Greg's GL1100 Winter Project

[Greg_C]

I purchased my 1980 GL1100 project bike before christmas 2012, and was finally able to trailer it home to my garage on Saturday Jan 5th 2013. The winter has been quite bad here in Nova Scotia Canada this year, making driving challenging at the best of times.
I used the "How to" article to ensure the bike was staped down on my trailer and the 150km drive home from Sheet Harbor Nova Scotia was uneventful.

The bike had been sitting stored in a garage/bard for the last 7 years, and the inspection sticker on the bike shows it had been last saftey inspected/ok'd for on the road use in 2004. In NS you need to have a safety inspection every year, although now it has been changed to be every 2 years for a used vehicle, 3 for a new vehicle. Anoter tax grab by our provincial government.

I also had to pay the "provincial tax" of 15% for my new purchase when I did the title change. What a crock ... but I regress...

In any event my adult twin daughters helped me transfer the bike project from my trailer into the garage, which was not a simple job as the rear tire was locked up (disk brake siezed). But we got it positioned in the garage on a bright bitterly cold winter day.

So begins my project..... I found this site and registered soon after buying the bike ... many positive and friendly welcomes from many other Goldwing enthusiasists. This site is fantastic ... the admin guy is a saint .... or he deserves a place in goldwing heaven ...

The users/visitors of this site are true Goldwing patriots .. and all are extremely knowledgeable and helpful ... all add to the value of this site...

so I'm giving back and will be posting my pictures and progress as I work thru my winter project...

I have noted a certain rebuke/distain for post "without pictures" so I'll do my best to keep the troops happy by uploading pictures from my project as it progresses.

I am a solf confessed adictive garage tinkerer ... I love to "tinker" on various garage projects ... bikes, cars, motors etc... I look at an oil change as a simple 15 minute task that gives me a chance to look over the vehicle, and look for any issues, problems. I have a wife and three daughters all with their own vehicles, so changing oil and doing the brakes etc. is something I've been doing for years. People will say to me why I "waste my time" doing that, but I get a lot of satisfaction doing it, and over the years, I know I've saved our family a fortune in auto repairs/service. And I have taught my wife and daughters to let me know when another 5000kms has gone by or if they hear any "funny noises" coming from their cars.

As for cars, besides our daily drivers I have just sold my classic 1980 Porsche 911 which I bought 7 years ago. Before that I had fully restored a 1979 MGB ... in between and while I owned those I worked on a number of other projects including a Yamaha XJ750, and a couple of other car projects. My garage is not perfect, but it is mine, and it is my sanctuary where I can think, relax, and "tinker".

I've owned and driven 5 or so bikes in my younger years, the largest and last one I drove which was a 650 Yamaha. When the children started to arrive many years ago, the bikes and toys got shelved or sold ... but I always though I'd get back to them sometime in the future. My brother had a Honda Aspencade back in the mid 80's which he said was very reliable bike.

Flash forward ... empty garage needing a project ... came across this 1980 Goldwing GL1100 Interstate.

so I start this thread with good intensions of posting progress pictures to it as I move the project along.

greg

[RoadRogue]

First and foremost another big welcome, wecanalwaysuse another Canuck around here. I am glad to see that you havebeen paying attention about the pictures issue, no pictures means it didnt happen . I take it that the engine turns over freely. Before you try to start it (again) change out the timing belts. You can get them at NAPA, Gates belts T274 .They will be about half the price as the ones from Mother Honda and of the same quality.
There are lotsof threads here on every aspect of bringing your bike back to life afterits long sleep.
We love to see these old girls back on the streets, they draw lots of attention from people on the street, more so than the newer ones. People cant believe its as old as it is and still looks that good.
If you need help/advice or parts just ask, we know everything.

Oh ya , keep up the good work with the pics.

[Greg_C]

So the first thing I did when I got the bike in the garage was to remove the valve covers, pull the plugs and spray soime wd40 into te heads... and let them sit for a couple of days ... then I carefully , manually turned over the crank shaft, making sure that the valves/rockers were moving and nothing was locked binding up.

I then adjusted the valves, an recheced after turing the engine over a few times ... couple of the valves needed adjustment.

Some coolant weeping from the water pump weep hole sor a water pump rebuild is in the works for me...

removed the seat, false tank, filter ... get a better view of the state of things...

then removed the gas tank sending unit and saw quite a mess inside, so know the gas tank has to come out. Spent time looking over the site... to prepare myself... removed the rear crash bar assembly ...

removed the front grill, horns, drained and removed the radiator, drained oil (a thick slimey goo), removed oil filter cover and water pump cover.
disssembled water pump and determined it to be rebuildable (from info on this site) ... others will wade in and say wy waste your time but I',m stuborn, cheap or both ... so I ordered rebuild kit and gasket set off e-bay ...

when I removed the lower front cover, there was lot of "sludge" or oily jelly fish present... see my pictures ... I removed the oil pickup / screen cover on the side of the engine ... could not get the 4th bolt off ... the site indicates I can use a "crow bar" to pry the frame away from the engine, but I could not figure out how this was supposed to work.... I was able to back out the 4th bolt until it interfered with the frame ... then I used a hack saw blade to cut the bolt in half, the cover fell free, and then I removed the remainder of the bolt ... used a shorter bolt after cleaning the screen and reinstalling the screen cover etc. [cutting off the bolt was not fun, but with patience i got it]

After I drained the oil and while the screen cover was off, and after reading a few posts, and seeing the oily sludge in the engine, I decided to flush the engine with kerosene... with my oil drain tray in position I dumped a litre or so into the oil filler and a lot of the sluge/crud was force out and came loose, I did this three or four times, and used a small old tooth brush along the lower front of the engine to get the loose crud/oil free... the gooy mess was gone, and then I put the screen and cover back in place after cleaning it...

greg

[Greg_C]

Here are a few more pictures of the project ... first one is the oil jelly fish found when drained oil ... what a gooy mess ...

IMG- 20130118-00017.jpg

I was able to flush out the old oil by dumping/flushing kerosene thru the engine .... Then I spent some time on the water pump dissembly ... took the bakelite type water pump apart ... no a lot of play in the shaft ... removed the retaining clip and drove the shaft out of the assembly ... used a file on it side in the slotted shaft ... again lots of great info on how to do this from this and other sites referenced on this site. The key from what I gather is the condition of the shaft of the pump ... if it is not pitted/worn, then the rebuild should be successful.

Water Pump Dissassembled - 1

Water Pump Dissassembled - 2

Spent some time using my grinder wire brush to clean up the oil filter cover and the left and right timing belt covers.

Wire brushed Oil filter cover

Wire brushed Timing Belt covers

As I've been removing parts from the bike I have been lining them up in the back of the garage out of the way.

Parts removed from Greg's GL1100 project

[Greg_C]

More disassembly Pictures for you ...

View from the garage with door open ... nice cool -14Celcius (7 degrees Farenheit)

-14C outside

Couple of pictures of what the gas tank looks like inside ... I had to drain about 4 litres (1 gallon) of what was once gas from the tank using a siphon ... what a stink. I had sprayed the top of the sending unit with rust check a few days earlier and then I used a flat screw driver and hammer to tap the retaining ring to unlock it .... I'll be placing the sending unit in vinegar to clean it ... put it aside for now...

Inside gas tank 1

Inside gas tank 2

I've been removing and identifying parts that will be sand blasted and powder painted ... I work at a company that does this in house, and they will let employees get personal parts blasted and painted at minimal cost ... the parts shown next picture will be blasted and painted gloss black.... you will notice that I trimmed (using metal shears) part of the metal from the upper radiator trim part so that removal next time will be easier.

parts for powder paint

The picture below is the rear wheel being prep'ed for removal... I followed the DIY article on this site on how to remove the rear wheel ... really important to put a block of wood under the rear wheel to get the rear shaft to clear the muffler when you drive it out ...

Rear Wheel being prep'd for removal

Picture of the left hand side of the bike after removal of the battery holder, etc. Also the left engine side ... the triangular piece between the frame and the engine I removed as well ... allowed me to remove the fuel pecock.... another part to be blasted and powder painted.

[Greg_C]

And the dissassembly / rebuild pictures continue...

To give me access to both fuel pecock screws I removed the black triangular piece between the frame and the engine. Also removed the identical piece on the other side to give me clear view of the gas tank during removal. Two more pieces for powder paint pile.

Left Side Engine

Pictures of the top left of the bike with false tank removed .. lots of odd 'not original' wires from an old CB and god's knows where going to in-out of the fairing.

Top left side - false tank removed

Shot of the front wheel... PO had removed both calipers - probably seized... another rebuild project waiting for me.

Front Wheel - calipers removed - to be rebuilt

I show a picture of my "oil jelly fish" removal kit .... after I had the oil screen cover and water pump cover off, put a funnel in the oil filler and dumped in ~ 1litre of Kerosene ... which ran thru the engine and dumped out into my oil drain pan... I repeated this 3-4 times until the oily sludge sitting along the bottom of the engine was mostly flushed out. The jug with the black liquid in it is the flushed out result ...

My oil jelly fish removal kit

The previous owner also gave me a couple boxes of parts / heads and a complete starter from a wrecked 80 GL1100 that he had come across ...
These may come in handy ... have not gone thru them yet ...

spare starter and cylinder head parts from PO

Shot of my "gas tank cleaning kit" - 6 jugs of white vinegar ... I found l needed almost five 4-litre jugs to fully fill the tank ... more on that process later...

White vinegar for cleaning the gas tank

[Greg_C]

And more pictures for you all...


Front right of the bike - water pump and timing bet covers removed ... my growing inventory of removed parts in the background ...

Front right view - water pump and timing belt covers removed

Also the rear saddle bags and crash bar assembly takes up a lot of space in the garage ... this part came out surprisingly painlessly... some stubborn bolts that I sprayed liberally with anti-seize ... you also need to unplug the rear harness from the main bike harness .... there is a a plug found on the left side near rear wheel fender... When I had all of the bolts loose/removed, I used a crow bar to pry the front upper part of the assembly off of the shock bolts ... once they were free I was able to lift it and move it backwards and clear of the bike ... there must be 50-60 pounds of "stuff"
... no wonder the "naked wing" groups like to strip this stuff off the bikes .... the white coating on the side of the saddle bags is salt residue ... we use is on our roads here to keep the ise clear ... unfortunately I had to trailer the bike home on a day where they had the salt trucks out as the roads were quite icy and slippery ... it will be washed down/cleaned up before it goes back on the bike ...

rear fender, Saddle Bag - Crash bar assembly

Moving along -more prep-dissassembly to get the gas tank off ... removed the two bolts holding the right brake assembly. Also removed the bolt holding the rear brake fluid resevoir...

Removed the rear brake assembly bolts

Next comes the removal of the rear wheel ... read up on the how to articles on this site before wading in on this ... get the wheel up on some blocks of week... remove the cotter pin, castle nut, put a block of wood on the left hand side of the swing arm, drive the axle out... use piece of wire to hang-support rear brake caliper... I temporarily placed both shocks on top rear of bike while removing the wheel.

Rear wheel - right side 1

Rear wheel - right side 2

rear wheel removal - left side

rear wheel removal - left side - swing arm blocked

[Greg_C]

More pictures of the dissassembly process...

used an idea found on this site to keep my water pump cover bolts sorted out...

Keep the bolts for your water pump cover organized for easy re-assembly

Continuing with wheel removal process... with block of wood in place between muffler and swing arm drive out the shaft.

rear wheel removal ... shaft removed.

then removed the three nuts that hold the drive shaft to the rear wheel assembly.. and shile supporting the hub assembly I rilled the wheel backwards and clear of the bike..

wheel removal - shaft nuts removed - ready to pull wheel off

Rear wheel pulled off

After the wheel is out, before you can get at the gas tank there is a plastic wheel / fender liner to pull out ... there are a couple of metal tabs that hold it in place ...

Rear Wheel removed - inner plastic liner needs to come out

At this point things look pretty ugly ... bike torn apart ... beginning to wonder if I will ever get it all back together ... but I keep going ...

Rear wheel gone!

[Greg_C]

So the rear wheel is out, put aside... keep going to remove the gas tank... removed the fuel pecock from gas tank... as noted earlier I removed the triangular frame-to-engine support piece to give me acces to both fuel pecock screws... and in the process discovered that the battery ground terminal ring is sandwiched between the engine and frame bracket just removed ... lots of corrosion there... have fought many electrical issues in the past becasue of poor grounds ... will clean the surfaces up and add a dab if delectric crease to this ring / ground point when it all goes back together...

removed fuel Pecock from gas tank

Removed the rear brake resevoir ... also the cross frame piece that sits along the top of the gas tank ... and finally the bolt that secures the gas tank at the rear fender .

removed the rear brake resevoir

So all of the visible/obvious bolts/brackets that secure the gas tank in place have been removed ... but the gas tank did not want to move ...
had another look around ... again nothing looks overlooked ... just some rubber mounts... still not budging ... looked it all over again ... is firmly held in place so I pulled out my crow bar and wedged it into the front of the gas tank next to the rubber mount that looks like it goes into the frame cross member and gave it a little encouragement and it pulled free / loose ... after being held there for 33 years! ...

moving the gas tank backwards with encouragement from crow bar

You can see in the next picture how the rubber mount of the gas tank fits into the horizontal cross member. Remove the tank vent/drain hose from the tank before you move the tank further back...

gas tank removal - front rubber mount pulled out from cross frame piece

After the tank is loose, continue to move it backwards... turn it to clear the frame as you go ... it shoul not get caught up, and will pull clear of the bike without any great difficulty... having the fuel pecock off make it pretty easy... And FINALLY we have the gas tank out !!!

At this point I was pretty proud of my self so I went in the house for a drink... (it's Friday evening after all)

Gas Tank Removed !!

My next picture series will show the process of what I did to clean the gas tank...

[Greg_C]

This next series of pics are of the bike with the tank removed .... to give all a sense of what things look like with the tank out...
I spent a bit of time trying to remove the rear brake pedal and spring to the shaft it rotates on, as it is quite stiff, cotter pin is all rusted, not budging... the brake shaft probably just needs grease-cleaning ... also found that the brake resevoir was EMPTY, so am trying to remove the whole assembly to do the rebuild/cleanup of this whole brake assembly.

Gold wing stripped to her nickers!

Right side - tank out

Looking down at engine visible thru the frame

another naked picture - need to clean up the work area around her!

[Greg_C]

OK now the really messy part! - cleaning up the gas tank... I used somewhat of a hybrid approach, using some of the info found on this site, and some prevouse experience I had working on an old bike gas tank... I took a bunch of pictures as I went thru this so hopefully it will makes sense...
first series of pics are of the tank (outside and inside) after it was removed from the bike, and before I did any of my tank cleanup... there was a bit of slury/old gas still inside, which I funneled into an "old gas" container for recycling by the enviro guys ... I did put the fuel pecock back onto the tank as I went thru this process... I also removed the front rubber tank mount and lower rubber tank mount... there is some surface rust on the outside / bottom of the tank, but nothing realy bad ... my intent is to have the exterior of the tank bead blasted and powder painted gloss black.

gas tank cleaning - 1

gas tank cleaning - 2

gas tank cleaning - 3

gas tank cleaning - 4

As you can see the inside of the tank at the start of this looks pretty bad....

gas tank cleaning - 5

gas tank cleaning - 5

[patbrandon1]

Welcome to the site Greg. Great job with the pics, and explanations. It is fun to watch this. I believe you will have a lifelong friend with that bike when you're done. A labor of love that you will enjoy the outcome of, for many, many years. Keep up the good work.

[WingAdmin]

What a fantastic set of pictures documenting your process - this is the first time I've seen anyone document the removal of a gas tank, in pictures. It's a nasty job!

The oil strainer bolt can actually come out if you lever the frame out just a bit. The Honda service manual instructs you to do so - and then when reassembling, it instructs you to use a smaller bolt to prevent this from having to be done in future.

[Greg_C]

Thanks for the encouragement and positive feedback Todd, Pat and WingAdmin!

More pictures to follow.

WingAdmin I now understand what I was supposed to do to get that 4th bolt out! Too late but I,ll know " next" time. ...

Wing admin this site is great ... As they say in the navy Bravo Zulu ... Meaning well done!

Feel free to build (and edit) How to article(s) out of this series of pics as I post them....

Greg

[Greg_C]

This next series of pics and posts is the process that I used to get the inside of the gas tank to a point that I felt is was suitable to go back into the frame for another 30 years or so ... apologies in advance for the boring pics, as they are of the inside of the gas tank as the cleaning process was done ... all were taken using my Sony Cybershot digital camera.

as previously shown the inside of the gas tank of my project bike was REALLY bad ... full of crud .. typical of a bike gas tank that have been sitting for many years with gas left in it ... This is the first bike I've owned where the gas tank is mounted inside the frame below a "false tank"... lots of fun to get it out as previously documented .... be damned if I'm putting a less than clean tank back in the frame after the effort to get it out!
so here is the starting picture for reference...

gas tank cleaning - 6

What you see is the bottom of the tank, with the reserve feed tube visible in the "muck" ... inside the gold wing gas tank there are two gas feed tubes, each with an "acorn" shaped metal screen filter at the end of each .... the main feed tube, and the reserve feed tube .... the main feed tube screen/filter is located close to (within 2" of) the fuel peacock ... while the reserve feed tube filter is placed at the lower rear of the gas tank ... where all the dregs. rust and crap will collect... I belive this set up is typical of most gas tanks with a "reserve" feature... I will admit that at the start of this process I could not see any of the gas feed screen filters as there was so much crap/rust inside the tank at the start of this ...

DISCLAIMER
NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED IN THE PROCESS OF CLEANING OF THIS GAS TANK!

Except for some Kerosene used at the start of the process, and the last item in the list below I used the following fairly safe, readily available products to clean my gas tank:
- 2 litres of kerosene
- 6 four litre jugs of white vinegar
- 2 small 16 oz jugs of CLR ( as seen on TV) for cleaning calcium, lime, rust etc
- 1 collection of small nuts,bolts,screws,washer (any self respecting garage tinker has a small jar of these)
- 1 large oil drain pan
-1 funnel
- 1 small penlight type flash light to inspect progress of the inside of the tank
- rags,
- 1 understanding wife/partner/significant other (very hard to find)

required gas tank cleaning items

So the first step is the one that involves the kerosene which is really smelly, but quite good at flushing and cleaning the gummed up mess at the bottom of the tank. For any cleaning of your project items that involve a petroleum product do it in the garage, or outside or risk your current relationship with your wife, partner, significant other...


Take your jar of small screws that have been sitting in your odds-n-sods crew jar and dump them into the tank (thru the top sender unit hole opening. put the gas tank cap on the tank. Pour in ~ 2 litres (half a gallon) of kerosene into the tank.... use only small screws/nuts/bolts ... nothing really big with lot of mass/weight ...

misc. small screws, nuts, bolts, .. make sure you count them (NOT)

make sure you have coveralls on, and plastic gloves ... stick a rag into the top of the sending unit hole to keep from being splashed ...pick up the tank and start to shake the bolt/kerosene mixture around, back and forth, side to side, up and down, put on some tunes and give your self a good upper body work out ... then after a few minutes, position the tank over the oil drain pan, remove the gas tank cap and dump the slury mess into the drain pan ... shake all of the nuts and bolks out of the tank into the drain pan as well .. will take a bit of shaking but they will all fall out with some shaking ... use your flash light and see how things look ...

tank after 1st kerosene/bolt flush/shake-1

tank after 1st kerosene/bolt flush/shake-2

So the process is to pick up the oil drain pan and carefully transfer most of the liquid back into the tank, leaving the nuts/bolts/major crud behind ... "retrieve" the nuts/bolts from the slury mess in your drain pan and drop them back in the tank ... leaving behind the MAJOR pile of rust/crud/crap that will be in the drain pan .... as I said this is the messy part ... I scooped the rust/crap out of the drain pan after removing the nuts and bolts ... next picture is the pile of rust/crud that came out of the tank after doing the above "shake/rattle/roll" process 2-3 times ...

Crud-rust removed from the gas tank after shake/rattle/roll

[Greg_C]

Despite the pile of crud that was removed using the nuts/bolts/kerosene mixture, and the shake/rattle/roll process ... as the last couple of pics show there is still a lot of rust / crud stuck inside the tank; however I had managed to expose a lot of the bare metal. The wire mesh for the tank filters was still heavily coated... so Still a ways to go ...

As much of the real stinky gooey mess at the bottom of the tank was gone, I put away the kerosene, and switched to non petrol cleaning products ... namely CLR, laundry detergent/water, my trusty collection of small nuts and bolts and for the final cleaning vinegar

first picture of this series shows the rubber mounts that I removed from the tank prior to the cleaning ... one at the front of the tank and two at the bottom ... they come off fairly easily and you can put them aside for when the tank is all cleaned up, painted, and ready to go back in the frame..

rubber mounts for gas tank - one up front, two at the bottom

One cleaning tool I forgot to include in the list of items for this tank cleanup project is a long narrow flat blade screw driver .... i used this to reach in to scrape off some of the stubborn rust chunks that I could see inside the tank.

.... before I started with the non-petroleum based products I dumped out any remaining kerosene, I rinsed the tank out a couple of times with laundry detergent / cold water, then I dumped in the two jugs of CLR added two jugs (using the CLR containers) of water to the mixture, gave it a good shake, and let it sit over night ... My main focus here was on getting the rust off the tank screen filters, to try and get as much of the screen exposed/open ... the next day I added my nuts-n-bolts and did the shake thing for a few minutes, then dumped the contents into my oil drain pan, including the nuts n bolts .... after rinsing with water I was pleased to see some of the exposed metal screen of the filters ... others on this site have suggested using compressed air at the fuel peacock to blow back air to the screen ... I did this and the screens cleaned up more so ...

After using CLR and nuts/bolts and water rinse

tank cleaning - 7

tank cleaning - 8

tank cleaning - 9

I then moved away from the CLR and rinsed out the tank, and using flashlight and my long screw driver I inspected the areas of the tank that I could see and scraped / poked at any stubborn rust barnacles still present ...

I stuck my fingers into the sender unit hole to feel the underside of the top of the tank and I could feel a lot of roughness which i presumed was rust etc. I then dumped in my nuts and bolts into the tank put the gas cap on, and suffed a rag into the sender unit hole to keep the nuts etc in the tank and then proceeded to shake them in the tank with the tank upside down so the nuts abd bolts are rubbing around on the underside of the top of the tank ... I then dumped out the nuts and bolts into my oil pan and then rinsed out the tank ... each time I did this a lot of rust continued to be flushed from the tank ... I did this three or four times where I was shaking the nuts and bolts vigoursly in the tank for 3-4 minutes ... its noise, is a good upper body work out but it works... I rotated the tank in all positions, while shaking the tank and contents, and after the final round of this the underside of the top of the tank felt clean and smooth .... and generally the inside of the tank looked quite presentable and clean ....

finally after rinsing the tank, I filled it up with white vinegar and am leaving it sitting for a week .... i post pictures of the inside of the tank after I rinse it out... after I dry the tank out am going to spray copious amounts of WD40 into the tank to protect the exposed metal while it is out of the bike.

tank sitting filled with white vinegar

[NKYWinger]

Great reading! We do like our pictures....

[Joecop]

Nice! Thanks for the post, enjoyed it!

[bcassel]

Great posts! But can I make a suggestion? Don't spray down and let sit the WD 40 in the tank. It will rust like the dickens. WD 40 is not a protectant or lubricant. It is a penetrant and water displacement with a quick evaporative carrier. Use an oil, silicone or displace the the moisture with a drying gas like nitrogen or co2 and then seal up tight.

[Greg_C]

Good point on the wd40... I,ll coat the tank with lite coat of motor oil

[Greg_C]

Another cold weekend working on my project .... I let the vinegar sit in my gas tank for about 6 days,
then dumped it out and rinsed ... to be perfectly honest I really did not see any real change in the appearance of
the inside of the tank ... it was fairly clean when I started the vinegar soak ... after I dried out the tank I noticed some "flash rust"
forming ... I put in some lite weight oil, made sure the inside was coated and dumped out the excess ... I'll give it one more rinse with some kerosene or gas before it goes back in the bike ... I decided to sand down the external rust on the exterior of the tank and paint it with some gloss black rust paint.

Gass Tank - gloss black rust paint

I also noticed that my fuel peacock when in the "OFF" position leaks ... meaning fuel would continue to dribble to my carbs ... it appears to be a sealed / rivited unit, so does not appear to be something that can be repaired ... if any one can point me to a repair that I could do to it or suitable replacement i'd appreciate it ...

I cleaned up the rear brake master cylinder ... had dried up .. resevoir was empty ... used the "grease gun" technique found on this site ...
to pop the innards out ... did the same to the rear brake cylinder ... works pretty slick ... the inside parts are in good shape ...cleaned up every thing, going back together... the linkage that goes from the master cylinder to the brake pedal was pretty rusty, but I cleaned it up with the wire wheel and painted it with some rust paint ... can a person remove the brake pedal with the engine in place? I've removed the split pin and large washer that holds it in place but as I attempt to slide it off the shaft it sits on, the brake pedal arm hits the engine ... I'd like to add a grease nipple to this part as I've seen on this website as it was seized/sticking, but I was able to soak it with oil and its nice a loose now ... but want it to stay that way...

Rear master cylinder parts cleaned, ready for rebuild

I rebuilt my water pump with the kit I bought on e-bay, $29 + $8.50 shipping from Germany ... great instructions / pictures from the vendor ...
everything went together well, nice and tight ... pics of the kit and the pump all back together... you just need a large vice to reseat the bearings
The vendor I purchased the kit from is named Reiner and his e-bay handle is Goldwingnews ... very responsive, and he sent me the instructions by e-mail ...

Waterpump rebuild kit - for bakelite type impeller

Water pump back together

I pulled out the carbs out of the bike today ... pretty easy to disconnect the choke/throttle cables with the gas tank out ... this will be my next big project ... but I need to put the water pump and water pump covers back on ... I am getting the timing belt covers, and oil filter cover, pump covers powder painted ... more pics to follow when they get painted ..


big gaping hole where the carbs used to be ... pretty dirty looking engine ....

Removed the carbs nothing but engine left ...

used some varsol to clean up the exterior of the carbs before I tear them apart ...

Carbs ready for disassembly and cleaning

[WingAdmin]

Great posts! But can I make a suggestion? Don't spray down and let sit the WD 40 in the tank. It will rust like the dickens. WD 40 is not a protectant or lubricant. It is a penetrant and water displacement with a quick evaporative carrier. Use an oil, silicone or displace the the moisture with a drying gas like nitrogen or co2 and then seal up tight.

Actually that's not true. WD-40 leaves behind an oily film specifically designed to prevent corrosion. In fact, the original purpose behind WD-40 was to prevent corrosion in the fuel tanks of Atlas rockets:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wd-40

WD-40 is the trademark name of a penetrating oil and water-displacing spray. It was developed in 1953 by Norm Larsen, founder of the Rocket Chemical Company, in San Diego, California. WD-40, abbreviated from the phrase "Water Displacement, 40th formula,"[1] was originally designed to repel water and prevent corrosion,[2] and later was found to have numerous household uses.

Larsen was attempting to create a formula to prevent corrosion in nuclear missiles, by displacing the standing water that causes it. He claims he arrived at a successful formula on his 40th attempt.[2] WD-40 is primarily composed of various hydrocarbons.

WD-40 was first used by Convair to protect the outer skin, and more importantly, the paper thin "balloon tanks" of the Atlas missile from rust and corrosion.[2][3] These stainless steel fuel tanks were so thin that, when empty, they had to be kept inflated with nitrogen gas to prevent their collapse.

[WingAdmin]

I also noticed that my fuel peacock when in the "OFF" position leaks ... meaning fuel would continue to dribble to my carbs ... it appears to be a sealed / rivited unit, so does not appear to be something that can be repaired ... if any one can point me to a repair that I could do to it or suitable replacement i'd appreciate it ...

Randakk sells one: http://randakks.com/collections/honda-g ... master-kit

You have to drill out the rivets and replace them, but it should work fine for you.

[Greg_C]

Hello All - Belated Happy Ground Hog Day!

Again my thanks for the positive comments, feedback and helpfull suggestions as I go thru my project.

I have not yet taken the time to work on the Carb rebuild ... too much of the bike is already torn apart so have been working on trying to finish off a few other smaller projects underway for the bike.

Since I have the rear wheel off, this past week I picked up the bearings for the rear wheel, and while I was at it I picked up the two bearings for the front as well ... great DIY article on this Forum on how to do this ... the large bolt with the split end will be used to remove the two bearings.... I need to get a large socket to build the wheel seal retainer ring removal tool described in the DIY article.... but I have the rear wheel other wise stripped to that point... the bearings I purchased are NSK type, made in Japan, appear to be of good quality with race seals on both sides ... these were not expensive ... I paid $8.89 ea for the two 6302-2RS bearings using on the front and $6.29 and $8.54 respectfully for the 6204-2RS and 6304-2RS bearings used on the rear wheel.

New Wheel Bearings and removal tool for GL1100

Since I was working on the rear wheel I spent time cleaning up the final drive ... is was pretty dirty, full of caked on grease, dirt etc. I also noticed that the rear wheel rim on the side of the final drive had grease streaks all over it suggesting something was being thrown out of the final drive over time ... I placed the final drive into my large oil pan, used varsol and an old stiff paint brush ... once it was fairly clean on the exterior was time to see what was inside ... fortunately I was able to to loosten both the filler plug and the drain bolt without any difficulty ... pretty black and smelly what came out but very little actual "fluid" drained out ... the bike had been sitting for over 7+ years ... I sprayed in a generous amout of brake cleaner into the filler plug opeing with the drian bolt removed ... lots of black crap came out of the drain hole ... also rotated the drive gear while doing this ... then with the drain bolt in place I dumped in some new clean 90 weight drive fluid and rotated the drive gear by hand for a while ... then I drained out this fluid .. and then repeated it one more time .... the fluid being drained on the second round came out looking pretty clean ... because the final drive is off the wheel you can tip it over on its side to get all of the old oil out... I filled the final drive with new gear oil and I let it sit for a few days ... to see if there were any obvious leaks etc ... thankfully nothing

I did notice during my clean up of the final drive that the O-ring at the drive end of the final drive had a big chunk missing, appears as though the
previous owner or mechanic had pinched this O-ring during reassembly .. this may be the source of the grease streaks on the rear tire ...

GL1100 Final Drive O-Ring

Damaged Final Drive O-Ring

I spent some of my weekend looking for local supply of this o-ring ... without luck

I found a great o-ring site with great info and reasonable prices and delivery charges but have not ordered from them...
http://www.theoringstore.com/index.php? ... ath=368_12

Have you ever needed an o-ring of a particular size but no readily available source for it? In a pinch you can splice your own with excellent results.
In the early part of my career, on one project we built custom pressure vessels which would house electronics that would be used in deep water ...
and we had to build our own custom o-rings... what you need is sufficient length of the o-ring material with the cross sectional diameter that you need, and the correct rubber adhesive which is Cyanoacrylate ... which is also what is found in most of the "instant" glues such as "crazy glue"

There are links that will calculate the correct "cord" length of your o-rings ... this is the length you cut and then splice the ends together.
An excellent link for o-ring cord length is here: http://mdmetric.com/tech/cutlengthring.htm

So in this situation I had a few used o-rings still in good contition, with the same cross sectional diameter as what I needed ... but they were bigger OD which means I could cut them to the cord length I need and then splice them back together with crazy glue.
... as you will note from the link above if you want to make your own o-rings you need to know at least two of the following: the inside dia (ID) of the O-ring, the outside dia (OD) of the o-ring and the cross sectional (CS) diameter of the actual o-ring material...

From the link above you will also note that these spliced o-rings should only be used in static/fixed applications.

So for the final drive o-ring I removed the old one and measured ~48mm ID, and I used 2.5mm as the CS diameter, making the OD = ID + (2xCS)= 48+5 = 53mm .. to calculate the required o-ring cord length

( ( OD + ID ) / 2 ) x Pi = length
Pi=3.14159

This works out to ~158mm for this situation ... so I cut my old used o-ring, measured and cut it to 158mm, discarded the excess, put a dab of crazy glue on each end, held them together for about 60 seconds and DONE. Placed it on the end of the final drive ... Perfect fit.

My apologies for this lengthy off topic discertation, and pls don't flame me for not just buying a replacment o-ring. Hope some find this info helpful at a future time. I intend to use my spliced o-ring on the final drive. Below is a picture of my spliced O-Ring next to the damaged one that needs to be replaced.

DIY O-Ring for Final Drive

I cleaned up the exterior and painted the final drive assembly with a silver engine paint... here it is...

Cleaned up and painted final drive for my GL1100

My order of parts arrived from Cascade Cycle http:www.cascadecycle.com arrived ... I've see folks on this forum give them a thumbs up and now so do I. They have what I think is a great deal for GL1000 / GL1100 owners called a "new to U kit #1" for $92 which includes 1st class postage to Canada (is only $80 for US addresses) ... there is a similar kit for GL1200 owners... the kit arrived complete, well packed, and within a week of ordering
the kit includes 2 Gates T274 timing belts, 1 Gates 21008 hose(makes up. and lwr. hose), 1 Murray 15868 Ultra Thermostat,
1 Murray 7013 Ultra radiator cap, 1 WIX 24940 oil filter w / new O rings, 1 Thermostat O ring, 1 lower rad. hose O ring, and
4 NGK B8EA (new # 2120) spark plugs..

Cascade Cycle "New 2 U Kit" Special

[Greg_C]

I've have my first batch of stripped parts back after being media blasting and powder painting gloss black ...

They turned out great, look almost like new!

Painted parts include the radiator grill, as well as the upper and lower rad. grill mount brackets,
battery frame assembly, rad hose springs, the left and right rad air defectors, and gas tank cross member, and the left and right frame to engine
mount brackets.

Some of my Gloss Black Powder Painted Parts

My gas tank is all cleaned up, painted, ready to go back into the bike ...

Cleaned up and Painted gas tank for GL1100

I drilled out the rivets that hold the fuel pecock together ... then carefully removed the metal cover from the main body ... and pulled it all apart...
mystery soled as to why it leaked when in the OFF position .... on the side of the rubber seal that rubs against the movable part of the pecock, the rubber seal was badly worn and had a groove/channel cut between two of the four small holes in the seal... a nifty trick I learned on this forum is to simply flip the seal over ... because it is identical on both sides, it has no wear and tear on the other side... put the seal back in with the old/worn side facing into the bottom of the pecock body ... and then put it all back together ... pictures show it taken apart and all back togher ... I used two small phillips screws just slightly larger than the hole I drilled which self tap and bites into the soft metal of the pecock body, and holds the top and full assembly together ... I put some blue thread locker on the screw threads ... looks and works like new ... will go back on the gas tank when its back in the bike.

Disassembled GL1100 Fuel Pecock

Re-assembled GL1100 Fuel Pecock

I took apart my "spare" starter motor, following another one of the great DIY articles on this forum ...

GL1100 Starter taken apart - before cleaning

After cleaning it up, generally the starter looks pretty good inside ... one of the brushes still looks ok length wise, but the other appears to have worn down further... I might consider replacing them both before re-assembly ... can someone point me at a reputable supplier of replacement brushes for this starter? Also I have my bike with rear wheel removed ... is it critical that I only replace the starter with the bike on its side stand?

GL1100 Starter taken apart - after cleaning




cleaning