Winter projects

[007brendan]

These are actually about a year and a half old, but I'd figure I'd post em anyway.  At the time I was living in an apartment and my bike desperately needed a valve clearance adjustment, but my parking space was in a small, dark, underground garage with no power outlets.  My only option was to squeeze the bike up the elevator and onto my porch.  I figured as long as I'm going through all this trouble, I may as well do a few other projects I had been meaning to do.

Some pics of the workspace.  Not ideal, but it'll do.












Doing the valve clearance adjustment





Switching the rear shock.  I used one from a gsxr 750 with a remote reservoir.






One of the nuts on the rear shock linkage was completely seized.  Had to cut it off with a dremel.




Testing the fit




Just enough clearance on the linkage






Not enough clearance on the swingarm though, had to grind a bit off.














Mounting the remote reservoir




A few quick coats to prevent rust on the swingarm




Switched to a 15-tooth front sprocket




New rear sprocket and chain while I'm at it




Ignition advancer from Bob Broussard. Thanks, Bob!




Changing the brake pads.  Rear wasn't too bad.  Front was almost completely to the metal.






Gotta paint the calipers red!  Pretty sure it makes you go faster.  Switched to braided steel lines, too.




Sanding and painting the headers.  I'm pretty sure hell is a place where you're forced to sand all day




My slip-on, I think it was made for an older honda, not really sure.  I've actually had it on the bike for a few years.




Managed to break a bit and tear up a bunch of screws taking apart the carbs.  Replaced them all with hex screws.








Finally, an oil change.








The bike all put back together!

[mennobike]

Looks great man, impressed you had the gall to pull your swingarm on a balcony!

[Iarn]

Great write up. Love seeing these stories.

[ShowBizWolf]

Me too... thanks so much for sharing all that excellent work!!!   

That's the same color scheme as my GS... do you have any pics or details about how you cleaned up the tail?  It looks very similar to how I set mine up. 

[The fink]

Looks awesome man Great job on pics and details.

[007brendan]

Me too... thanks so much for sharing all that excellent work!!!   

That's the same color scheme as my GS... do you have any pics or details about how you cleaned up the tail?  It looks very similar to how I set mine up. 

I don't think I have any pics of the tail cleanup.  I do have some pics when I switched out the handlebars that show the old tail.  I basically just threw out the whole fender and tail lights and replaced it with one of the clear alternatives integrated tail lights.  It's the one for the GS500F model but if you trim a little bit of plastic off rear of the side panels it fits.  I used a piece of angle bracket from home depot to mount the license plate. 

In retrospect, I wish I had kept the fender so that I could store stuff under the seat.

[ShowBizWolf]

Cool beans... swapping to the F tail light was one of the first things I did when I got my GS!

That would indeed be a bummer to not have the storage space under the seat anymore    When I cut my fender I trimmed it all the way up to the bottom of the space and then made some little brackets for the plate.  I found the thread with the pic, about halfway down... http://gstwins.com/gsboard/index.php?topic=67924.msg817505#msg817505

Do ya have anymore plans for your bike?

[007brendan]

Maybe change the front signals or get a set of rearaets if I e er find a pair for a reasonable price.  At this point, Im probably more likely to buy a bigger bike than put more money into the gs.

Ive dreamed of chopping off the tail and making a sweet little cafe type bike.

[GSRiderDad]

Nice work!