My GS sprung a leak!

[afweinie]

OK, so I was not all that shocked consider how long it sat idle. Still a little depressing to see though.

Anywho, I took the bike around the block a couple times to give her some exercise. Which was a lot more fun once the #1 cylinder started running:? That took about a minute once I started moving. I think I may have to completely rebuild the carbs after all. I would like to run a couple tanks of good gas through her with Sea foam first. I just don't think these short 5 & 10 minute runs are doing any good cleaning out the carbs. This is the first time it has happened since the bottom end of the carbs were cleaned out. The bike did sit for a couple days without me running it. Are there any consequences to it running for a short period on only three cyls. ?

That took about a minute. Then when I returned to the house and shut off the bike I notice smoke wisping up from the front of the engine...
low and behold I have oil leaking somewhere on the front of the engine. The bike is off at this point so I double check the oil level (which was just changed a couple days ago) it is a tiny bit low, maybe, so I crank her back up. Runs fine, and the culprit is quickly found: my cam cover gasket has spung a leak at the left corner where the cam chain is near the middle on the front side. 8-[

Back to the GSR here, a little searching... oh, this is not at all uncommon. A call to Real Gaskets in TN and my cam cover and also a breather gasket are on the way. I also have my factory reprint of the service manual in hand now too.

More good news. My rear master cylinder rebuild kit and all important mirrors came in today, so I can pick them up tommorrow\\/ My new tires are also in route. I felt brave and ordered two Avon AM26 Road rider tires. They seem to be pretty new, I had trouble finding much info on them other than Avon's description. But I like what I saw and the prices were pretty good too. Thing is I'm not really a super-experienced rider so I'm not sure what my review would be worth, however I'll post one after the new treads have been on and the bike (and my maintainance skills/ tenacity) have been proven roadworthy.

I sure am ready to go for a ride. OK, this is a nice length book now, I'll quit for now. Thank you for all your contributions that make this place what it is.

[terbang]

If its a pre 82 1100 then thats pretty common to leak from there. Post 81 (ish) they added extra bolts in the front of the cam cover for a good reason.

[mark]

Running it on three cylinders for a little bit won't hurt anything. Is it always the #1 cylinder that won't fire at start up? A carb rebuild could help, you could also switch your #1 and #4 plug wires and see if the problem moves to #4 to see if you have a weak spark or other possible ignition problems.

[afweinie]

leaks...

Sorry guys, I finally added my bike to my sig line.

The bike is an 83 that does have the extra bolts there, but the poor thing spent the last three years sitting idle with the previous owner. I did not exactly rebuild the carbs, but a friend of mine went through did pull them and go through the bottom end. After that this is the first time that one of the cylinders was a little stubborn. Of course now that I've seen the detailed carb rebuild on the home page I see there is a lot more that could be done there. One thing I noticed when looking for carb rebuild kits is that they do not seen to all be created equal. Some have definately contained more componenets than others.

Does anyone have a sugggestion on who has the best rebuild kit?

Mark, I have seen on here that there is weak spot with the stator/ rectifier sometimes, but for right now I'm thinking it's the carbs. If it continues I will look into spark issues.

[Dave8338]

I ordered mine from georgefix and was very satisified with the contents and the quality. Price was right in the middle of cheap to expensive.

[afweinie]

The gasket is on the expensive side

but I liked what I saw. Apparently the far majority of their gaskets go to aircraft. My main concern was to not overtorque the gasket. Planning on putting some blue Loctite on the bolts to keep them in place though.