1981 GS450E Rebuild

[pete]

Thanks Leigh... although I think Eddie wasn't terribly happy yesterday 'avo!

Anyways, I had one of "those" days yesterday where nothing seemed to go right. Lost way too much time looking for my key to get the seat pan off again... found them beside my crank case bolts

Anyways... put these bits:





In the BBQ and gave it the final bake treatment:



And this time, any peeling paint will be met with scorn. If I *still* need to do touch ups due to shoddy prep work, it can wait. I want this motor back together!

[pete]

While the engine bits were baking, I figured I'd get the seat foam off and check out the real state of the seat pan.

Underside isn't looking so bad, only really looks like the edges, not the structural bits in the centre:



However, flipping it shows a different story... ugh:



And it seems a fair wack has stuck to the seat foam:



Soaked it in marine clean for a while, this stuff is awesome. That's the same bucket I've been using since soaking the crank cases and it still works just as well even though it's full of crap now:



Continued...

[pete]

So after hosing all the marine clean off, it was out with the wire wheel, wire brush, and sand paper:



Thankfully, at this point all the structural parts are still solid and ok. Only the edges are bad mainly, so to stop it going any further I decided to get some rust converter on it and paint it.

Rust converter on (it's on the underside as well):



And after wiping it off with a damp rag, then running some metho over it, and wiping off again:



That's a locally made (I believe) rust converter there called Septone. It's good stuff!

I made a last minute decision to paint the grab rail while I had the paint out too but didn't get prep shots. So here's that and the seat pan after the first coat:



This morning will be second coat time, then next time it'll be all about the transmission and crank...

[pete]

Second coat on this morning:



And the Black Velvet turned out much better this time by the looks, but still have some small peeling areas where my prep work sucked again:







I'm happy enough to leave it like that until it's reassembled, then I may or may not touch up those little spots that are bad and visible.

[davidduarte]

beautiful work, I can't wait to see it back together! Great to see another twin brought back to life!

[pete]

Cheers David, I'm getting quite desperate to go ridin'. We're into spring already here and still nowhere close to riding... at least we can still ride in winter usually

I'm also thinking about options 4 and 5 for my mock ups, will get back into the GIMP tonight I think...

[pete]

Ok, last effort with GIMP'ing for the moment, or at least last effort for the seat and cowling.

I'll put them all up here for comparison to see if any look better than others, or if they're all just plain horrid and I should start from scratch...

At this point I've dropped the whole flat seat idea because I lose the ability to relocate the battery with that option.

Option 1 and 2:



Option 3 and 4:



Option 5 and 6:



Option 7 and 8:



Also, the plan with the blue is still to end up with either a single offset stripe like the below, or maybe a central stripe with a pin stripe either side, or some other "retro" style paint job like that.

Where the options above have the blue cowling or blue rear BMW GS style guard, they would also get the same stripe(s).



Of course what I see in my head doesn't always translate that well into the GIMP...

[scottychop]

Whew

A lot of choices! I like a smaller rear end like option 4. I can't recall, but have you switched to a smaller battery? If you went with a half size battery like the YTL-4BS you could hide it anywhere, not necessarily behind the seat. You could even put the flat seat idea back on the board and create a "hollow" in the rear panel for it.....

Scott

[pete]

Cheers Scott.

Yeah I'm still leaning towards the lower profile seat and cowling.

At the moment there is no battery at all, but was the standard size. I had a look at smaller alternatives when Macguyver mentioned them earlier in the thread so I will definitely try to go down that path.

I may have to go for a drive to a wrecker's soon with a measuring tape and see what's around. Even though I scrubbed the flat seat off the options, it's still sitting there in the back of my head...

At least with preserving the stock pan I can use it as a mold for fibreglassing if I go down the low profile path and it shouldn't be hard to make up a suitable framework for the cowling so I can still use the key latch.

[Macguyver]

Wow Pete!

Things are really coming together now! Great work.
Seat decisions eh? Been there, done that, still waiting on the T-Shirt.

Call me a loon, but I like #8, the curved rear cowl looks pleasing to my eye.

You should hopefully have lots of room for the battery, they are nice and small after all.

The seat pan looks great compared to what it was, that rust convertor did a pretty good job, I like it!

Cheers, and please remember to keep us pic addicts happy with our fix!

[pete]

Cheers Mac, it's getting there! Well, getting somewhere anyways

This Saturday should be all about the engine I hope, starting to read up on checking out the crank and gearbox as they'll be first in, so wanna make sure I cover everything off properly.

I'm back to the drawing board a bit with the seat so I may end up finding an alternative brand flat seat, or I may look around for another duck tail and seat pan to chop a bit. We shall see...

I'm also still undecided on that BMW GS style rear guard, whether it will look way out of place or not.

[pete]

So I said to my wife I want to buy some bolts from the US... she said look at the exchange rate, nearly 1 to 1!!

So in the morning I will be ordering myself a shiny set of allen head stainless case bolts from Z1

[Ricko19]

I ordered a set of these myself from Z1 last year. Haven't fitted them all yet (only the valve cover ones when I did the clearances) but they look great. Will get around to the others sometime Great price too!

Looks like she's coming along great Pete! Hope she'll be barking into life soon!

I also have a Tranzac full system on my bike ( 4 into 1) sounds amazing. Was on the bike when I bought it and was only 7 months old apparently. Not sure how much it cost.

They've been on other bikes that I've bought in the past and I can't recommend them enough. Not only do they sound great, but the quality of the workmanship is excellent. Give them a call, what have you got to lose? should be fairly reasonable for a twin.

[pete]

Cool Ricko, I'm hoping once I get the case covers all shiny and the motor back together they'll add that nice little touch.

And thanks for the Tranzac feedback. I haven't heard a lot about them, but the very few things I have heard have all been good. Usually if something's bad you'll hear a lot, and most or all of it will be bad.

I'll give them a call once things progress a bit further.

Unfortunately, looks like it'll be a few weeks before I get back into it again at the moment, always the way when I finally get some progress underway.

[Ricko19]

Thats bloody frustrating about the delay mate Its horrible when u can't ride.

I've been much crooker than usual for a few months so haven't been out. In that time the bike has mysteriously dropped a cylinder (don't even know where to start!) and now won't fire at all. She doesn't like sitting longer than 5 days or so without running or I have problems. I plan to start her everyfew days but it isn't always possible the way I am. When I manage to do it though, she starts first prod of the button

Great thread mate - love reading it, and hope u get some more time on her soon