West Seattle GS500 Club Bike Cave day today!
Member Gorilla came over and helped with a much needed cleaning up of the cave. Then we evaluated his bike. Seems besides eating oil it now has a leaky gas tank with some dampness under the right side (we smelled gas).

So..... 

Looking at the plugs and inside of cylinders with a spy scope, we deciding the oil issue was leaky valve stems on the left cylinder.

Rather than take the bike out of service we opted to embark on a head rebuild. No heads on ebay so we took a chance and finished stripping down that $100 parts bike I got last year. Surprisingly - the engine looked really good. There was a little water in the left side so some slight rust on the valve and gunk in the cylinder.

The head looked really great otherwise, so the plan is to rebuild that head, clean the pistons and hone the jugs. Once done, we can take a day and swap the jugs & head onto his bike without removing the engine from the frame. He took the pistons home to clean and get new rings.

Our only expense will be a valve spring compression tool. Anyone in West Seattle area have one you'd let us use?

After all, with the spare parts here and since the head on his bike needs new valve stem seals, why not take a spare motor and rebuild the head, pistons, jugs then just do a one day swap? No down time. and we will gain valuable experience. When done, he will have an engine like new good for another 100k miles. I imagine we will replace the clutch plates and do a lower end check-up when we replace the head.

...and that makes for an interesting project in the next few weeks.

(For those wondering, since we replaced his forks a month ago he has no more leaking forks from those perpetually leaking forks. New bushings came in to completely rebuild those leaky forks for the next person needing forks. )

As for the gas tank problem, he will borrow a spare tank from the Bike Cave and matching tail plastics for a few weeks while he finishes painting his original tank.

Later BrianRC stopped over and we put engine bars on the EX500. We were going to put on the Motad exhaust but found we needed to get original exhaust clamps as they were not included with the Motad and the Muzzy on there didn't use the OEM exhaust clamps. I posted on the EX500 forum for those parts. If anyone has them here, let me know.

(New members may not know the West Seattle Bike Cave operates like a co-op. People take parts and others leave/donate parts. We all help each other and the only cost is for a part we don't have, and beers & pizza's. Often parts go around the world to help twinners in need for postage + donation. We're now stocked on shims thanks to jestercini and other assorted parts thanks to weedahoe. We're always glad to warehouse your un-needed parts and distribute them when someone needs them. We've got 16 rims, some with decent rubber, plastics, luggage mounts, cowlings and other stuff. We only ask that requests for special parts you be patient for us to locate them. Emergencies to get your bike running or licensed get priority.)

Today was a fun, satisfying day.

.....and here are a couple pictures....


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All praise the bike cave !!!.
It's a wonderful,magical place !!.


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U guy's r so lucky with all the help n stuff around. I have to get my friggin wheel aligned & I sweated all day but its still the same... Like the joker said why so serious   

Got a spare engine from Unsane .. Cheers bro!
Got a second seat from Beezleboss .. Cheers bro! ... Nice cars btw!
Got a K&N drop in .... Because it was on sale AND the sales guy gave me an extra discount  .. And because I needed an air filter anyway
Got a reasonable set of feeler gauges
Got myself a pair of Bull-It riding jeans http://bull-it.com/products/covec-laser/indy/ .. And got a discount on them too!!
Got the new copy of AMCN free ... 

Quite a good day ! 

God damn janx u did have a good day

Quote from: slipperymongoose on September 17, 2013, 04:48:30 AM
God damn janx u did have a good day

yep! ... Nearly forgot ... Unsane also gave me a spare whole dash and clocks!!

Only thing I am having trouble tracking down is a waterproof case for the Ghost .... Might just end up going online for it    ..but I want it NOW!! 

I thought the drifts were all waterproof as they are?

Vlog thread

Got insurance and went for a ride. 

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T - that's a beautiful bike! Like brand new!

(Stainless steel chain guard would really look good on her. )

Agreed.  I really like that color scheme.

- Bboy

Thanks. Probably later. (who is doing the chaingards?) Going for the shock upgrade next and the spacers for the front. 11k on the clock.

Quote from: tcmia on September 17, 2013, 12:55:59 PM
Thanks. Probably later. (who is doing the chaingards?)

Me.

http://gstwins.com/gsboard/index.php?topic=58237.msg660337#msg660337

Took it for a quick ride to the MVA to renew my car's registration (which I found out has been expired since April...WHOOPS). The bike is running poorly again. It seems to bog down and stop accelerating past 1/4 throttle, so I'm thinking it's a carb issue. Putting the petcock to prime doesn't help, nor does opening the choke or any combination of the two.

test the performance of the rejet I did last night.  Stock jetting sucked; now it's almost perfectly the way I like it.

BrianRC came over and got "IT" - a 1971 TS-185 to fire up. It is a real POS! Throttle seems stuck open internally so we have to kill it after 1 second since it goes right to full throttle.

Then I put the black tails onto Frank. These are the 2007 tails that go with the 2007 tank. I think I prefer the silver 2006 tail.

Looked at the wiring think i got it figured out. It sits in the garage waitibg for the frame brace and a few other parts. Mught be able to ride before the snow flies.

Installed an LED Battery Monitor
Works a treat


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Is that the Gammatronix one from the UK Cods? Got one on my custom dash and has already saved me from one failed R/R