change oil on 81 gs550L

[Anonymous]

i need to drain and replace the oil on my 81 gs550L. could someone give me some sort of instructions on how to do that. thank you
bret

[Anonymous]

Change oil on 81 GS550L

First off get something for the old oil to drain into,an old oil can with one side cut out or a cat litter tray would do.(Make sure the cat ain't still in it!)
Put the bike on the centre stand and run the engine for a few minutes until the oil thins enough to flow easily.Not too much as you don't want to burn yourself.Put the container under the sump (oil pan) and with a 22mm socket loosen the drain plug,located in the centre of the sump.A spark plug socket should fit.Remove the drain plug watching out for the hot oil.To change the filter undo the three 10mm nuts on the casing at the front of the crankcase behind the header pipes and let the oil drain.Watch you don't burn youself on the pipes and DON'T drop the nuts or the spring (behind the casing) into the oil.I speak from experience.Remove the filler cap from the clutch cover,this lets the oil flow quicker.Remove the oil filter and replace with a new one,checking the condition of the O-ring in the filter cover.Any doubts,replace it.Once the oil's drained refit the cover and drain plug,then fill with approx 2.4 litres of 10w40 oil.Don't forget to replace the filler cap.Run the engine for a few minutes,check for leaks then check the oil level and top up if necessary.Dispose of the waste oil and filter sensibly,clean yerself up and go for a run!Hope this helps.

[Anonymous]

thank you

thanks a lot

[Anonymous]

Sorry for the newbie question, but...

How does one dispose of the old oil? I assume you can't just throw it in the trash...

Is there a place to dump it or drop it off? Like going to a Jiffy-Lube or something?

Thanks!
Justin

[Anonymous]

Change oil on a gs...

Not sure what the procedure is in the States as I'm in Scotland,but I reckon you could try a garage,a service station or even the city council environmental dept.Sorry.

[Anonymous]

Bret,
I haven't changed my oil yet in my 85 GS550L so I was glad to read the thread. Procedure sounds like what is in my Clymer service book for the GS550 series (including your year).

The purpose of this post is to let you know that all parts stores (NAPA, Pep Boys, Checker, Autozone, and Advance, etc.) take used oil up to 5 gallons at a time. I keep two 5 gallon buckets (pickle "barrels") with lids just for this purpose. It's like doing feet maintenance around here sometimes with two cars on the road. One at my son's house across town and his two cars too all changed here at my house. Now the motorcycle. Not to forget all the lawn equipment and snow thrower (go that when my manual snow remover moved out (son).

So, there's the straight poop on disposal of used oil. You can usually mix other petroleum things in with the oil (rear lube from a car, etc.) EXCEPT gasoline. They won't take oil with gasoline in it I suppose since it's likely to blow up in storage tanks.

They sell the stuff back to oil companies for recycling so they're not just doing us a favor.

I'm pretty sure Jiffy Lube, Valvoline instant oil change, and all those places would gladly accept used oil too. I used to take mine to one of those places when we lived in Louisiana. (I'm in Ohio since 1998).

Tim