My 1980 Suzuki GS1100L

For all the Before and After photos, click here
(Note - photos pages will come up in a new window, so if you have a pop-up stopper, disable it for this)

Part one: Introduction

Early in 2004, I had two bikes. My original bike, the 1981 Yamaha XS400, and my regular and
long distance ride, my 1997 Kawasaki Concours. I'd decided to give the Yamaha to our friend Kelly,
because it was really too small for me to ride comfortably. I didn't NEED a second bike,
but then again NEED is a subjective term, isn't it?

One thing I'd found on the Concours, is that regular maintenance is very expensive if
you put on a lot of miles. Valve adjustments, brakes, etc. all add up to hundreds of
dollars you could be spending a year. While my mechanical skills were improving,
I was still nervous about doing a lot of things. Having a project bike could be a good
way to learn about bike maintenance without risking serious screwups to the Connie.

Part two: Hey Dave!

My friend Dave Nahan, who was the guitarist in our band shoot lucy used to
ride, and I knew he had an old bike in his garage collecting dust. He'd offered to let
me use it to learn on, but an 1100 was way too big for a starter bike. At the time he lived
a few blocks from me, but in May of 2004, he was moving about 50 miles away.
I wondered if he'd consider selling me his old bike.

I talked to him for a bit, and he said if I could get it going, we could talk about
a price (it later ended up being $250). The bike was in less than stellar shape. It hadn't been licensed in four years,
and it hadn't been started in three, I'm sure the carbs were full of varnish, it didn't idle, the brakes
barely worked, the fork seals leaked, some of the wiring was duct taped and the mufflers sounded like a coffee can
full of rocks. This was not a good sign. Dave got it started with about three cans of starter fluid,
and we managed to hobble it to my house. I don't think Lisa was thrilled, as the first
she saw of it was me wheeling it down the street as I'd run out of gas.

I proceeded to dig into it with the idea that first I should get it running, and then I could deal
with the other stuff. My goal was that if it weren't a lost cause, I wanted to get it running
by Labor Day to run it in the GLMC Buffalo Run in South Dakota.

Part Three: Chris the Mechanic

I started looking for parts, because I learned with the Yamaha, that a lot of parts can be
discontinued for older bikes. I found the cables and hoses easily (and learned it's best
to buy OEM parts for cables and gaskets, so you know they actually fit). I had to replace the brake pads,
brake lines (with stainless), and replace the rear brake master cylinder. I did a valve adjustment,
(which taught me how to do them on the Connie, saving about $600 a year already) I sanded off
some of the rusty spots, and painted some small parts, but the one thing I couldn't find
was the stock exhaust. It seems that Suzuki stopped making them, and there's only one aftermarket
exhaust still made for the bike. Vance and Hines makes it, but the problem is, that it's a 4 into 1
exhaust, and on this bike, it blocks access to the oil filter and drain plug. I didn't want to have to pull
the exhaust every time I changed the oil.

Some guys on The GS Resources message board had clamped stock Harley-Davidson pipes
to their exhaust in place of rusted out mufflers. Since most people replace their Harley pipes
with straight pipes for the sound, they're cheap and readily available. I got some pipes off
ebay, and managed to make them fit. They looked terrible at first, until I was able to
get some chrome heat shields to cover up the automotive clamps and reducers I used to attach
the mufflers to the stock headers.

Part Four: It works!

I had mechanics do two things, rather than doing them myself. First was rebuilding the
carbs, because I'm terrible with small parts. It was a good thing too, because
the place I took them said that they were among the worst they'd ever seen to
the point they almost couldn't get the pilot screws and jets out. I also didn't do the fork seals
myself. I had to have the front tire replaced anyway, so it seemed easier to have them
done at the same time. All the other mechanical and electrical work
was done by me. I did have some setbacks, like filling the crankcase with fuel
three times thus ruining 12 quarts of oil, and dumping about three gallons of gas
on the driveway after not properly attaching the fuel line to the carbs. I broke a turn signal switch,
went through three choke and two clutch cables, two fuel petcocks, a lot of fuel line, and broke the airbox.

I also had to refurbish the seat pan. It was almost rusted through, and had I not done it when I did,
it would have been a lost cause, which is a real problem, because it's also discontinued.
I replaced the rotten foam and cover with a new Travelcade seat and cover on the old pan,
and added a small windscreen to just keep the wind off my chest.

Still, I met my goal of getting it running for the Buffalo Run. You can read about that here.
It ran perfectly, though I didn't do so well in the rally. There was only one thing left to do.
I needed to get it painted as the clearcoat was peeling off. Our friend Paul recommended a guy to do
the job, and I wantedit painted a metallic blue (the same blue that Fender paints their Lake Placid
Blue guitars). Sure enough, one of the first colors he showed me was perfect, and I got the
tank and side covers back a month later.

The bike looks perfect now, and I'm really happy with how it turned out. I completed my goals of learning
how to work on a bike (without ruining my other one), and I'm most proud of taking something
that was a total lost cause and left to rot, and turning into something that (I think at least) is pretty cool.