$270 '78 GS1000EC Project (Frankenstien Re-build)

[TheCafeKid]

Those cases are so porous they're very difficult to weld successfully. I agree it's worth a shot, and I can't really see how big the crack is, but you may find it's a permenant fix. Then you also may find that even after welding the oil will seep through the weld. Worth a shot for sure if it's only a few bucks (less tha $50) to have it done.

Can't tell from that pic but agree with Dale. Likely that's one of the mounts that uses the little teardrop nuts on the back side. A pain to get back in too. But someone probably used too long a bolt and just kep cranking on it til it was "tight" and had punched into the case....

[7981GS]

Possibly a better picture of the damaged area:



TCK is probably correct. Someone, installed a bolt that was WAY too l-o-n-g.

Daniel

[Mr.Midas]

Wow, you guys are good! Great deductions and input very appreciated. Here is a better shot of the crack's location(I'm pointing up behind the mount hole inside the hollow area where the teardrop nut goes)



To weld it all the way up I'd need to get at the backside and I think to even hope for a clean leak-free weld it would need a proper degreasing, bake in the oven, and then another scrub with soap and water. The bike was apparently set up for cruising and wasn't ridden hard, so it should be sound enough internally to forgo a rebuild this season at least. My shop space is a little limited, so when I need to do motor work I almost have to "retool" and setup a clean environment to work in. Most fab work must be stopped to keep the dust away(and even then it seems to never fail that someone leaves a door open while making dust outside)

[Mr.Midas]

Catching up on progress. Most of this was done through last summer:

The tank from a '77-'78 CB750A I picked up for $52.50 shipped. Ready for fitting modification.






Cleaning up the rear frame and setting up the 01-05 GSF1200 Bandit swingarm which I picked up for $85(just recieved the bushings and lower shock mounts made at a local machine shop for $215)




More pics to follow(after I get some sleep)

[Mr.Midas]

Setting up the rearsets from 03-04 GSXR1000 - Left with shifter linkage, Right with MC, light sw, Caliper & hanger. Total: $89.55 shipped.

Ended up with about 7.5" inches behind and maybe .5" higher than the stock footrests.





Time to recycle this tubing!



The bent portions worked nicely to brace up the front with revised coil mounting. Coils with good ends are from a Honda VT750 $20 + shipping with other parts. (those crappy welds were cleaned up later on after I acquired more practice and a better helmet)




Bracing in the frame(can't remember what that location is called atm) and passenger footpeg mount tabs set. Brackets are from an 08 Kawasaki ZX10 @ $25 + shipping with other parts.



Still need to upload pics of the rest of the bracing /w front gussets, upper tube boxed gusseting, and X-brace seat mount above the rear wheal...



Fitting the Gas tank: New rear mounting plate fabbed and tacked in place(if you look closely, you will notice the boxed gusseting on either side of the upper tubes.)






Had to make some clearance for fork tubes and upper tree: Trimmed back the front and removed a little crimping(challenging sealing it back up. De-rusting the inside first probably would have helped)





Rear mounts attached and tank mounted after some clearancing work on the underside. Surprised that the neighbors never complained about the late-night racket I made.
Also you can see the test fit '02 KTM 300 Aero-tapper Bars with riser adapters I picked up for $50.00.




In Primer after some sanding/filler work.

EDIT: The tank was striped down on the topside with chemical stripper before paint-work. Also the inside was thoroughly cleaned and treated with phosphoric acid based rust-converter(got the kind from kleen-strip this time and it worked as well as any other I've used), and to prevent the tank from rusting up again, it was lined with Red-kote. Also not pictured is the new petcock bung which I welded in aft of the original.

[7981GS]

You do VERY NICE work!
I love the coil relocation! Excellent idea, I may have to steal it.

Daniel

[Mr.Midas]

03-04 GSXR1000 steering damper, $32 shipped. Made the lower tree bolt-on bracket from scratch. To keep the damper from bottoming out I welded on about 1/8" more to either side of the stop lugs.




Shortening the front of the fender. The piece of steel brake line serves a very special purpose...



With some care and patience the brake line is formed and welded along the cut edge of the fender, and then dressed with a sanding disc. Now whatever's been cut or modified has a factory-like appearance and needed rigidity.(Picked this trick up from a hotrodding acquaintance.)







After a phosphoric de-rust treatment and some sanding. I used some por-15 on the underside and on the outside I sprayed the primer and base coat, then experimented with some black marine paint which I actually brushed on. I think it'll do. One more light sanding to take care of some runs, and if I still don't have a compressor set up by then, lay down the finish coat by hand again.

[voivod]

cool mods

[Mr.Midas]

You do VERY NICE work!
I love the coil relocation! Excellent idea, I may have to steal it.

Daniel

Thanks! I'm sure I copied someone elses design when I came up with that mounting configuration.

It is a bit tricky installing the coils now(and I learned to ALWAYS place a large rag or towel on top of the motor encase I drop a washer or spacer), but my Honda gas tank was able to retain much more of it's original capacity this way.

[Mr.Midas]

Once I'm caught up with what I've already done, updates should be a little less random. I'll try to let the pictures do most of the talking, but would be more-than-happy to provide specifics. Should I keep listing part costs?



More stuff I did Last year:

Picked up a SS super-trapp 4-1 with a little road rash for $240 shipped. Repacked the can with SS scrubber pads and painted with some flat black VHT. Only pic I could find for it was the of the diffuser(phospho-treatment and high temp paint). I was in a hurry and left the camera down. It was stuck upstairs in the shop and I had nearly forgotten where the whole exhaust was when I got back home. Major brain fart...



Dismantled, cleaned, painted, and re-bulbed the gauge cluster. It was tricky finding the bulbs locally because the parts stores only stocked like one pack of each size needed.
The chrome covers were severely pitted, so I attempted an interesting faux finish idea after phospho treatment...



Basically, what I did was spray it with paintable rubberized undercoating(intentionally creating a spatter finish). After it cured I sanded it lightly to "knock down" the bumps, and painted. It gave the covers a deep-grained vinyl-like appearance, which I think looks cool, but I'm still not sure it'll look good on the bike.

Tomorrow I'll cover how I made fiberglass side covers from scratch. I started on them last fall before leaving and in the past couple weeks completed fabrication & mounting. Just need to paint them!

[Mr.Midas]

Again I was rushing to finish up some things before leaving last fall and didn't think to take pictures until after undoing the form used to lay the first couple layers of glass mat. After cutting and forming the expanded metal( regular wire lath for stucco, ect) to fit the frame openings, I covered it and the frame tubes with masking tape. To keep the fiberglass from sticking to the tape I used a layer of plastic wrap held smoothly in place with contact spray adhesive. After two layers and another extra coat of epoxy I popped the panel off in order to work on the backsides.(Had the frame on its side while glassing)




After a little 60-80 grit sanding, I laid down another layer on the backsides, and let them cure again.



Then trimmed down with jig-say and smoothed the edges and bumps on the back with a sanding flap-disc on the side-grinder, before hot gluing a 1/4" cord down and placing the upper mount tabs cut from 3/4" aluminum angle.



Then I laid strips of fiberglass over the cord with a liberal-enough amount of epoxy for it to wick into the cording, and placed the whole panel into two regular(hole-free) shopping bags and applied a vacuum.
Already had the pump from when I retrofitted the AC in my car.(It's just a regular compressor pump pulled from a "retired" appliance.)




Last steps were setting a 1/4" furniture-bolt(with its large, round, and flat head well suited as an anchoring flange) with a couple layers of glass to lock it down. The knobs were made from T nuts epoxied into 1/2" pvc.(I could have picked up some knobs from the hardware store, but I had the extra epoxy and figured, "why not?"



The cording acts a reinforcement beam around the entire panel, allowing me to use a single fastener to hold them in place without the risk of them beginning to "flutter" at speed. I was really surprised just how rigid the panels became afterward.

A little more sanding/filler/paint work and I'll have some pretty nifty side covers. Of course now the battery box and electrical panel will need some refitting modifications to allow these panels to work(already have to do something with the battery box anyway).

Latest pic O' the project. Note the finished bracing, rearset/passenger peg brackets, and other gusseting in place; removed seat latch/hinges; X-shaped brace/seat mount; small cross-bar for retrofitted front seat release; and gas tank in some color.

[ratdude]

Wow , those side covers are incredible . Really nice job fabbing those up .

Rat

[Mr.Midas]

Whipped this oil cooler adapter up a couple days ago.


Many thanks to BassCliff's website and Mr. Nessism's writeup on making the adapter plate. I've been schooling myself here and on BassCliff's site as much as I can, and am really impressed by all the good info and very cool projects(stock and not), and love all the detailed how-to's.

I ended up using a 5/8" thick piece of aluminum instead of 1/2", and for whatever reason I couldn't find a 3/8 to 1/8 FIP reducer fitting locally, but did find a 3/8" FIP to Male flare fitting that I could get the proper dimensions out of for the port adapter.



What's the general consensus on installing GS750 oil pump gears after installing an oil cooler for a stock bike? Has the pressure/flow drop with the cooler installed ever really been measured?
I know this has probably been asked and answered a hundred times before(still haven't quite mastered search functionality... I usually have to bookmark a thread I want to return to, because it usually takes forever to find it again.)
Thanks all!

[Mr.Midas]

Painted the outer fork tubes yesterday. Going to tackle cleaning, fixing, painting miscellaneous stuff later today. I really want to have this thing rolling again, but I'm not quite done with the frame.

Definitely starting on the seat pan this week, and possibly physically committing to repair the crack in the case with JB-weld. I am 80% certain the JB will fix the leak and hold long enough for me to prepare for a rebuild, but that 20% uncertainty has kept me from actually doing it... (In this instance, it looks like more $$$ does appear to be the only solution; however, since I can't just print and dispense it like a continuous roll of toilet paper, as the current administration enjoys doing...)

[Mr.Midas]

Slowly making notable progress...

Painted the triple trees; cleaned up/painted headlight rings and rear housing, & fit the new replaceable-bulb xenon headlamp; finished painting cluster housing & assembled cluster(mechanically tested needle functions with a drill); began work on controls - clutch bracket and left switch box painted(still need to fix a missing horn button & a cut wire); and almost finished with the seat pan form.

Here's a shot of the (florist foam) seatpan form on the bike. Just a little more shaping left to go:



I'm very new to fiber-glassing(the side panels I made were my first real attempt/practice), so any recommendations/pointers as to the current profile I've come up with would be welcome. Thinking about maybe pushing the first "step" back a little more to give me a little more room up front.


Double checking clearances with the swingarm before setting lower shock mounts; this will be the closest spot if the shocks ever bottom out:



There is just 3-4mm of space between the MC's reservoir tube elbow and the swingarm. To close for comfort? I could remount the mc to the outboard side of the bracket, giving me another 5-7mm to work with. Or I could just move the whole rearset out, and lose a little cornering clearance(really wasn't a regular peg-grinder in the past anyway).