80 850 Clutch Cable Replacement

[djscottymiami]

Well, after getting my new Vance and Hines 4-1 exhaust put in, i put about 300km on the bike. Today when I was coming back home, I was noticing that when I pulled the clutch lever in when I was stopped in 1st gear, the bike wanted to move forward (like the clutch wasn't dis-engaged properly). I figured the cable may have been out of adjustment a little bit since I recently re-did the clutch and it may have needed tightening.


I got the bike home (after great difficulty) and looked at the cable end at the handlebar... low and behold I found a broken strand from the cable and it looked like the other ones weren't in too good of shape. I guess the reason I couldn't dis-engage the clutch completely was that the cable was stretching/fraying?


Anywho... how hard is it to replace the cable? I need to call the dealer tomorrow and see how long it'll take to get the clutch cable in. The bike was supposed to go in for fork seals next weekend so we'll have to see what happens with that (I'm supposed to drop it off next saturday, pickup the thursday after... if the parts take too long to come in, I'll just get the dealer to order the cable and put it in).

Thanks for your time!

[almarconi]

Anywho... how hard is it to replace the cable?

On a scale of 1-10, 10 being the hardest, I would rate the job at about a 2.

[tkent02]

The cables break at the lever because the cable end bearing has not been greased. If the bearing gets stuck in the lever from not being lubed for years the cable has to bend every time you pull the lever. If you don't know what I mean, the end of the cable is a round piece of metal so it can pivot inside the hole in the lever. Grease the round part and the hole.
Grease the moving parts of the lever too while you are at it.
Grease the bearing often enough and you will stop buying cables.

[BassCliff]

Hi Mr. djscottymiami,

There's an 850 manual on my site with cable routes. The cable is no problem at all. There is also a couple of pictorial guides re: front fork springs, fork oil, seals, etc.

Install Progressive Fork Springs
(I did everything except replace the seals)

Fork Seal Replacement
(by Mr. Matchless)

If you work on it yourself, you'll save a ton of $$$ and you'll know it's done right. Otherwise I hope you have a good mechanic.


Thank you for your indulgence,

BassCliff

[djscottymiami]

http://www.z1enterprises.com/SearchResult.aspx?All=True&KeyWords=gs850%20clutch%20cable

Which cable do I need to order? Suzuki Canada doesn't have one in stock.... 3-5weeks to get one in They're 2 different sizes. Both say they're for the Gs850 but none say that they're for a 1980 GS850GL


I've done all the other maintenance on it myself so far. I just dont have the time or the ability to do the fork seals. I'd rather leave that up to someone who's done it before.

[BassCliff]

Hi,

I'm looking at the link on Z1's website:

**************************************

MP04-0031
Cable - Clutch - GS850 GS1000 GS1100

- - - - - - - - -
Motion Pro Clutch Cable 04-0031 - 56" long (end-to-end for inner cable) with 2" slack (max amount end-to-end movement)

Fits Suzuki GS850 G GS850GL GS1000G GS1100G GS1100GK GS1100GL
$13.59

******************************

But you would think that you'd need the longer part for the "L" model with the buckhorn bars. Hmmmm.

850GL OEM part# 58200-45300
850G OEM part# 58200-49100

Thank you for your indulgence,

BassCliff

[djscottymiami]

Well, Here's my dilema:

This is what I pulled out:




Notice this:




and most importantly this:


Prettty damn lucky I made it home!


Now the parts fiche for the bike shows the connector in the middle of the cable (seen in picture #2).

This cable has a seemingly large resemblance to this cable:

http://www.z1enterprises.com/detail.aspx?ID=1440

which does not say that it is for a GS850GL

Whereas this one:

http://www.z1enterprises.com/detail.aspx?ID=1448

says that its for a GL and a G but doesn't have a connector.



Am I safer with going with the first one ( Cable - Clutch - GS750 GS850 GS1000 MP04-0017 ) ? I measured the cable and definately got longer than the 56" that the other cable said.

AARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH lol

[chef1366]

Get the Suzuki cable. You can't go wrong.
They don't have the adjustment in the middle of the cable because you don't need it.

[djscottymiami]

Get the Suzuki cable. You can't go wrong.
They don't have the adjustment in the middle of the cable because you don't need it.

Oops. I forgot to post up that part. The dealer up in Canada wants $42.00 for the clutch cable. The crappy part is the delivery time.... 4-6 weeks away! Apparently Suzuki Canada's warehouses don't have any and it needs to come from Japan.... and they get shipments once a month. I can't wait that long.


They gave me the OEM number. I guess I could try finding a dealer in the states who can sell it to me?

[chef1366]

Try mrcycles.com.

[djscottymiami]

Waiting for a reply from Z1 and Flatout.. we'll see what happens.