Work in progress

[jasonrun]

Here are some pictures of the 91 gsx600 I just got. It's going to go through quite a bit of work. So far all I've done is drop it a few times (first bike,) replace the clutch plates, remove the cushion rods (lowering links,) and remove all the crap that I broke/want to replace.

In the picture with the plastics on I just threw that stuff back on for the picture.

[SlashZero]

Nice awsome looking color : I think that orange goes really well with the pre 98

[WildKat]

I love that orange color too ! I used to think orange bikes were ugly but since that copper/orange color has been so popular and all the different variations of orange you see these days on bikes like yours and Lou's , it's really cool !

[Novelldude]

Re: Work in progress

Here are some pictures of the 91 gsx600 I just got. It's going to go through quite a bit of work. So far all I've done is drop it a few times (first bike,) replace the clutch plates, remove the cushion rods (lowering links,) and remove all the crap that I broke/want to replace.

In the picture with the plastics on I just threw that stuff back on for the picture.

How bad was the clutch fix? I've got to do that on my 93 and I'm currently saving up for the parts. I've looked at the Clymer and it doesn't look too hard as long as you go slow. Any got'chas that I should be aware of?

TIA,
ND

[jasonrun]

I have to agree; it actually looks pretty damn good in these pictures. Unfortunately that's not the case in real life. The quality of the paint job is pretty horrible. Also you can't tell too much, but the plastics have lots of small cracks/scrapes/breaks. This means eventually I'm going to replace them, probably with my own fiberglass creations. I'm most likely going to go with blue (blew by you) to match my car. Either that or translucent. I'll be keeping the orange for a while though, there are plenty of other areas that require more of my attention (AKA money.)

[paradoxmd]

from here the color looks good.

[DreKat]

orange is the best Kat color

[fordfurious]

dang, i guess i am with everyone else on the color , sweet

[jasonrun]

Finally time for an update.

First thing I did was work on lowering the bike. I know it's been spoken against on the forum, but I cut the dogbones and had one inch inserts welded in. At least I had my dad's friend with the machine shop do it.
Because of the way they curve around the spring the inserts pretty much had to go where they went. We were careful to make the offsets of the ends the same afterwards as before so that they would still sit flush where they bolt on.

Because of the lever action, the one inch inserts actually lowers the rear about three inches by my estimate.

[jasonrun]

Next I replaced the crappy non gsx600 forks with some pretty decent ones from Dr. Rodey.

They have to be raised quite a bit in order to balance the lowering in the rear. In order to limit bottoming out I inserted about one inch spacers made from some washers and PVC fittings, as described by others in the forum.

I'm lowering the bike because I'm short. Going along with that I'm also only about 125lbs, so I'm hoping not to have any issues.

I did ride the bike like this for about 100 miles before my transmission gave out...

[jasonrun]

So when I got the bike it had 33,555 miles and the second gear problem... meaning essentially there was no second gear. After I put about 100 miles on it I was just putting around on a curvy road and I started to feel a slight jolt in a regular interval. At first I thought there was an issue with my lowered rear. I stopped and looked the bike over but there was no glaring issue. I started to think I was imagining things so I took off. I had to make a left turn onto a slightly busy road and then go through a set of lights. I made the turn in first gear fine, then I shifted up to second, and since I didn't have a functioning second gear I shifted up to third right away without giving it gas. It clunked around a bit and finally locked in and I made it through the light ok but then it all fell apart. It felt to me like the chain broke (I've never actually experienced that though, so that's just what I thought it would feel like.) I pulled off the road. Transmission is toast. Can't get it to go in any gear, and it catches and almost locks up when I try to push it even with the clutch in. So now I'm replacing the engine.

[jasonrun]

In order to make this engine swap happen I looked around on the forum for stand ideas. I took a pretty simple idea from here with some flaws and made it a lot better.

The people here got as far as using racket straps to lift the bike with this type of stand, but lowering was, well, more like dropping.

With this crank I can raise and lower in a controlled fashion. The little catch on the side of the stand keeps the crank from spinning when I want to hold it, and I can flex the crank around it to rotate it.

[jasonrun]

Next step while I'm waiting for my new (2005 GSX600 w/2100mi) engine to come is to add these casters from a shopping cart I scavenged. This will hopefully make it a lot easier to move these beasts around.

[jasonrun]

And here it is with the wheels. Moving the engine around is pretty easy now.