1980 Suzuki GS850GT help Needed.

[arveejay]

Please Help, Advice needed. Hello fellow Suzuki riders. My dilemma is. I have a 1980 Suzuki GS850GT with 16000 miles which has absolutely no problems whatsoever. I just bought a second 1980 GS850GT which is identical except dif. color and only 5000 miles. This second bike came without carbs. I removed carbs, gas tank, and battery from my first bike and installed them on second bike and it started right up. It would die after about 3 miles then start right back up. After exchanging parts and cleaning all connections my problems are as follows. After 30-45 seconds the bike bogs down and dies abruptly. I turn the key off and right back on, (NO WAITING PERIOD), and it runs again for 30-45 seconds then dies out again. It will do this all day either cold, warm or hot. No parts are appearing to get hot, in fact feel cool to touch till bike has ran 8-10 times. As I said these parts are working fine as when installed on other bike I can ride it anywhere with no problems. I performed the tests found in the stator papers and everything checks out fine except that the RR may be bad as the voltage to battery seems to drop off about 1 second before the bike dies. Stator test shows about 90 volts on all 3 tests. It puts about 12.5 volts to battery till it drops to about 12 volts when it dies. No matter what rpm I run it the output never exceeds about 12.5 volts. I have swapped parts from running bike which include igniter, signal generator, coils. I have cleaned all connections, including ground wires and ground points. Nothing seems to help. Would a bad RR cause the problems I am describing? I never have swapped the RR as I don't want to risk burning it up. I have just bought a NOS RR and am patiently waiting for it to arrive but am not sure this will solve my problem. When I put the parts back on the runner everything is fine and bike performs flawlessly. What else can cause bike to die abruptly? Please don't think your advice or knowledge is not worth posting as any advice is better than none. I am desperate and if I can this bike running right I will sell the other bike, (I only need 1 850 Right). I'm pulling my hair out and really am not ready to be bald yet so please help me fast.

[Anonymous]

just an idea

if all the parts are going perfectly on the first bike

if the second bike runs perfectly 45 sec, stop and a couple of second later start perfectly again for 45 sec

then perhaps a problem with the tank

there is no more "air input" (sorry for my english) in your tank

this means that you have to clean the "free pipe" that goes into you tank and bring it enough air to avoid this problem

sorry, I cannot explain beter and find not the technical for "mise ? l'air" in french

V++
Rackham

[Anonymous]

You can rule out coils, carbs and gas tank. Seems electrical. Have you checked the ignition lock and the kill switch? Maybe there is a bad contact inside and vibrations cause it to shut down at least the ignition part of your bike. There's an earlier post on how to start the bike without the ignition key. Perhaps it's worth a try.

[Anonymous]

I don't know about ruling out the tank. Are you sure it is getting fuel? It is possible that the fuel flow is restricted, and that it runs out of gas and dies. Then, when you start it again, you crank it a few times and this gets enough gas into the float bowls to get it going for another 30 seconds.

If that is the case, it could be a faulty petcock, clogged fliter, or plugged tank vent. When it dies, open the tank. If it is under vacuum, then you have a plugged vent.

If it was a short, I would think that it would be intermittant, not repeatable. Either it wouldn't run at all, or it would run for five minutes this time, an hour the next time, thirty seconds the third time, etc.

That said, don't rule out anything just yet. Good Luck.

[Anonymous]

You could be right there Brian. It's odd that the problem appears once every 30-45 seconds. On the other hand, the fuel tank and the carbs come from the other bike, and that one didn't have the problem.

[Anonymous]

Good point, Jojo. I missed that the tank from the running bike was swapped. Now I'm out of ideas.

[arveejay]

response to help.

Thanks guys, when this initially happened, the first time I used all the original equipment on the second one and it just died, my first thought was that the tank, petcock or line was plugged so I decided to put the tank on the bike which I knew was fine. It made no differance. I have been trying each weekend for a month to get it going. This saturday was the only time I started cleaning connections. I previously had exchanged the electricals, including the igniter. Just this last weekend I rode the one I already had, to work and back then I took it out for about 100 mile joy ride. The next day, Saturday, I decided to try to get the second 850 running, I cleaned all the connections that had anything to do with ignition, coils, Igniter wires, Reg/Rec, etc., removed battery box and filed down to bare metal everywhere it had to ground. I ran a ground to the battery box, both pieces, to be sure it was grounding. I took the carbs, air box, battery and gas tank off of the first bike and put it all on the second bike, I turned it all on, pulled the choke, and since it had gas in the carbs already it fired up instantly and went to about 4000 rpm, the choke was on full. I returned the choke a little at a time to maintain about 2500-3000 rpm and before it even got warmed up it died. I grabbed the reg/rec, and the piece the igniter feeds and both felt more cool than hot. This is when I performed the stator papers and went thru the test. If I had the test ready I could perform the tests, one at a time, before it would die. The stator was putting out just where the book said it should so I left that and the reg/rec on the bike. I didn't change them. I didn't want to risk burning up the only one I had that I knew was good. Every thing checked out ok except the reg/rec. It only charged to 12.5 volts no matter what rpm I tried. That's what led me to wonder if it could be the root of the evil. Anyway, rather than waist the whole day I put all the parts back on the first bike and have ridden it to work and back all week and have had no problems what so ever. It's really got me baffled. I bought a reg/rec from ebay and should have it in 7-10 days. If it doesn't get to cold in a couple weeks I'll try putting that on and see.

[arveejay]

follow up.

I will try to find the part about bypassing the ignition, about the kill switch, I'll have a look. I have tried running on prime and there's no difference. It will drain the tank quite quickly when hose is in gas can and valve is on prime. Thanks for the help. Here comes the weekend and here I go again. Heck working on them is half the fun but I'm ready for the other half.

[Anonymous]

I can't imagine that the r/r would cause the engine to die that soon. In my view your battery would not be charged, or worst case, be overcharged.

This is the link to the ''ignition without a key'' post. Your GS850 should have the same fuse box as the GS550 mentioned in the post.

http://www.thegsresources.com/_forum/viewtopic.php?t=3657

[SqDancerLynn1]

If you think RR is causing problem It will not hurt anything JUst disconnect it and run the bike on the battery. Just make sure the battery is charged

[Anonymous]

I've read your story. Doesn't sound like anything to me having to do with stator?? sounds like igniton.. Does coil have a resistor wire supplying power to it.. or it may have an inline resistor. I had a similiar problem with a car and I found the problem out when I ran a hot lead to the coil 12v input direclt from the battery. My positive lead to the coil was a resistor wire and would cause the car to die when it got hot, sometimes not very hot at all. Obviously you've got to narrow it down to parts not brought over from ther other bike. Do you know how to hot wire the bike? (start it without the key) if you do this and you still have the problem, then you can rule out your ignition switch and kill switch. If it were my bike, I'd run a wire direct from the battery to the coils and see if that resolves it, however I can't swear doing that won't damage something.. I don't think it will but can't tell you definately.. Good luck with it.. I'll check back to see what it was.. Did you bring cdi unit over from other bike.. sounds like you probably did..

[arveejay]

I don't understand about the resistor wire. All wiring is factory. Only nonstock items are accell coils and wires which look new but I'm not sure. Where do I hook this 12v lead to? I have changed the igniter, cdi box, and cleaned all connections.

[arveejay]

I don't understand about the resistor wire. All wiring is factory. Only nonstock items are accell coils and wires which look new but I'm not sure. Where do I hook this 12v lead to? I have changed the igniter, cdi box, and cleaned all connections.

[Anonymous]

Run the hot wire from the + side of your battery. Try this first, let it run and die. Without touching the key or kill switch, pull a plug and check for spark as quickly as you can. If you have an inductive timing light check with it. It's possible that the coils are acting up. Try that and we'll go from there. I would guess that it's electrical in nature rather than fuel related as when you switch it off and immediately back on, it goes away. Having said that, I wouldn't bet on the coils but would lean more towards a bad ignition switch or kill switch. When it starts to die, jiggle the key in the switch and see if this catches it. Bob

[Anonymous]

Your coils should have a positive 12v wire connect to it as well as a ground wire.. I was referring to you taking a wire and attatching one end to your positive post on your battery and the other end to the positive lead on the coil. Probably one for each coil.. The run the bike and see if it still dies.. At this point, you are supplying power to the coils independant of your ignition switch and kill switch.. It's just another diagnostic tool to help you narrow down the problem. If there is no difference, you might try running a couple of ground wires from the negative coils to the bike from to see if that helps.. No matter what, it's going to end being a 40 cent repair with 40 hours of time finding out what it is.. Oh the joys of motorcycle maintenance.. It could be you ignition switch or your kill switch or it could be an old wire that is on the verge of completely failing and is hanging on by a thread and fails when the voltage builds up.. AS long as the battery is fully charged, the stator should have no effect on the bike running. (At least that's my understanding.) Good luck. Joe