1978 Suzuki GS550

So in an earlier post I mentioned that I got a GS550 for some trade work on a little Ace 100. This bike got parked sometime in the early 90's (I was still in high school) under a pine tree. if you can imagine what 25 years of pine needles and sap can make a motorcycle look like, and then add on that someone had been steeling parts off of it; imagine no further.

This project isn't quite finished yet; it will be within the next few weeks to get it on the road. I'm just down to electrical parts I need to buy, but cash has ran out so I'm waiting on that.  Finally finished and it's a fun little bike.

It was a sticky mess, and the electrical was corroded, places pine needles had no place in being. Bolts threated to snap everywhere. Someone tried to mess with the clutch at one point and severely messed that up. front and rear master cylinders were open to the elements and were froze up and junk.  The tank was bone dry when parked (thank god), but the carburetors; where to even begin...

.....Hardened Jello is my best analogy at this point 

The 4 carbs took 3 days to just dissemble with out damaging anything, soak, brush, clean, repeat over and over again. by the end of the week I had them back together, minus pine needles.

did I mention the pine needles and the sap yet? the first day was just pressure washing; that gets rid of most the needles, but not the sap. I've found old bad gas is a great way to clean off the sap; it still takes awhile, but at least it works and gives me a way to get rid of bad gas.

 Bad electrical, everywhere!

 At this stage it was running, notice the little temp gas tank hanging off of the handle bars. drove it around the neighborhood just like this to make sure the engine was sound. it's got goo low in toque, but the chain's links were stretched out in one spot, didn't want to try smoking the tires or anything yet.

 Hair cutting time.

 lowered handle bars. better.

 sucking in the headlight

 tried to see what a uni-shock would look like, not bad but with out redesigning the swing arm, I couldn't get enough throw to support the weight. besides I'm going for an older rat/café racer mix.

 drop the tachometer, just use the speedo

 looks cool, just wasn't going to work.

 Those 1936 Ford spare tire carrier is coming in to use again for fenders. the tail light I think is Ford Model A. I'm ripping the guts out and making it break, turn signals, and marker lights all in one package, using an Arduino mini for the computer; more on this later.

 dropped the stance 2 inches and moved the rear springs

 baked the pain off with a torch, wire brushed the scalely rust off with a wire wheel and coated with Krylon's rust converter primer to make that smokey metal look that I just love. Don't try this with any tank that's had fuel in it with in the last decade, unless you like surprises.

 working on the seat platform

 tail light and license plate holder. Yes I'm leaving all the weld looking like this on purpose, makes it look just raw which is what I'm going for.

 Got burned on some aftermarket air cleaners, they were just junk that fell apart. made these out of old exhaust pipe, stainless pieces and some filer element pressed between. I also used a little bit of old rubber tubes to make a gasket between the carb and the filter for a tight seal.

 this also shows where the key switch is going

 Front fender, because it's required by Washington state law, liked it better with out, but hey I do want to legally drive this. You can also see the hand made headlight bucket. I wanted something small and compact, so it was easier to just make one.

 made the seat with some vinyl and rubatex for the cushioning I had laying around. I messed up on one little stitch, no one else knows it's there, but I do and it's burning me, but not enough to want to redo it.

 Battery box and new rear master cylinder set up. it looks good.

That's all the pics I got for the moment, to this point it's been mostly done in 3 weeks, I'm working out the wiring harness now and I'll add more to this post as it gets more completed.

-Edit 5/4/2017-

Have not had a lot of time out in the garage lately, but finally got my marker/break/turn signal unit built.

18 White LEDs were used, 3 per series channel using a 150ohm resistor (120ohm would have been ideal, but I'm using what I got. the LEDs came from busted flashlights. the outer ring has 12 LEDs separated in to left turn signal and right turn signal and together make the marker for normal operations. the inner ring has 6 LEDs separated into left and right.

Here's the basic on logic:

• normal mode: outer ring lights up
• breaking: outer ring and inner ring flash back and forth quickly 10 times and then goes solid to try and get the attention of any cars behind me.
• left/right turn signal: that half of the outside ring blinks the other outside half stays on solid
• left/right turn signal and Breaks: that half of the outside ring blinks the other side (inner and outer) stays on solid.

This is all handled by the Arduino embedded computer; I'll post the circuit and code later if anyone is interested.

The rest of the wiring is nearly there; about 85%. Currently in a waiting pattern for more cash, to order the remaining parts I need: generic buttons from Digikey, throttle pieces, new clutch and front break master, front break hose, and new coils.

About the coils; they work, but one got awful hot on the last time I test ran the engine; turns out the plug wires was damaged, creating more resistance on the wire, over heating the coil. It tests fine, but it would be safer to just replace both with new wires and caps.

The tail light lens and housing is Delight brand, I thought It might have been 30's Model A, judging from the box I pull it out of but Ford Model A looked quite a bit different, so I'm not sure the age or where it came from, the lens and license plate illuminator window are both made of glass with cork gaskets (they fell apart when I opened it) the housing was changed to fit the circuit board, but nothing is visible from the outside. Doing a Google search the lens looks like Griffin for 1932/33 Plymouth/ /Desoto possibly?  

 now that the computer has a home, I can finish out the harnesses

 break light test

 more wires, and more wires. you can also see next to the clutch lever the custom bracket that will hold the new controls (turn signals, horn, hi/lo head light selector) on the other side (not shown) is the buttons for the starter and kill button.

 The new coils were a tight fit over the original, one had to be flipped upside down.

 yep more wires

 now comes the debugging of the computer, unfortunately I must of damaged some of the PNP transistors used to power the LEDs, or were just faulty. In retrospect, I should have tested the parts before soldering them in place. (got the new plate this weekend to. yay!)

 I don't have any replacement PNP transistors, I had 7 and I used all 7. scratching my head because I don't want to wait for another order from Digi-Key; I dug in my junk to find something. I've been kicking around this old 8-track player for years (I'm not even sure where it came from). I though to myself; why the hell not. I pulled the dozen or so NPN transistors from the side board and tried to look up the parts on line for the datasheet on them (ya right) one site had some base information but not everything I needed, so I set up a test circuit and all the transistors still worked just fine (I know that 8-track got hosed down with water a few years back). I reconfigured the bread board to work with NPNs, at first everything looked great until the Arduino was hooked to it. The Arduino put's out a 5vdc signal, and I had been testing with 12vdc to trigger; It wasn't going to work :(
Originally I preferred the PNP because you pull the trigger low (ground) to let what ever power flow through. these NPNs on the other hand you bring high but the out voltage is the same as the trigger voltage, so they will not work (no I'm not going to re-wire the whole bike to work the way NPNs like to be used)

So one more small order to Digi-Key (damn I miss the old Radio Shacks when they were geared towards us hobbyists) the parts (micro relays this time) should be here mid week hopefully. until then I can still do the carb clean up and startup the bike and tune it a bit, just can't get on the road yet without break llights and turn signals. hopefully the end of the week.

---may 23 2017 update---

started it up for the first time since cutting the exhaust; oh it makes a rumble. So attached a small 1qt fuel tank to the handle bars to take it for a spin in my neighborhood; no seat, no real tank, no marker or tail lights, and apparently a sticky clutch (okay that I did have to get working correctly to test ride).

I'm sure my neighbors love me; with the obnoxious exhaust and half torn down mess putting through the cul-de-sac at 8:30 last night. Found the exhaust was too open not giving me enough back pressure for power, so I made a duster bend down with a tunable washer on  a stud on the inside that I can change to restrict off so much exhaust to make the back pressure. It still sound wicked, but it was too late last night to test (10:15) by the time I got that done.

I still have to tune the carbs of the vacuum before I can put the gas tank back in place, and my final Digi-key order should be here on Thursday, so if everything goes well it will be on the road Friday for some (near to home) test runs. This is about a month later than what I was shooting for, but  it was saving money for parts that really killed me on time. 

--July 4 2017 update--

I've been driving it for a few weeks now daily just getting the final bugs worked out; It's not 100% exactly how I imagined it in the beginning, but I like it better!
There are just a few more minor changes I'll likely do before it goes up for sale, but they are purely non visible. This one was a fun project, but now I'm bored with it and I think the next project will be the 64 Honda Cub 55 for my wife.