83 gs550 es

[kevsgs]

Hey everyone, finally got a chance to start this thread for the build/rebuild. Not quite sure what catagory it would fall into. I'm trying to get it all fixed and in good shape again. I bought it in pretty bad shape. The only thing it really had going for it was the engine would start and run for a few moments. I've been slowly going through the bike fixing it as I go. The main problem I'm having is the carbs flooding, I've posted this problem in the carb/fuel forum and have been getting some helpful advice there. Although if the new valve seat o-rings dont fix the problem then I will be at a total loss of how to proceed. I really like this little bike and would love for it to get out on the road again. I've enjoyed fixing it up, and have spent so much time with it now I am definately attached to it and want to keep it. I'm happy to have found a site where people are just as into these cool bikes as I have become. My intention is not to put it all back to stock, but to just make a cool bike that will be fun to ride and hopefully in a few years be my sons starter bike. Well let me tell what I have done with it so far, I'll try to get in as many pics as I can but should have took more before pics.

[Motocrossx23]

Definitely post of some pictures! A few of us on here have some on going project threads that might help you out with a few things. A lot of useful knowledge can be had easily on here, it's a great community

[kevsgs]

Flooding issue

I'll address this first since it is still an ongoing issue. I'm not going to go too in depth since its one of the parts I'm still working on. When I got the bike the oil level was way overfilled. Once we smelled the oil it obviously had gas in it, which I'm sure was from the flooding. Drained it, put in fresh stuff with a new filter. Pulled off carbs, broke them down and gave them a total cleaning, they didn't look bad at all though. After puting them back on the bike they continued to leak, they float valve was not stopping the gas at all. Ordered new valves seats and needles, o-rings looked great so didn't order them at the time but after reading some forums here decided to go ahead and order new ones because at this point thats all I can think of is the problem, maybe PO put in wrong size or something. While I had carbs broke down I decided to give them a little extra something for appearance and painted the bowls and tops with anodized blue.

[kevsgs]

After pic

[kevsgs]

Electrical

When I got into the bike one of the first things I noticed was wierd wiring going on. After tracing a few of these wires I found that someone had hard wired the starter straight to the battery, this was just one of a few off things I found. The left side controls were aftermarket and had twice as many wires as the OEM, the only lights that were working were the lo beam on the headlight, one blinker would come on, not blinking, on only one side and that was it. No high beam, no brake light except for the rear brake, and three blinkers were not even coming on. After diving further into it the main problem was the wiring of the aftermarket controls. I have never took on this type of electrical task, but dove in with service manual with diagram and went through just about every wire on the bike to make sure they went where they were supposed to. It truely looked as though someone had just winged it, poorly I might add. So 30 hours later over a three day period I had everything back to proper working order. For the aftermarket controls we had to open it up and try to identify what wires did what, but I was lucky that most of the wires were original so I could easily trace them and get them back where they belonged. Not bad for my first time attempting this. I did get nervous as I would get one system working and another would fail, but going through system by system it all worked itself out.

[mike_of_bbg]

The main problem I'm having is the carbs flooding, I've posted this problem in the carb/fuel forum and have been getting some helpful advice there. Although if the new valve seat o-rings dont fix the problem then I will be at a total loss of how to proceed.

I haven't seen the other thread, but have you checked to make sure the petcock isn't sending fuel down the vacuum line? That will dump fuel into the carbs, no leaks past the needle valves or seats necessary...

[kevsgs]

Engine

When the engine is going it sounds strong, but not being able to take it out yet means there might be some work that needs to be done, not sure yet. Besides changing oil and filter, also put in new plugs. One of the next steps with the engine will be to check the valve clearances. Other than that I don't think it needs anything at the moment. It does have a 4-1 exhaust with an old school super trap. Sounds pretty cool when its going. The carb has been jetted with slightly bigger jets. After I'm able to take it our I'll be more able to tell if I need to tweak that setup at all. May need to get a dyno jet kit, but like I said it sounds great and strong so I think its OK.

[kevsgs]

I haven't seen the other thread, but have you checked to make sure the petcock isn't sending fuel down the vacuum line? That will dump fuel into the carbs, no leaks past the needle valves or seats necessary...

While trying to fix carbs I have had the vacuum line on and off many times and have never once seen any signs of gas. Petcock seems to be functioning properly, but if the o-rings dont fix the problem that will be my next step, then at that point every part of that system will be brand new OEM. But like I said the petcock seems to be doing its job.

[kevsgs]

Brakes

The front brakes felt very spongy, so we flushed the fluid and put in fresh. There was almost no fluid in them, and only one side of the right caliper seemed to be working. There was a lot of corosion near the piston heads so we cleaned those up real good and with fresh fluid they were 100% better. Pads had plenty of life to them. After I'm sure I can get the flooding problem fixed I plan on putting on new pads and stainless lines before next riding season. The rear brakes were good.

[kevsgs]

Body

The tank and plastics had been painted a flat black, which looked cool, but was old and beat up looking. So I put a fresh coat on them. I also didn't care too much for the look of the rearend. It reminded me of the new bikes in need of fender eliminators. So I chopped off the rear by about four inches or so, remounted the tail light under the back cowl, and cut off the lower part of the rear fender bracket and modified it to hold the liscense plate and rear blinkers. Before:

[kevsgs]

tail section

I think this really cleaned up the tailsection some.
After:

[kevsgs]

tail section

I have been considering doing a custom tail section with a single seat also. I've seen some really cool ones people have done.

[kevsgs]

Front Fairing

Well the next thing I'm going to tackle is the front fairing. The fairing is from I believe a Kawasaki, doesn't look too bad. I started painting the windscreen the anodized blue:

[kevsgs]

This seemed to be a bit much blue, so I added some white:

[kevsgs]

When I tried to put a clear coat over it though the anodized blue did not like the clear coat, so I had to go over most of it, but left a small strip:


Now the problem is that because it is not the right fairing it is only mounted by three bolts in front, two under headlight and one above. It holds it there but at high speeds it will be shaking and blowing around pretty good. So I'm going to make a couple of brackets on the sides and one over the top of the instrument cluster to better secure it. This should be interesting since it will be my first time welding...wish me luck.