Boxcuta's 83 GS550E Project log...

[Guest]

Holy crap,

I don't even know where to begin. As promised in my intro I am starting a build thread for my new GS. I have a lot of theories about what happened to this bike in it's past life, and why it was donated to me. But we'll get into those in a bit.

I am very new to working on bikes so this will be a long thread with a good bit of trial and error.

My long term plans are to get her running strong and trouble free, maybe do some performance upgrades. I also plan on doing some frame modifications, new suspension from a GSX-R, and maybe a new swing arm. First things first the engine and electric system. After going over some of the wires, I saw few things that made me sadface...

As I got her...


Carbs removed, they don't look bad to me...




Air box missing a few pieces, one of the places that caused issues.


This guy...




What I assume is the R/R unit...


Something "un-good" happened here, these are routed to the R/R unit...



So my tentative plans are as follows,

Carb cleaning and new o-rings. (Hopefully that's all they will need)

Valve adjustment.

Oil and filter.

New R/R unit as mentioned in the "Stator Papers". (Please God no fried stator)

Sorting the fried wires.

Buying a battery.


I will post my progress and questions here. Please feel free to critique my work.

Wish me luck folks, I'm going to need it.

[JEEPRUSTY]

excelent build thread thus far

good luck and all that

[GateKeeper]

good luck on your project.....

if you need inspiration or motivation have a look at my rebuild thread and or anyone of the many on here, past and present....lots of good info, ideas, etc....

Cheers

[Flyboy]

Looks like a good one, I am along for the ride, keep the updates coming.

[Boxcuta]

So I have a theoretical question.

With the weak link in these bikes being the electric system. Are there upgrades to the system that can be done to make it more reliable?

For example a beefier ingniter/coils? Maybe redo the wiring?

I plan on buying the R/R unit and maybe the stator as well.

What else can be done here?

[eil]

The "weak links" are mainly:

* the dodgy stock R/Rs (not exclusive to Suzuki, however)
* one stator leg going through 3/4 of the harness before going to the R/R
* electrical connectors get dirty/corroded easily and must be cleaned semi-regularly
* lack of proper frame ground

These don't necessarily apply to all models, though. I seem to recall reading that the 550s had unreliable (and hard to find) ignitors as well, not sure if that applies to yours or not.

The coils are generally reliable and the harness is fine once the connections are clean.

[Boxcuta]

Update,

Thanks Eil for the list of issues, I will definitely keep them in mind when I tackle the electrics.


So I got the carbs taken apart, they look decent no real damage. I did have a few questions though.

The needle here doesn't seem to have a "pointy" end, all the manual show a picture of a pointed needle. Is this something to worry about?



Another odd-ball thing I notice is the bottom of the float bowl has a nipple on it that had tubing tied in a knot attached to it. Again I haven't seen this in any manual.





Also on the air-box, the plastic clamp that attached to the carb also had some sort of nipple for tubing. Any ideas of what these go to?



Those are a few things I noticed that stuck out to me. I currently have one carb soaking, the other is still together.

Looking forward to your feed back.

[Flyboy]

Good to see you getting on with it.
Not sure about the needle, what you have there in the first pic is the float and the needle is the little small thing above it, looks pointy to me. maybe a better pic on its own on a white piece of paper as a background.
Not all needles are pointed, some have a ball like tip.
I's function is purely to allow or stop fuel flow into the float bowl, if the tip of the needle matches the seat in the carb body it came out of, you are good to go.
However the needle may be damaged or worn and not sealing properly against the seat, allowing fuel through, even when closed, which is "maybe" why you have pic two.

That tube in pic two coming out the bottom of the float bowl is just the over flow pipe, it gets routed down between the back od the engine and the swingarm, to dump onto the road.
Seems like they had a flooding issue at some point which caused fuel to run out there, so they simply tied a knot in it.....eish.
That could have been caused my a faulty needle and seat, not shutting off, or an incorrectly set float level, that was too high.

[Boxcuta]

I'll take some better pics of all 4 needles tomorrow. The needles don't look damaged, but I'm too new to them to be good judge lol.

[JEEPRUSTY]

could that last pic be of a dial a jet system in place?

[Boxcuta]

Here's another pic of the needles, I think they are good to go.



Tonight I plan on rinsing and reassembling the first carb....

[eil]

Those needles look fine. Make sure they (and the slides) are smooth and you're good in that regard.

The float bowls are supposed to have drain screws and o-rings in the bottom. Not a brass tube and fuel line with a knot in it. Sounds like you're getting to know the PO pretty well now.

Edit: I just noticed Flyboy said those are supposed to be overflow tubes on the bottom of the carb bowl but I'm not sure I agree. You can show us a picture of the inside of the bowl to settle it, if you want.

[Boxcuta]

I rinsed the carb tonight, to my surprise the Pinesol took the paint right off. The brass needs a little polish, but all in all the pieces look clean.

After everything dries I will spray everything down with carb cleaner and put a piece of wire through ever hole. Then reassemble, correctly I hope lol.




One thing I am not sure about is this brown stuff, it's sort ashy almost.

Is it suppose to be a sealer? On the clean carb it's pretty much gone, and will need replacing.





Was there suppose to be some sort of plug here?


PS: Eil, I will get a pic of the inside of the bowl tomorrow.

[JEEPRUSTY]

Plig wgere?
One of those orifices is for the transverse fuel tube so there should be an open hole there.

[Boxcuta]

Correct, the fuel line goes on the opposite side. I blurred the image, to show focus on the hole. The brown stuff is some sort of filler.