Hi Guys,

I'm back to this site after a 2 year hiatus.  This is such a great resource for GS500 owners.  Here's a story that some of you might relate to.  I've moved from Austin to the Seattle area and my bike has been sitting in my garage for about a year and a half until recently.  Since the weather's getting better, I decided to do some work that I'd been postponing for a long time.  So, here goes:

1) I've had a leaky left fork for a long time and I decided to fix it.  The fundamental cause of the leak were tiny pits/scratches on the inner tube that inevitably ruined the 2 previous seals that I'd installed (that was a painful process, so make sure to check your tubes before just changing seals).  Anyway, so I bought a new tube from bikebandit, and installed it along with an OEM oil seal.  While I was at it, I also replaced the oil in both forks from 20w to 15w, which imho is a much better choice.  After getting the job done and taking the bike for a test ride, I noticed that the other fork is now leaking.... I hate Murphy.  I have no idea what I could've done to cause this, but it looks like I have another problem on my hands...... Any advice or clues here would be great.

2) Replaced the original/rusted handlebar with a Bikemaster superbike one.  Great fit, but I don't know how to install the bar ends that I previously had.  I really like the Bikemasters btw, so I would recommend them.

3) New brake pads up front.

4) Took out and cleaned/lubed the rear suspension.  I don't have the C-wrench used to change the preload on the back, so I'm seeking suggestions for alternative tools for the job.  Right now, it's at 7, which may be a bit much (at least I'd like to experiment).

5) Changed oil and filter.

6) Lubed the chain.

7) Replaced the bolt/nut for the sidestand, which had too much play in it.

Finally, I had a small oil leak from the magneto crankcase cover.  First, I tried tightening the cover and guess what?  Yes, I broke a damn bolt....  Why do thy make them so flimsy anyway.  That didn't help of course, so I decided to do it right and bought a new gasket.  Even though I spent hours scraping off the residue of the old one, when I put the cover back on, filled her up with oil, and started the engine, it was leaking oil like crazy.  Tried to tighten the cover some more.....Yes, you guessed it, I broke another bolt....  This time, I emptied the oil and used a dremel tool to completely clean the mating edges, put the cover back on, tightened the bolts hand tight, and voila, leak is gone   

So here you go... I hope that some of this helps others avoid a problem in the future. BTW, mine is a 1994 GS500ER.  Mostly stock (except for the new handlebar). 

Thanks again for a great forum.

Zoom

with your bar ends, if you thread them back into your old bars loosly, you should be able to pull out the rubber insert and use it in your new bars.

With the gaskets, Make sure that you clean off all of your old gasket and then I use a gasket cement or sealer to glue it in place. It makes installation easier and reduces the chance of leaks. I just scrape them because dremels can cause an uneven surface and get lots of dust into the open engine.

Go slowly when tightening the bolts and go in a criss cross pattern (or follow the torque procedure) to tighten the cover down evenly and do it in 3 or so steps.

Make sure your threads are clean and don't exceed the specified torque values, If yu go too toght you'll either pinch the gasket and cause a leak, or break a bolt (also causing a leak) The bolts are small and there are lots of them so they don't need to be super tight.

You live and learn 

That's sage advice.  Thanks!

Any ideas for tackling the rear suspension preload (without the special tool) and/or what I could've done to screw up the "good" fork?

Zoom

Welcome back!

Fork seals wear out on regular intervals.  You didn't do anything wrong, it just wore out.  Usually, when one does the other will soon follow (just to experiment I replaced one and it took a whole year for the other one to finally give up; this was on an '82 Yamaha 550 Vision)

Bar ends - Are you going from the stock bars to the Bikemasters?  If so, you'll need to buy a pair of Lockhart-Phillips barends to use the rubber parts out of, and buy a pair of longer screws from a local hardware store, and maybe nuts, as well.  Take one of the stock barends and the rubber part with you.

Rear shock: http://gstwins.com/gsboard/index.php?topic=26802.msg289184#msg289184

Thanks scratch!

Zoom

Tonight, I did my other leaking fork.  When all was done and I was pumping the forks to check installation by pushing the bike forward and applying the front brakes, the forks were very stiff.  The tubes would only go down by maybe 1cm or so.  Much less than before.  Is this normal?  How stiff should the forks be with 15w fork oil?

Also, I found out that I have another small leak from the clutch pushrod seal, so I bought one today and will install probably tomorrow or over the weekend since it looks like we might be getting some rain... sigh.  I hate Seattle's weather....

Zoom

Shoot... I think that I just realized my mistake.  I measured the oil (382 ml), but after pouring it in, the level wasn't 9.9 cm from the top, so I added.  The mistake was that the fork wasn't COMPRESSED.   This is going to be a pain to fix.

Zoom

For your rear shock, you can probally use a large screwdriver and a hammer to adjust it. It's tough with or without the tool. If you remove the rear wheel you'll get better acess.

For your bar ends, I'm sure that scratch is right about the lochart philips parts working, but it's easy and cheap to modify the originals or use a piece of rubber and a nut with a large shoulder.

Basically they are held on by compressing a piece of rubber in the bars. If you can get the original pieces out of the old bars you'l see what I mean, no big deal.

Thanks again, but the old handlebar is long gone.  From your description, I might be able to make a replacement myself.

Later,

Just came back from a ride after fixing the fork oil level.  It's never ridden better     I definitely prefer 15w over 20w and it looks like both forks aren't leaking any more.