Project Belsebob - a restoration of faith.

[Guest]

Hi! My name is Niklas, and i live in sweden. In the summer of 2010 i bought myself a GS1000 with the idéa that you dont have to be a "cool" Harley Davidsson rider to build bikes that look nice, right? I have always lookt up to the HD-guys building cool bikes, and felt something like despair that I could not afford those kind of money on a hobby. But then it hit me, why not trying to do something with whats been given to you, instead of whining about not having money? Granted i did not have the amount of money to buy my "cool" parts to my ridicoulus expensive bike. But i did have two hands and a little experience at the anvil with a hammer in hand, and i do have got a nice talent for spraypainting. Basic engine-stuff i also know. This project would be a restorations of faith for me - to prove to myself that you can build cheap and cool! So i checked out some bikes that would fit my wallet. And I did the best choise ever! The GS1000 - Bulletproof!
Aside from the new handlebar and exhaust it looked exactly like this when i bought it:


So this is what i had to work with. And at this point I hadent the faintest idéa of what i would do. Restore it to original? Build a longchopper? Do some ugly modern Streetfighter? A german tail maybe? Nahh...I decided i would go for a bastard style between Scrambler/caferacer with a dash of custom chopper. And i would like some of Old school style to. But first there was some repaires to do...

[Niklas]

The repairs.

During this stage i was not certain if the bike would run or not. Was the engine alive, could it be brought back to life? There was cracks in the rubber intakes beween the carbs and top.
(I have just now learn that this device is called intake boots in english and also that they may be cheaper to import from the US, thank you GSresource, - if thats the case I shall do so immediatly!)
I called some dealers to get new ones, but the ba---rds would chare me about 90 dollars each!!! Thats 320 $ for rubber!?! I said - Well i dont need originals suzuki. Som aftermarket pirate things from china wil do just fine, those cheaper right?
The answer was: They dont make them. -Say whaaat?
Turns out that there is so little demand on that spare part that its no profit in making those. So the dealer could just get me originals.
I said Thank you kind Sir, but i will pass.

And then i went out to the barn and welded me four intake thingies myself and conected the carburators with rubber hose from a volvo cooler.
As shown on the picture below, you can also see a home made sketchy intake air filter. Im planning to make nicer ones in brass evetually on a lathe machine.

[Niklas]

It just wont start!

Okay. With the caburator intakes fixed i was ready to give it a go. I connected a brand new battery and pushed the "start" button. A kind of whezing sound came from the left side of the engine...the starter clutch! It was broken, it did not grip the shaft. Oh no! Not good!
So i disassembled the starterclutch with some swearing words and other bad words on my lips. And lo and behold - som stupid "mechanic" had drilled three holes through the thing and welded it rigid. The three screws that held the thing to the starter sprocket had gone clean off! And one ofthe three needle pins that pushes the "rollers" that conect to the shaft was also in two parts. So this time i i had my old lady/wife weld that thing for me, because she is the best with a MIG/MAG. I did not think it would work, but it did!

It was this little bugger that needed repairs, you can see the repair as a brighter area beside the bottom "roller".

[Niklas]

Its ALIIIVE!

Okay, now with the startercluch fied we were ready for another go, i turned the starter screwdriver and pushed the red button. And after a few seconds the engine started with a roar! The hole exhaust system and mufflers lie on the floor beside the bike so the noise the engine did when it came to life was...astonishing! I was a very happy camper!
So now when i new that the engine was a Lazarus type of guy (Bible - Jesus does a nifty trick with a dead man named Lazarus) I started planning on what I would do for real. I decided that i would give the fueltank some tender love and caring and bought at brand new fueltank lid. But before I could install it i moved the place of the thing to the right. I simply welded a steelplate over the old one and drilled a new one to the right,used a hammer to shape it a little and then welded a new "fitting" into the hole. And after painting the tank now looks like this:


Oh, and the halfmade thing you can see in the bottom of the picture is the caféracer tail.

[Niklas]

And this is where I am today.

Heres the bike today, not finished at all. but what i have done so far is:
Brakes back and front - restorated.
Steelhousing brake - front
Paint - tank, tail, rims.
Welded caferace tail.
Lether saddle - hand sewn, brown leather.
Front fork - restorated with new springs and gaskets, oil.
Cut the back of the frame to get a "bobber" feel.



What im planning to do this winter is take away the original fork and making a webb-fork instead and put this wheel in front with a breakdrum istead of disc like it is now. This is and old wheel my lady wife found when she was scavenging for materials with a friend of mine. Im going to fix it up and put a tyre with wite sideboard on the rim.
when it comes to the engine i going to check that the compression is allright and the trying to fit a little compressor to overcharge it. What do you think folks?

[cowboyup3371]

I really haven't had much of a taste for a cafe bike but that looks really nice. Congratulations on the work so far and looking forward to seeing more.

[gsrick]

I think you've got a good start there. I don't know about whitewalls on a cafe. But I feel ya, on the price of Harleys, I think your paying more for name and reputation, than a quality bike. I get just as much attention on my GS($800), if not more, than my friends with there $10,000+ Harleys. It seems every where I go, someone has something to say about it, the bike they used to have, or there brother had ,.... I'm in the same boat, low on cash, big on ideas. Besides, its a lot cooler to make something with your own hands, than to buy someones elses work. I'm working on an '80 1000G that I'm turning into a bagger. Eventually it will be lowerd, with Harley hard bags, and a customized Pacifica fairing with molded in '58 chevy pickup duel headlights. I might go with some whitewalls on it, but I'm still noodleing on that one. Maybe the forks and tires/wires from a Suzuki Boulavard. Have to see what I can find cheap. I'm just getting the bugs out of my carbs with the hepl of these fine folks here on GSR. You've come to the right place, keep us posted. Good work.

[JEEPRUSTY]

Belsebob has a devil put aside for me? For me?

[Rover]

Niklas, You have many skills and talents in motorcycle building,very impressive.Keep the pictures coming,looking good.

[Redneck]

Spoke tires and whitewalls would look awesome with that particular build. Your doing a wonderful job my friend keep it up and keep the pictures coming.

Paul

[gs58]

I was wondering where you were going with the original/long chopper/streetfighter/German tail/bastard style/scrambler/cafe racer look, but so far, so good. Don't see too many compressor installations - looking forward to some photos.

But I'm not so sure about replacing the discs with a drum. I like to stop when I need to stop. If it was a twin leading shoe then maybe, or maybe not?

[TheCafeKid]

It's looking better already! By the way I really really like the exhaust system. There is something about those old school looking up-swept stacked exhaust systems that I think is just awesome. I hope to do the same a project some day.

[Niklas]

Spoke tires and whitewalls would look awesome with that particular build. Your doing a wonderful job my friend keep it up and keep the pictures coming.

Paul

Thank you Paul, I will do that. Is that SCA-armour I see on your pres. picture?
The SCA was the reason that I started doing metalworks and blacksmithing!

[Niklas]

Thank yoy for the input and positive feedback. I will of course post more pictures when I have something new to post. And as I said in the mesage below so are my thoughts right now about this project:

1. Maintenance of engine: Compresson checkup, checking valves and seat, new aircleaner filters in some custom made housing of brass and of course to order new carburator intake boots, my own welded works fine, but are ugly.

2. The webb frontfork, custom made of course, those you buy is way expensive and I like to have my own style of things.

3. Front rim restoration along with the drum, evetually change to brakediscs instead of drum. I dont know.

4. And the compressor I mentioned earlyer, but I need to find a little copressor that will fit and lower the compression. Thats a big thing...

Thanks again for the interest!

[platinum2]

just wondering , belsibob? meaning devil? dosent it?,how is there faith then