given - I asked for clarification and reasoning for performing a given task.
15) Getting really nice and intoxicated and decide to fix some things on your bike... then waking up the next day and hop on your bike with some unfamiliar sounds, if it starts at all!
I like this 15 better.
If you do not adjust your valves you will burn your valves and have to do a top end rebuild. You do not want to do that.
Here is the thread about the shim club:
http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/showthread.php?t=122394
Thanks, I actually saw a notice in another thread about this earlier - I'm already considering which shim to order as my baseline. I'm thinking 2.50 or 2.55. Since I have a few that are within the .03 - .05 range, I'm guessing they can't be too off right now. We'll see what happens.
I'll email the fellows about the shim club tonight and begin the first trade. Hopefully that 2.50 does the trick, I can't afford to waste too much time here. I'll get it done right, but I'm not confident that my luck will hold at this point.
If you refuse to take care of your valves your bike will not take care of you. Adjust them now using the procedures found on Basscliff's site (
http://members.dslextreme.com/users/bikecliff/images/gs850valve_adjust.pdf). The Shim Club is listed in the GS Services section and run by GhostGS1 - great guy to work with. Email, don't PM, Steve for his spreadsheet
Indeed, I have a copy of the spreadsheet from when I first ripped the gs1000 apart. Steve was a huge help, very knowledgeable fellow.
