GS673 Conversion — Cleaning The Crankcases and Painting Engine.

The 673 kit.

The next step for the GS550 is to relieve the crankcases slightly so that the bigger diameter liners will fit inside. I'd just ordered a new Dremel as my old Draper version was getting a bit tired. That thing has been amazing and I've had it almost twenty years — it's done lots of porting and polishing. Anyway, i was in the process of grinding out some of the casing when the Draper tool finally gave up and spat chunks of plastic out the side. The Dremel came just in time!

If you're wondering about the quality of the deburring tools, sandpaper barrels etc., the Dremel ones are superb! I've always bought the cheaper versions and they wear out in seconds, The Dremel ones are worth the extra cost. 

But on with the job. 

I found it easier to slip the cylinders over the studs, turn the case upside down and mark where the liners were touching. Then remove the cylinders and start grinding. Bit by bit, they went lower and lower.

Suzuki GS550E 673 — Stripping the Engine, Decking the Barrels.

And skim the head!

The next thing on the list was the broken fin on the barrels. I cut out a similar shape from some old aluminium that was lying around, then filed it somewhere near. I wanted the barrels to be hot before welding to avoid cracks etc., so a trip to the oven was in order. Half an hour at 150 Celsius was perfect and the liners slid straight out. This was even better because No.4 sat slightly proud before I started.

Roughly shaped, let's take a look.

Suzuki GS550E — 673 Conversion.

Slight Misfire Halts Play!

It finally happened, I knew the engine was on borrowed time, but it's been happily running me around for the past couple of years, relatively drama free. Now, still running reasonably well considering, it's misfiring on one cylinder and after a quick compression test, no.4 was found to be sadly lacking. You could also hear the familiar chuff-chuff out of the righthand pipe from a burnt exhaust valve.

The reason, you may well ask, why this engine was on borrowed time was because there is wear in the camshaft journals, so not ideal to do a top-end rebuild with the original head. And finding another head for one of these seems to be impossible in Australia. Plenty in the UK and America, but postage wouldn't be worthwhile.

RPM Moto Nerang — New Chain and Sprockets for the GS550E.

Suzuki GS550E — I'm attached to this little bike.
It's nowhere near restored or concourse, and likely never will be, but looks pretty good considering the condition it came to me in. I'm always doing little jobs on it, and enjoy the odd ride out even if the seat is as hard as wood.

The chain and sprockets were well worn, in fact the chain I was using came off my Gixer1000 years ago. So when I saw a NOS standard rear sprocket for next to nothing on eBay, I snapped it up (obviously a fifty tooth sprocket for a GS550 is not a common item now). The gearing on the 550 was way over the top before, and was fitted with a 43T on the back. I'd always thought it had the wrong chain guard on it because of the huge gap underneath, but that wasn't the case. Standard size was seven teeth bigger.

So now I needed a front sprocket and an O-ring chain to go with it. A quick look on eBay and there was a shop selling both, with different sized fronts if need be. I decided to go for a 16T to give the GS a sightly more relaxed time (15T is standard). The prices were superb, and with a little more investigation I found out they were actually on the Gold Coast.

So I popped in...

Suzuki Bandit 1200 — Suspension Upgrades.

The Bandit is pretty damn awesome!
Especially considering, for the last couple of months, the shock absorber has been breathing its last and dumped its oil. Not bad for a 24 year-old bike.
Hustling it along was ok as long as you didn't force it. Maintain pace and keep things smooth and it handled most roads perfectly. But while I've been off for the Christmas break, I figured it was time to sort it all out. With a GSXR1000 K8 shock ready to slot in, it was time to upgrade.

Suzuki Bandit 1200 — Tacho Update!

Resistance is indeed... futile.
As the previous post eluded to, the big Bandit's tachometer is now working only by hooking into the black/yellow coil-feed wire. This is how Suzuki did it on the later Bandits, and I'm having to do this because the later model CDI unit I bought doesn't run a feed to the tachometer. 
After joining the two wires together where the looms plug into the CDI unit, I initially thought my troubles were over, until i hit the 4,000 RPM range.
But then the needle went berserk, floating all over the rev range until you dropped the engine speed to four grand again.

I put this down to interference from the coils, and wondered whether a resistor inline with the tachometer might help.

There were various performance shops around the world selling such items for race cars so, with a bit of shopping around, found that a 10,000 ohm resistor was the way forward. Worth a punt for a few cents (unless you find the guy on eBay who was trying to sell them for $16 per resistor! 😐).

I bought a pack of 25 for $5.82 😀 (you never know when you might need another).

Mk1 Suzuki Bandit 1200 — Tacho Not Working!

Comfort.
I think I've been cramped up on sports bikes too long, because I absolutely love the comfort of the GSF1200! Just this Sunday, after a bacon and egg roll and flat white at Cafe Metz, I headed up the Goat Track. For those not in the know, it's a cracking little road full of hairpin bends that takes you up to North Tamborine. Great fun, up or down, whatever bike. 
Fifty K's per hour is how fast I was going. Fifty K's! 
I was more mellow than a bong-induced mellow guy from Mellowford, and happy to cruise. Until six or seven bikes flew past me like I was on a pushbike!
I took chase, but gave up when the front got a bit iffy in one of the bends. All good, back to Sunday morning cruising.

So what's this thing like day-to-day?
Honestly, it's blown me away. It's quick when you want it, happy to mooch around at snail's pace, just a cracking allrounder. I'm fixing up little things as I go, and making a list of things I want to do.

One thing that was niggling me since getting this thing running was the rev-counter... it wasn't counting the revs. I had two secondhand CDI units, it didn't work on either. I had continuity from the tacho (black/red), back to the CDI. I had 12v and a good earth at the tacho itself. So the tacho must be faulty? One would assume so. But to assume... 

New Old Stock.
Secondhand rev-counters were going for around $150 on eBay, if you could find them. But then a NOS one came up for $300. 

Suzuki Bandit 1200 — Brake Caliper Stripdown.

Nissin Calipers Overhaul.
The Bandit has been a lot of fun so far, but one thing was niggling me. Although all the discs and pads looked quite new, the rear brake was squealing so loudly I was actively trying to avoid using it.

So a couple of weeks ago I thought I'd whip off the rear caliper, clean up the pistons and pads, and apply some grease to the backs of the pads. During the cleaning of the pistons, I noticed part of an O-ring sticking out on one side. The only thing I could do was unbolt the two sides of the caliper and remove the pistons to see what was going on.

The secondary O-ring (dust seal) must have been so dry at some point that it got caught on the piston and worked its way out. However it happened, I popped out the pistons, cleaned everything up in soapy water, blew it all dry and refitted the O-ring along with rubber grease. With careful refitting of the piston, all was well. Obviously this was done with both sides of the caliper, and then new brake fluid was flushed through. The back brake was then perfect... and silent.

What I did notice while the caliper was apart was the amount of orange, jellied brake fluid hiding within. There is no way this stuff is getting out unless you strip the caliper completely, which left me wondering about the fronts...

Suzuki Bandit 1200 — Fuel Gauge Not Reading Correctly?

Rusty Tanks? Sounds like a Blues singer.
And if you leave the rust to spread, the blues is what you'll be singing.

Takes me back to when I was 18 or 19, riding a '58 Triumph Speedtwin. My mate and I were on our way into Hereford, the traffic was backed up a bit from the roundabout and we were busy swerving our way through when he came alongside me, on his Stan Stephen's Stage-3 tuned, RD350 YPVS, to tell me that I had a water leak.

My initial response was "F#ck, where from?"

It dawned pretty quickly that there is no water in a pre-unit Triumph! The tank had split and petrol was absolutely pissing out all over the head and barrels! I killed the engine, which helped a little because the vibration stopped, and calmly pushed (very quickly) it over to the bike shop that used to be on that very roundabout. A mechanic there gave me a tray to put under it, and my mate gave me a lift back home where I borrowed a Transit from work to pick up the old Trumpet. Job's a fish.

But I digress, as usual, because we're now in Bandit country. One of the first things I noticed about the Bandit was the fuel gauge, and it didn't move as Suzuki intended. There was also rust visible in the tank. 
A quick test of the fuel gauge goes as follows: unplug the tank sender unit, rear right of the petrol tank on the Bandit, and insert a wire into both terminals of the loom. This is basically returning 12v to the gauge (or mimicking a full tank). The gauge went to the full position so happy days. Time to pull out the tap and fuel sender.

 

Suzuki Bandit 1200 — The Old School Hooligan Tool.

Bigger cubes!
Part of the reason for putting the GS550 on the road was to take things at a gentler pace. While the CBR600RR is amazing — compliant, smooth, light, quick — probably too quick, you need to be a bit careful where the constabulary are concerned.

Ambling round on the GS is great, it's happy mooching round and gives you plenty of time to take in the scenery. I absolutely love being on old stuff too. Points and condensers, carburettors, air-cooled engines... they just have more soul. The smell in the garage after they've been for a run is awesome too.

But then you hit that steep hill, loaded with hairpin bends, and she struggles in first gear just to make it round. It starts me thinking about GS1000's, GSX1100's, something a bit bigger, torquier. Something that will go two-up with ease, trundle around all day on the sniff of fumes and sit at 3,000 to 4,000 RPM.

Mmm... nice but too expensive nowadays. 

So, it got me thinking. What about the first of the Bandits? 1157cc, oil/air-cooled monstrous fours that ooze torque and charisma, and will wrench your arms off just off idle. Basically the detuned engine out of a GSXR1100. Always wanted a GSXR1100. Mmm, here we go again!

Gumtree.
Such a visual feast of all things bargain, if you look properly. There were lots on there, later 1250S models with the water-cooled engine, but all were runners and commanding large sums of money. I prefer a project for much smaller sums of money. And I found one. But it was a thirteen hour drive, for a non-running Mk1. It looked in reasonable fettle (obviously in photos) and Murray, the guy selling it, seemed pretty legit, in fact an absolute legend. So transport was organised...

Suzuki GS550E — Replacing The Clutch.

EBC Heavy Duty Springs.
So after a few rides on the old 550, it soon became apparent there was a bit of clutch slip when used hard in high gears, but the main issue (for me) was the clutch lever was just too light. To the point that when you were trying to get away from the lights, especially uphill, the clutch just wouldn't bite fast enough.

So Wemoto quickly sent me some new springs, and a Slinky clutch cable in case the old one couldn't take the pressure. These guys are amazing, great prices, very quick and efficient service!

Back On The Road — Suzuki GS550E

From a parts bike, to potential mileage muncher.
It was a little cheapie, bought unseen on eBay. My famed acquaintance Bryan picked it up for me, and even delivered it to the door... I swear legends are made of less. Pretty sure he's dying to ride it too.

It wasn't pretty, but he's a mate. The GS was also rough, no plugs in the engine, the carbs in a box and broken, but with seven years of TLC, dedication and, pure laziness, it's back on the road.

Considering the massive oil leak when the engine was first turned over, the fact that the bores were left exposed for however long, and the carbs had been left off too, it's incredible how good this thing goes and sounds. 

I put a cam chain on it, adjusted valve clearances, new coils, plugs, points and condensers and it runs like a bought one.

With a first test run (shakedown) a few nights ago, I discovered I need to fix a few things:

1) The gear lever circlip fell off and the lever nearly went astray. Luckily the foot peg bracket just held it in place.
2) The clutch slips slightly under load, heavy-duty springs are on the way. 
The lever itself feels so light, it's hard to pull away from standstill — definitely needs more pressure.
3) The seat is too low, and too firm, but the cover itself is still pliable and soft. I assumed somebody had cut away the original foam for a shorter rider, but maybe it's sunk over the years. I've ordered a section of gel to go into the seat for a little more height and comfort.

In fairness, it goes very well. I'll get some of these little jobs done and keep you all posted. Never done a gel seat conversion so looking forward to that. This is how it looks now — not immaculate, but definitely useable.

I'll clean up and paint the exhaust as and when, but for now need to get some miles on it. Hopefully the gel will arrive this week so I can sort that out.

More soon...

Improving Your Motorcycle's Brakes... Cheaply.

As the lever fades...
With a few miles, or years, under its belt, most bikes start to feel a little bit lacking when it comes to the feel at the lever. And I, for one, am not keen on riding bikes where the lever almost touches the bars. Now, if money is no option, there are plenty of easy fixes:

• New discs and pads
• Braided brake lines
• Rebuild the calipers with new seals, maybe pistons if damaged
• Brembo adjustable master cylinder 

But this gets expensive, and changing parts could be masking an actual problem — something that could be easily fixed. So what if you could improve your standard brakes where things have deteriorated over time? Well read on...

Can You Clean and Adjust Your Chain?

Drive Chain Maintenance.
A bit of a back to basics story here. I thought I had this covered sometime back, but I actually don't, my bad. A couple of weeks ago, a geezer asked if I thought the chain on his Ninja 300 was worn out. Wish I'd taken some pics of it now to give you a better idea.

The chain was hanging down in a large arc because it needed adjusting so badly. On closer inspection, it was also really greasy/dirty where chain lube had been sprayed on constantly during its life, but had never been cleaned. It was also heavy and slow to move because of the grease.
Now you can give all the advice you want in person, but words are meaningless unless you're doing the job with them, there and then. And if the person isn't confident in adjusting it correctly, it's a tough call. Everything is easy when you know how.

Regarding the wear factor? It was half-and-half. Yes, you could pull the chain links away from the rear sprocket slightly (a good test for a worn chain), but then I've seen far worse. If it was mine, I'd give it a damn good clean up first, spray it with chain lube again, adjust it and take it for a ride. And then monitor it for a while.

So, a good time for a tutorial. Take from it what you will, ignore it completely, or find out how I get years from chains and sprockets. 

Here's a Can-Am 175 that is just beyond a simple clean and adjust. I'll admit defeat with this one. 

How To Fix Broken Valves On A 2.5HP Compressor.

The Throwaway World...
I've never been one to hang onto old rubbish, ok that's a lie. If it might come in useful one day, it stays... forever. 
But the old portable compressor has been sooooo useful over the years, and I didn't really want to buy another, not yet. It was working its heart out the other day while I was blowing water and dust of my deck, when its tone changed, and not for the better I can tell you!

Had the head gasket blown? Filter blocked? Piston holed?

Ten minutes later the head was off. I'd actually never looked inside one of these before and was surprised at the valve set up. Just a couple of sprung steel strips, and one of them had worn thin and snapped. Apparently a common fault.

Balancing Motorcycle Wheels At Home.

Getting Balance In My Life.
Because I fit my own tyres, I knocked up a contraption to balance wheels ages ago, but it involved a couple of lengths of wood which needed to be supported high enough to get a wheel off the ground. All this took up space and was a pain to set up, even if it did the job ok.

What I wanted was the nifty little self-standing static balancer I'd seen online. A quick perusal of eBay had one snapped up and delivered for less than seventy of the finest Aussie dollars. And, what's more, it arrived two days later! In Australia that's pretty much unheard of.

Just a quick look at the box and you can already feel the quality can't you? 

"This twin purpose wheel balancing stand and stand..." I'm lost. And "twin purpose" means? Well, according to the destructions, either a biker or motorcyclist can use it. 

Alright, sarcasm over, let's have a little decko and see if it actually works.

Suzuki GS400 - Another Bike Project.

I've been busy... with wood. And I'm not a very accomplished woodworker. Prefer metal, but I wanted to create something out of junk. Pallets in this case. They'd been sat outside where I work for awhile, and were going to be broken up, so why not?

Changing Fork Seals — 2011 - 2013 Honda CBR600RR

One at a time...
So I was going for the approach here of "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Only the RH fork seal is leaking on the little CBR, but it's long overdue (just like tutorials on this blog). Well, no more! I haven't been riding as much because of it. I seriously needed a kick up the arse.

KTM690 SMC-R — Review, Test and Smiles.

For the good lord said unto them... "Tell me what it is you want." 

And the fools they cried, "We want power. Great power, over people." 

But the wise, more importantly, asked of power from a different source. A device that could invoke feelings like no other. A mechanical device, designed by the hands and minds of humans... an engine. An engine that could deliver oodles of power from low revs, and induce wheelies at the slightest provocation. And the diligent were patient, and they duly received.

Four-stroke singles. Word.
Unheard horsepower from a mid-sized single is a great feat. For years they were  dull, docile, heavy lumps that were dependable but, essentially, boring. Then they got quick, lightweight, scared the shit out of us, but were slightly unreliable. Because great power comes at great expense...

In time though, we got it all. Including 10,000km service intervals from a single cylinder midsize, pushing out around 66BHP. Stone the crows cobber, I think we're onto something.

The 690 SMC-R.

With great power comes great responsibility. 

Ducatis, Diavels, Dawn & Dusk.

I hate plans...
Always have, the best New Year's parties I've had have all been unplanned. And I live my life that way for this very reason.

I prefer to choose whether I go to a track day at 1.00am on the morning of the track day, just in case something better comes up. 😉

So, the other day, when I was out testing, playing and working on Smithy's Panigale, I fully intended to go for breakfast at the Metz, in Canungra, and then go home. But the best made plans...

Ducati Panigale — Fixing Brakes & Rid... Kicking Ass.

When a job's worth doing...
People scare me. No, mechanics scare me. No, I just hate people. 😉

The reason I really love my job is because you can take something that isn't working quite how it was designed, and improve it. Sometimes you can improve it even beyond the original designer's idea because he/she was probably restricted by time or, more likely, money constraints. 
But in the last few years that has become harder because most vehicles are amazing straight out of the box. No question. You can literally jump on a 650 Versys and embarrass the average Joe on an R1, easily. They are that good!

Why am I ranting?
Because I just rode a three year-old bike which, arguably, should out handle most things on the road. And yet, this thing was hopeless, dangerous even.

Scrub the suspension, we can all ride around that. Tyre pressures might cause a few indiscretions, but hey ho. Brakes? Brakes that are downright dangerous, on a modern bike, is not the way to make progress.

Ducati Panigale 899 — The Review, The Dirt.

Ducati? Never rode one.

It's true, I have never been on a Ducati, not a Monster, not a 916, not even a Mike Hailwood Replica. And I love to ride different bikes, just never had the chance, up until now.

Smithy.

He's a strange lad at the best of times, but had a bit of bad luck recently. The GSXR750L2 that I raved about, and that he crashed at Lakeside, was stolen recently (along with five other bikes!). Bastards! 

The only upside to this dark cloud was that he went out and bought a 2014 Ducati Panigale. And those things, without a doubt, look pretty damn cool.

Oil Filters — Part Deux.

Where are we at?
OK, so I've changed the oil twice since doing the original oil and filter change when I first got the bike. For those that remember, the filter fitted had no manufacturer's markings on it and, when I cut it up, found it to be absolute crap. 

I fitted a genuine Honda one, and since then just dropped the oil a couple of times to try and get everything running clean inside again. Today I put another flush in the engine and changed it all again. And this, my very bored friends, is how it went down.

2011 CBR600RR
Really like this bike, the paint, the shape, its agility... it's awesome. But someone decided it was a good idea to hide the oil filler cap behind that black fairing panel. Doesn't make sense that to top up the engine oil, or check the filler cap for tightness (as they do before you enter the racetrack), you have to remove part of the fairing.

It's True, I'm All Torque...

And old school.
I'm trying to work out when I became old school. I guess I was brought up with old-fashioned methods of working on vehicles and there comes a point when you become the same as the person who taught you. Who knows? 
I also owned old, classic bikes when I was first able to ride on the road so my path was probably set.

What does this have to do with anything?
I often get asked about the torque settings on my various blog posts. Especially the little KTM Adventurer. The truth is, I don't know the actual values required by KTM and I generally crack on through with experience. And this stuff can only be learned over time. When I first started as an apprentice, every time a sump plug was tightened by me, it was double-checked by an old-school mechanic. Every single time. And this went on until they'd decided I was doing an alright job (yeah, they're still checking).

Of course, there are set values for most components and in this day and age of blaming someone else, stupidity and a lack of common sense, manufacturers have to give you an absolute figure for every bolt. Because they don't want to hear you whinge but, more importantly, don't want to be held accountable for anything.

In this crazy world, no longer can you keep tightening a bolt until the thread strips, and then back off half a turn. (Please don't do this, I'm being sarcastic)

Hand tight, and torque wrenches.
With all this frivolity I've forgotten what I was writing about. 

Oh yes, I was considering the small bolts like M5's and M6's a lot of home mechanics consider to be as strong as a 10.8 M12 Allen bolt. Having said that, I've seen a few "professional" mechanics do the same. There is a very fine line when tightening a camshaft cap, for instance, before the threads pull straight out of the head. Ask a Vauxhall/Opel mechanic about the 16V engines and they should be able to give you a fair indication. 

You see, you're looking for that sweet spot where it "feels' just right. You know at that point to stop dead. No further, or tears will flow. But on those Vauxhall cylinder heads, something appears to be made of case-hardened cheese. Either the alloy is very soft, or the bolts just keep stretching. Either way, it always feels like you've left them loose. But you haven't.

And mechanics needed to know. How tight do we go? The official consensus was hand-tight. Most of us, with just a hint of common sense, could get by with that. I wasn't looking for extra grief. I've been tightening bolts for years with very few issues.

But no!
Just as there is always someone in your class, when doing a manufacturer's course, that has to ask the obligatory stupid question, along comes old mate wanting to know how tight is hand-tight? 

"Well, how tight do you think hand-tight is?" asks the lecturer.

"Well, it's different for everybody. What if you're a big bloke, or a female apprentice?" retorts the mechanic (soon to be beaten to a pulp by a class full of impatient technicians).

Stalemate. Yes, everyone's idea of hand-tight is different. But give me strength! 

I see their point, but if you have to ask how tight to tighten a bolt to hand tight, are you in the right job? 

The answer.
Well some clever person at Vauxhall had a think and came up with a figure, which might've been around 5.9NM (I forget), and across the land everyone was happy. No more stressing out over loose bolts, stretched bolts, or case-hardened cheese bolts. 

Those of us with common sense rejoiced because that was one less stupid question that would keep us at the college longer than necessary.

For a while at least.
Because with that came a new problem altogether. You see, no one had needed a torque wrench that could work so accurately, and at such a low figure, before. And where the hell do you get one anyway? Oops. 

So what did old mate, who couldn't decide how tight hand-tight actually was, do without the mouse-sized torque wrench?

He went back to the old method of doing the small bolts up to his idea of hand-tight. Just like in life, the answer was there all along. 😜

More soon folks...

Lakeside 21/1/2017 — A Track Made For Fun... And 600's.

Boys, boys, boys...
Why do we hype everything up? What's with the banter? The underhand tactic of knocking self-confidence?

As long as there's been racing, riders have been looking over at someone's front wheel, looking up at their opponent and tutting. Anything to put an air of doubt into someone's mind and gain an advantage. And, depending on the mental strength of the other person, it's worked more than once.

But I was looking forward to this day for more than one reason. It was a chance to play with the 600RR on a track that was almost designed for it. Sharp, off-camber corners make big power a pain in the 'arris. The little Honda should be in its element. Easy to turn, easy to stop, and easy to get on the power.

The heatwave continues in Queensland and today will be tough. I'm taking my old leathers because the sweat is going to be pouring.