Free* Honda Project: GL500 Interstate

Parts are slowly arriving...

Rae San ignition, CBR COP coils, 2008 R1 front end, 2011 R1 rear shock, Noco NLP5 battery, used Mika Metals dirtbike bars, roller bearings for the stem conversion, various gaskets...

Those forks and that front wheel look suspisiously modern...

In reply to pres589 (djronnebaum) :

The front end are 2007 R1 forks and wheel.  The wheel will be temporary while I get it rolling before going for style points. The 17" tire size also gives me beaucoup options for tires vs the 19" OEM wheel. The whole front rolling assembly is already 3lb lighter than the 19" comstar+tire, and this might only be using one caliper and rotor when I'm finished.

I also did a bit of fitment work for the COP conversion.  I picked up 4 2015 CBR1000rr coils and harness for less than one replacement GL500 coil, and pulled the weather boots off the replacement 90° spark plug boots to make this hodgepodge...

Not too tall; only about 18mm higher than the OE plug boots and they should give vastly hotter spark.

I started to remove paint from the tank, but found that my perfectly shaped tank was also comprised of about 25% body filler. Also, when removing paint from under neath I uncovered a severely rusted patch, so I found a second hand tank in better condition. It's hard to tell, but the gouges in the filler are over 1/4" deep already.

I took the new tank and ran some orange degreaser and a chain through it to break up any loose rust.  Once it was rinsed, I ran a magnet through to grab the chain and any loose metal not rinsed out, then did a 4:1 water:phosphoric acid soak to remedy the final surface rust. The PO4 only sprang one tiny pinhole, so we'll call it good!

Drying thoroughly with the heat gun before pouring in the POR-15 tank sealer. I was bad at photos at this point (I was trying not to get it on my hootus), but make sure the solids in the POR-15 are well mixed!  I got lucky with some clumps, but they cured where they wouldn't block the fuel outlet. This stuff is magical, and sealed all the seams and pinhole. 

I'm going to have to strip the paint.  Does anyone have experience with CitriStrip-type strippers? I ran out of the good Aircraft Remover stuff, and no products have TSP in them anymore so I'm wondering what to use?

In reply to Parker with too many Projects :

Oh that is very interesting! I have broken several of the stock coils, once cracking the the coil body (I guess from vibration?) and many times breaking the brittle plastic of the plug boots. Opening up that space under the tank to relocate some wires sure would be nice. I'll have to do some research on if my ignitech has any problem firing COP coils.

gearheadE30 said:

In reply to Parker with too many Projects :

Oh that is very interesting! I have broken several of the stock coils, once cracking the the coil body (I guess from vibration?) and many times breaking the brittle plastic of the plug boots. Opening up that space under the tank to relocate some wires sure would be nice. I'll have to do some research on if my ignitech has any problem firing COP coils.

From what I understand, the Ignitech should function similarly to the Rae-San, except it may have a couple of advantages! I had to have the Rae-San programmed for the dwell, while you should be able to set your dwell to "auto" and get by just fine with the short-dwell COP coils.

Oh, and if anyone needs front end parts, make an offer! I'd hate to toss any of this stuff, as it's all straight. The controls are in BAD shape, but that's plastics for ya.

It wasn't TSP that was removed from stripper a few years ago, it was methylene chloride, and none of it is as good as it used to be.  I have had okay luck with Jasco Premium which you can get at the big box stores.  It's not like Citri-Strip was before the change.  Lilke half as good.  Which can still be useful but it's frustrating.

Grab a quart of the stuff and see what happens.

Cool deal with the COP conversion.  And everything else you're doing.

Yeah that's right, methylene chloride was the good stuff!  I tried the citristrip spray and thought it wasn't working after an hour or so.  Went back inside to make dinner, dinner turned to movie, turned to sleep.  Came back in the morning and the paint had been turned to a damp powder! Nice and hands-off, and it seems that it'll work, it's just going to take several days to get completely stripped...

Grabbed a shot of my "leave it overnight" stripper experiment. It didn't creep under the decal very well, but much better than I expected! I'd say 90% of this just came off with the air blower

Today the air suspension got pulled. It's replacement is a double-adjustable unit from a 2012 R1.  It bolted right in to the ProLink suspension with some spacers to center it!

I may have done a bit of excessive clearancing for the mounting tab to aid in installation...

Keep up the good work

Thanks! The carbs are off for disassembly and ultrasonic cleaning. The Keihins are a bit of an intimidating job, but it's what the budget demands.

Make sure you replace the orings in the fuel crossover tubes. I've replaced mine a few times now; I'm not sure why they don't seem to last. After a year or so, they seem to dry out and leak if the bike has been sitting for more than a few weeks, and then you have to wait a while before you can ride until they swell up again.

gearheadE30 said:

Make sure you replace the orings in the fuel crossover tubes. I've replaced mine a few times now; I'm not sure why they don't seem to last. After a year or so, they seem to dry out and leak if the bike has been sitting for more than a few weeks, and then you have to wait a while before you can ride until they swell up again.

+1 on this 

Just ordered all my Viton o-rings that didn't come with the rebuild kit (manifold, 2 different fuel crossover tubes). Since this photo, I caved and decided to split the carb bodies. Hey, I've come this far, right?

Sunday was hot outside, so I sat inside watching Babylon 5 and taking apart some Keihins. Glad I'm taking them apart for cleaning, as there is quite a bit of rust hanging out in here (that was a clean towel when I started!). Replacing the inner ACV seems like it'll be a challenge, but I'm excited that the overflow tubes have no cracking! 

I've also made a trip to Ace to replace all the fragile JIS screws on these things with some allen hex equivalents. It pains me to say that even with the JIS screwdrivers and bits, there are just some things that shouldn't be hit with an impact driver...

Parts delivery!

So I did the clutch! Instead of buying every special socket for this bike, I picked up a 32mm universal socket which seems to fit all the weird nuts. Word of warning, it's got a slight imbalance if you use it on an impact 

Got all the plates soaked, then finished the install with oily hands so photos didn't happen.  Either way, it's a clutch.

Curious what "special sockets" are required for servicing these bikes.  Seems like you're making good progress.

In reply to pres589 (djronnebaum) :

It's just several different sizes of ~$25per each spanner sockets to fit the clutch, flywheel, stem, and I think swingarm (haven't gotten there yet).  I could have started cannibalizing my large socket stocks to make the tools, but the 32mm socket pretty much covers all of them for $12 and doesn't twist under 72lb-ft torque (clutch spec).

Gotcha, and the picture helps.  Surprised that crazy do-all socket can take that much torque. 

Little update

Yesterday I began wiring the bike and decided that I want an under-motor battery box. So... I spent a crazy amount of time trying to remove the stock exhaust! Lots of repeated cycles of heat and penetrant finally loosened the silencers, then I dropped the headers and H-box as one unit where the headers easily twisted out with a couple whacks from the dead-blow. This battery will fit nicely underneath, as you can see!

I've also picked up a new starter solenoid as my old one seems frozen. A little smaller, more weatherproof connectors, and readily available as a replacement for hundreds of other bike applications.

Spent some time getting the Ray-San hall pickup installed. This will trigger my coil on plug, which is changing up a little bit.

Bring on the CAD! I'd been worrying about space to put all the electrics underneath a seat, but the GL frame has a ton of space up here in the backbone where the old coils lived. Now, the CDI drivers will live here on the left side, with the ignition controller on the right side where it's right there while checking timing marks.

Rivnuts make the dream work. What you can't see is where I went back and remade this bracket from a bit thicker steel so I could bolt on the control module.

And for a little bit of detail on the exhaust as a whole, courtesy of Motofaction

A small progress pic from last week. I've gotten all the controls sorted out, front brakes mounted, and currently just getting wiring taken care of before startup this week! (hopefully).

looking good!