Found a motorcycle, don't know anything about them...

[mswarrior]

A couple years ago I bought my wife a 79 Honda CB400T Hawk and it did not run. It had been sitting for ten years in a barn. I am no mechanic but I am mechanicaly inclined. I hope you are too because there is alot of work to be done.

First I removed the gas tank and replaced all fuel lines "cheap". Next was to replace the spark plugs,oil,flush the brakes,lube chain and all moving parts "throtle cable etc.",clean carbs, and install a new battery " and no they are not all universal". At this point I could get it running but it was rough and she smoked very bad.

To cure the smoke I had to take the head & cylinder block off and down to the local honda shop they went. It cost me $400 to get new valves,seals & guides, and ground the valves. They also De-glazed the cylinder walls and supplied me with a new set of piston rings. With the MANUAL I had it back together and she purrred like a kitten.

This bike cost me $350 to buy and $500 in parts and alot of my own labour. This not a project for the timid and before you even try and start yours, you'll need BRAKES!

In the end, after all this work my wife decided she did not want to learn to ride . So I sold it for $900 bucks. I put alot of labour into it which I never got paid for but I'll tell you what. The whole experience was great. The bike was reborn and is today being used by a young kid learning to ride himself.

Final Note: Don't do a half a$$ job to get it running. If your going to ride it, fix it right.

[mrchristian]

I think my friend's dad has a shop manual somewhere. I'll ask him when I go over today. Otherwise its off to Autozone today to order one.

Okay, here's the plan so far:

1. Forget the tires. If we replace them, it will be pointless since the bike is going to probably sit in the garage, given that neither of us have motorcycle lisences. They inflate. Thats good enough for now.

2. Clean the carb. Just unbolt it and spray it down. Easy right? Okay, don't answer that. There is no way we would be able to tune it. The most i've ever done to a car is to change a water pump.

3. As much as I'd hate to do this, we're probably going to have to replace all the fuel lines. Probably a good idea in case a spark decides to jump into our nice puddles. Is this relatively easy, or downright impossible for us?

4. Brakes... probably a good thing to pay for, right?

5. Replace the oil. <--Probably top priority. I don't know how to change oil on a motorcycle. Heck, I can't even find the place to put it in.

6. Slam hard on the starter to see if she still can breathe.

Somebody somewhere said that we might try just getting it started to see if the transmission works. They said not to shift through it manually, but to actually get the motor running and see if it works well enough. If not, scrap it for parts.

[kar_the_terrible]

My advise is, if there's a chance you're going to scrap the bike, start with the miminimum possible investment for parts. Partsnmore.com has free shippinig for orders over 30$, so I suggest you do it in increments of that!!

[poppygene]

How does the bike look? I mean, if you were to get it running what would you have? Got any pics, maybe?

I think what you need first is a mentor. That's not to say that you guys aren't capable of learning how to get a neglected bike up and running, it's that I hate to see you learn on this one! Even though it's kind of old, a good running GS850 is still a great all-around street bike and a pleasure to behold . I think it would be a terrible waste of a potentially good bike just for you guys to have something to do.

[mrchristian]

I don't know about this bike though. Its totally rusted from being in the elements so long and tons of parts are missing. Its about as far gone as possible.

On a second note, I looked at the carbuerators just now and hey! The fuel leak was coming from one of the little rubber tubes coming from under them. On closer inspection... none of them were connected to anything! Anybody know what these are for or what they hook into?

[mswarrior]

This bike keeps getting worse and worse. I'de stop even thinking about it and move on. As I stated in a earlier post, there is a bike for you out there. Keep Looking, and if possible bring someone who knows a bit about bikes.

[mrchristian]

Never! This bike was meant to cruise! Like I said, neither of our parents would ever let us buy another motorcycle, so we'll just have to make due with this one, even if it is rusted and blown apart. 325,000 miles and four owners doesn't help it either. We found a birds nest inside the engine cavity when we unscrewed off a panel.

Still wondering about the rubber hoses coming from the carbs. They should be really easy to change, but i'm wondering what they actually do or where they lead to. One of them is leaking gasoline(?) so I guess i'll just replace the lot of them. There are 4 carbs by the way, so cleaning them is going to be a bummer, but I think I can visualize how to get them off.

Changing oil/filter would be our next step. This thing is not like a car at all. I can't find the valve to open it up to drain the oil, or the place to put it in. Anybody know where these are?

We're basically not doing anything to it right now, except cleaning stuff (like birds nests) out of it. Those hoses should be easy to change, even without a manual (which we're ordering by the way as soon as his dad comes home and we can get a credit card)

[Toyuzu]

Look at the bottom front part of the engine block - right between the exhaust pipes in the middle. That's where the oil drain should be, and probably also the filter, if there is one. If so, it's not a spin-on like a car. You have to remove the filter housing and replace a paper filter element inside.

I'm going to encourage you to keep going with this, in spite of differing opinions from everyone else - you're not out doing drugs, after all! (I hope) I think I can understand where you're coming from. You've got a bit of restless creativity mixed with curiosity, so a bike project is a perfect use of your time, and a bike that would otherwise just sit and keep rusting is the perfect candidate for your project.

One big caution though: It sounds like this bikes needs a huge amount of work. In order for you to make it rideable, you will very likely have to spend far more than what you might spend for a running bike. I know you've said your parents won't let you get one, and they're probably only letting you work on the GS because they're convinced you'll never get it running. Even if you don't, you'll learn something in the process. Just don't throw too much money at it, okay?

Oh, there should be a small screw-off cap that you remove to add oil on top of one of the circular engine covers on either the right or left side, just under the finned cylinders. It will be roughly an inch in diameter.

[TechTMW]

This is like wathcing a horrible train wreck ... can't look ... away ....



Seriously. Good luck with your project. My current bike is one that I 'rescued' from a junkyard and got back up to riding standard. I managed to spend more than MSWARRIOR to get mine running. My initial reaction is to say 'forget about it', especially if you are short on cash ... but you'll figure that out on your own when the time comes I guess.

As for your current needs ... I'm guessing the rubber tube leaking fuel is an Atmospheric Vent ... this is meant to let air in the carb ... not fuel out, which probably means one of the floats has bit the dust. You need to take apart the carbs to see their internal condition. If any of the floats has liquid in it, that's yor culprit...

When taking the carburetors aprart : Leave them all on the common rail (Don't try to take them off one at at time, leave them in a group of four)

Also, Only take apart one (or two) carbs at a time. That way you will have at least one carb to reference back to so you know how to put it together.

Finally, when you do take the carbs apart, Make sure you keep all the parts separate - For example, everything you take out of Carb #1 needs to go back into Carb # 1 ... the parts have worn specifically to the carb they are in - if you mix them up, you'll cause more problems.

GET THE MANUAL


Finally, I'm moving this post to the Troubleshooting section, because you are obviously going to be doing alot of that in the future

[mrchristian]

So what kind of skills are necessary to actually do the carburator work? Is it one of those things where you just have to keep trying it and putting it back in until it works, or like where you get a diagram and stare at it and just adjust stuff for hours? I read somewhere that your working with 'jets' or something like that and there's over a billion combinations. I'm looking at diagrams right now and I don't see how you can actually adjust anything. It looks like a bunch of screws and springs to me. The fuel level float looks like some cork in a little box. Thats probably what I have to replace huh. Yeesh.

To tell you the truth, I think I might have met my match. It'll probably cost more to have this carburater serviced than actually buying a new bike. I still am not giving up though, and am going to call my uncle (big motorcycle guy) to see what he thinks and if he can do anything about it. If not, its off to craigslist with it.

After looking at this stuff, I see the masses of problems I could run into. I would probably have to replace that little floater thing and somehow put the carburator back together without hurting anything else. Odds are, it will be worse off than it was before I had tampered with it. I'm kind of wondering...how the heck did all of you figure this stuff out???

Hey, its only burst on one cylinder. That third cylinder is overrated anyway. I can drive without it, right? Am I right? Okay forget it.

Aw, the heck with it. As soon as I get that shop manual, i'm going in! Vengance will be sweet.