D-Mac's rat bike to......cafe bike? Here we go again.

[CLAY]

 The rings could be stuck from sitting.

I'd guess this ^.  Clean the carbs out really well, make sure she's up to specs, then start test firing it.  My guess is that with a little running things will get better.  My thing has always been to get the bike running (even roughly) so I know I have the basics covered before I start to pour money into parts.

[D-Mac]

I'd guess this ^.  Clean the carbs out really well, make sure she's up to specs, then start test firing it.  My guess is that with a little running things will get better.  My thing has always been to get the bike running (even roughly) so I know I have the basics covered before I start to pour money into parts.

UPDATE! I agree completely. I gotta hear it run before I do anything serious, but once it runs I'm hooked.

It turned over by hand ok, so it didn't seem like there was a ring stuck in there, and the fact that all cylinders were similar was actually a promising sign to me. The carbs look a lot better than the rest of the bike (previous owner cleaned them last year and drained them properly), so I popped on my aux fuel tank and plumbed it in......what the hell.

I was in a rush, but couldn't help myself. I had only 2 minutes until I had to run to a meeting at work, but I HAD to try and fire her up. Nothing. Cranked and cranked and cranked (with brief breaks) and nothing. Damn. Battery was running low at this point.

Just as I turned off the garage light it occurred to me that I had forgotten the most OBVIOUS thing. CHOKE  Duh.

Pulled the choke, pushed the starter, and after about 5 slow cranks SHE FIRED RIGHT UP! All cylinders (I think). A little popping, but nothing serious. WOOT! SHE LIVES!!!!!!!!! Made my whole day (with this kind of project you gotta savour the small victories).

Now to bankrupt myself loving her to death. That Ducati I wanted is rapidly disappearing into the horizon with every minute I spend on this rat project. Next steps are to try and repair the charging system problem (after confirming it exists) and then I'll start to really strip her down. I bought a bench buffer last week, so it's gonna be a long winter of sanding and polishing I think.

[CLAY]

 

Very nice!  That's always a moment of victory!  

[D-Mac]

Well, that was nice while it lasted.

The bike still runs - it's just that the long agony of what it's gonna take to make her run right is now starting to set in.

Compression - still sucks. I'm really thinking it's my compression gauge at the point because the bike will fire up instantly in the cold (I can't even hear the starter - it's like it senses that I want it to start and it just runs). If I can find a better one soon I'll try it. If not, I'll do a leak-down test at some later point after the engine is removed and go from there.

I've never witnessed such poor running in my life. The backfiring through the pod filters is pretty entertaining. Jetting is likely waaaaay off, carbs are probably dirty, and based on how much gas it leaking I'd say that at least one float bowl is stuck. Hopefully the ignitor is ok, but the coils looks to be about 1000 years old. Spark color suggests the condensor might be bad too. So lots of good reasons for its problems.

As the p/o told me, the bike is not charging either. I've spent several hours chasing electrical demons that might be causing the issue. What's frustrating is that the stator and regulator/rectifier test good in every way, so I'm now looking at possible issues with the harness itself (and I'm finding PLENTY, but none is "the" culprit yet). In their wisdom, Suzuki did all sorts of interesting things with the wiring. For one it's super small and has the absolute cheapest bullet-style connectors I've ever seen. They also got creative and decided that one leg of the stator should run through the HEADLIGHT so that it would shut down unless the headlight was on (I chased the damn wire all the way up and nearly all the way back before pulling out the correct wiring diagram and finding that out). I'm now going to bypass pretty much every unnecessary circuit and see if that helps. If not, I'll probably end up replacing the stator and r/r (which are both widely known to be absolute crap on these bikes even if they test well). The fact that earlier owners patched wiring together with PAPER CLIPS (yup!), household wiring connectors, and by just twisting ground wires together in various places isn't helping   I've never seen a bike with so many frame grounds on it.

I'm going to end up rebuilding the entire wiring harness by the time I'm done. That'll probably be a good project for next summer (when I take a motorcycle electrical class).

I'm anxious to start tearing things off, but I'm trying to be patient enough to identify some of the major issues first.

[sammyseaman]

Your bike sounds like my last house

[D-Mac]

Your bike sounds like my last house

Or my current house!  

I started stripping the bike yesterday. I've already discovered that the rear brake caliper will need some serious love - probably a complete rebuild. Easy enough since parts are available (front caliper parts will be harder to find).

I also removed the exhaust pipes yesterday and discovered that three of the eight bolts had already been broken off! One was secured by wire to the remaining stud and two others were sort of JB-Welded back together (crazy because I didn't think that stuff would work in the heat - I think rust was holding on the exhaust collars more than anything else!) Lovely. I managed to get three other bolts off with PB Blaster and lots of heat (I've been soaking and heating them for the past three days), but I broke two others. So now I have FIVE studs to deal with, and one is broken right at the cylinder. I'll probably just pull off the cylinder at some point and drill them all out (or try my local contact with an EDM if it looks really bad). I'm thinking at least two of them will eventually break loose.

[mxvet57]

 (or try my local contact with an EDM if it looks really bad).

I had a bolt brake off on the brake assembly on a transaxle on a garden tractor. It was a pain in the ass to get set up in the machine but after we burned a hex into the bolt it was a piece of cake to remove with a Allen wrench.

[Ack535]

Hey Dean, I recall seeing a parts bike early 80's Suzuki 550E on Craigslist in Monroe area. Might be worth a look.

I'll see if I can't find the ad again.

Pete

[Ack535]

Not the same bike I was thinking of, but a darn good parts bike.

http://detroit.craigslist.org/mcb/mcy/2718799162.html

Pete

[D-Mac]

Wow! That's my EXACT bike. I'd love to rob the wiring harness and lots of parts off that things (maybe the engine too!)

Hmmmmmm....... I gotta get a trailer first.

[wibornz]

I have a trailer...... Just saying..... and a truck......... Not that I am an enabler......

[sammyseaman]

I have a trailer...... Just saying..... and a truck......... Not that I am an enabler......

 

[Ack535]

Me too, I have a trailer and a vehicle to haul with. Not that I want to be a co-conspirator in enabling your bad behavior...

[sleazy rider]

All I can offer is an F-150 long bed, a set of ramps and a Canyon Dancer harness. 

[G]

how many do you want to pick up i can haul six bikes in an inclose trailer  plus one or twi in the back of truck if you want to get creative

[Bender]

How many bikes can we get in a double deck 53' trailer ?  

[sleazy rider]

How many bikes can we get in a double deck 53' trailer ? 

I got two that need to go someplace warm in February, if you're offering.    

[D-Mac]

Update time!
Since the petcock is completely blocked (even on prime I can’t get any fuel to come out, and the PO disconnected all the vacuum lines long ago) I rigged up an old fuel cell to the bike to try and start it.
Below is a video of the bike running (EDIT: Never mind it won't work.....). There is backfiring through the carbs and out the pod filters. Nice. With holes in the exhaust and loose aftermarket filters it’s obviously very lean. Carbs are probably pretty clogged as well and compression readings are still in the basement too. No matter – I will eventually run a leak-down test and likely rebuild the top end anyway. Carbs will get a full cleaning, rebuild, and complete rejetting on a dyno (I have some access to one and I’ll be doing a complete tune once it’s back in running order…..which will be a loooong time).  

Now that I’ve determined that the R/R and possibly the stator are gone, it’s time to start pulling stuff off the bike. The next task was removing the exhaust pipes. Recall those rusted bolts on the headers? I soaked them in PB blaster+WD-40 for three days with cycles of heating and cooling. All were nice and loose when I started to remove them. Result? Less than ideal….

Only THREE exhaust bolts came out cleanly. It turns out that another three were ALREADY broken off in the collar (!) and held on by some sort of glue/JBWeld/wire!? Lovely. I guess the previous owner decided that it would be ok to just glue the old bolt heads back on and forget about it!? The two that I broke snapped off with very little torque. Crap.

I broke out into a bit of a cold sweat when the first one snapped off, but all but one stud is protruding a little, so there’s still some hope. I will continue to PBBlast them. Worse-case scenario I’ll deal with it when I remove the cylinder (a little EDM can always save the day if I decide not to drill it out).
Behold the OEM exhaust. Really heavy! It will likely be replaced with a 4-1.

Up next was removing the rear wheel. It went well, but I rushed a bit and everything got hung up on the rear axle. A little maneuvering and it was out (needs grease, and I probably should check the run-out too).

I removed the carbs next. Boots were stiff, but it’s very easy on this bike compared with some of the twins I’ve worked on. Note how they’re “bleeding” fuel on my work bench……right near a charging. I really gotta get a fire extinguisher for the garage.

Then I removed the intake rubber pieces…..

….and I saw LOTS of this inside the engine!

It looks like the PO was in love with gasket sealer. It flaked off in huge pieces in my hands. I wonder how much of this stuff the engine has digested?
More in the next post….

[D-Mac]

Next up I removed the counter-sprocket cover……the screws were already pre-stripped. Here it is removed.

My little impact driver was having no effect, so I ran off to Sears and bought a much larger one. Heh heh. It made short work of three screws. The other three were too far gone, so I dremeled slots into two of them and got them off! This is my first time struggling this much with fasteners (small impact driver and heat has always worked for me before). I also have a set of Japanese screwdrivers, which usually helps, but these were just too far gone.

The big problem was the one remaining screw at the back of the sprocket cover. It’s recessed, so all attempts to dremel a slot in it resulted in me carving a slot into the cover! Doh! I ended up drilling it off, and the release in clamping force allowed me to spin the shank off with my fingers. Unfortunately, since I couldn’t get the drill centered, I accidentally machined a little out of the cover. Argh.

It’s a minimally important screw since it’s not fastening anything that holds in oil. I’ll probably stick an o-ring in there and see if that works. Replacement on Ebay is only $14 if that fails. It’s a bummer that I got so close to getting it off flawlessly. I’ll need to be more careful with the cases.
Check out what was behind the sprocket cover. This is AFTER I removed about 2lbs of soil, pine needles, and pine cones from back there!

Upon removing the sprocket cover, I discovered that the counter-sprocket was COMPLETELY LOOSE (not even hand tight). The only thing holding it on was a single bend in the locking piece! The sprocket is badly worn and looks to be an original (it has the right number of teeth anyway and it looks like a sprocket with 20,000 miles on it).

Then it was off to the store for a 21mm socket to remove the oil drain plug. There was definitely some gas mixed in with the oil - likely from the stuck float bowls combined with the lack of a vacuum operated petcock shut-off. I was careful to check the oil level before I started the bike (made sure it wasn’t too full or thin), but I’m glad I didn’t run it too long like this! (The smaller dish to the right contains old brake fluid).

My last project for the weekend was to remove and disassemble the calipers – also a first for me.
I got them off the bike easily enough (although I forgot to loosen the rear ones on the bike so I marred the cover getting them apart in my undersized bench vice. Here’s the rear, which looks worse than the front.

Would you trust your life to this?

Inside, the seals and boots looked worn, but intact. The pads will be replaced along with all of the seals, etc. (no sense taking a chance on brakes!) Getting the caliper pistons out was a BEAR – especially one of the rear ones, which was rusted in place. After applying high pressure air, I got the worst one to turn enough to grab it and pull it out. I marred it in the process, but it is definitely getting replaced anyway.
Ugh.

I’m now boxing up everything I’ve removed so far. I’m off to buy a small parts washer (and fire extinguisher) tomorrow and then I’ll be looking over the calipers, removing and looking at the master cylinders, and pulling off more bits in preparation for removing the engine.
I will have lots of time to work on the bike over the next couple of weeks.

I’m a little ahead of myself, but any suggestions for a color scheme? I really like red/black/silver, but I’m clueless about what colors to put where. I’ve looked over all sorts of café bike pics but I have trouble making up my mind, so I’m very open to options. Everything is getting repainted except the engine if I can help it (although I might paint the cylinders to set them off from the bike a little).

[Meemuh]

 

You may need all the help you can get...