Helping a mate

[Yamazer-92]

My mate recently sold his bandit 600 for £1100 and bought a 1989 GSX R 750 slingshot for £1000. Personally, I'm not so sure it was a good idea because that seemed a lot to me for a bike that age, plus it has no MOT or tax and has been sat around for 5 years. He likes sport bikes and got a bit bored of his bandit even though it was a good runner and a lot newer on an 03 plate. Anyway allegedly the carbs have been sorted on the gsxr and it was stored without fuel etc so thats all fine, the main problems are the brakes and oil drain bolt.


The bike failed its mot last week for having excessively binding brakes. He's fitted a new master cylinder which then made the brake lines fail and leak a lot of fluid from the banjo bolts. So he's now fitted new braided brake hoses and said a mate has checked the calipers and cleaned them thoroughly etc. They arent leaking fluid anymore but are still binding quite badly, the discs aren't that worn but could possibly be warped? Not all the bobbins are as free as they could be. The wheel bearings seem okay, we're going to take the wheel off tomorrow and check / grease the spindle and give the calipers another clean to try and free them up.


Also today he tried to drain the oil but couldn't undo the drain plug on his own so asked if I would undo it whilst he held the bike. When I tried it was just spinning round and round, felt at times finger loose then quite tight, just spinning round in circles.    It definitely wasn't undoing anyway, and he isnt sure what to do now, is it an engine out job? I think personally he's rushed into this buy a bit and is having doubts. It looks nice and it runs, sounds impressive but needs a few expensive parts like chain and sprockets etc.


Anyway, any advice with the oil drain bolt and brakes would be appreciated. Thanks.

[JoeRock]

My mate recently sold his bandit 600 for £1100 and bought a 1989 GSX R 750 slingshot for £1000. Personally, I'm not so sure it was a good idea because that seemed a lot to me for a bike that age, plus it has no MOT or tax and has been sat around for 5 years. He likes sport bikes and got a bit bored of his bandit even though it was a good runner and a lot newer on an 03 plate. Anyway allegedly the carbs have been sorted on the gsxr and it was stored without fuel etc so thats all fine, the main problems are the brakes and oil drain bolt.


The bike failed its mot last week for having excessively binding brakes. He's fitted a new master cylinder which then made the brake lines fail and leak a lot of fluid from the banjo bolts. So he's now fitted new braided brake hoses and said a mate has checked the calipers and cleaned them thoroughly etc. They arent leaking fluid anymore but are still binding quite badly, the discs aren't that worn but could possibly be warped? Not all the bobbins are as free as they could be. The wheel bearings seem okay, we're going to take the wheel off tomorrow and check / grease the spindle and give the calipers another clean to try and free them up.


Also today he tried to drain the oil but couldn't undo the drain plug on his own so asked if I would undo it whilst he held the bike. When I tried it was just spinning round and round, felt at times finger loose then quite tight, just spinning round in circles.    It definitely wasn't undoing anyway, and he isnt sure what to do now, is it an engine out job? I think personally he's rushed into this buy a bit and is having doubts. It looks nice and it runs, sounds impressive but needs a few expensive parts like chain and sprockets etc.


Anyway, any advice with the oil drain bolt and brakes would be appreciated. Thanks.

The brakes:

If they're still binding, there's really two possibilities.
If the master cylinder and lines are new and good, then either the calipers are in need of a proper strip down (pistons out, clean up, new seals and pistons in jobbie), or the discs are extremely warped and are causing too much drag.  To be honest on a bike that's been sat for 5 years its likely the seals have given up the ghost, so i'd sort out a new set.

Oil drain bolt: Sounds like he's stripped the thread, or possibly the bike had a helicoil fitted which has given up the ghost. What you need to do is carrying on undoing the bolt, but you need to get downwards pressure on it to make it come out - maybe a thin chisel lightly tapped in might help it start coming down, and then you can carry on using the chisel as leverage to push the bolt down as you undo it. Once it's out, it'll probably just need a helicoil fitted, just check the size, order up a new one and get it fitted.

Personally though, there's no way I'd have paid that for a 1989 bike. For a couple hundred more (and I do mean literally a couple hundred) he could've got himself an S-RAD 750 for sure, maybe even a K1-K3 if he was lucky, and they are literally light years apart from a slingshot!

[Yamazer-92]

Cheers for the reply Joe, yeah I'm seeing him tomorrow so I will ask again in more detail about the calipers but as much as I love the guy he can gas on a bit about stuff so not always sure what's really going on. He claims they have been properly cleaned, pistons out blown through with air lines etc but when I asked about the seals he didn't really give a definitive answer. I suggested he should replace them anyway, age of the bike and that much power I would want peace of mind personally. Not sure about discs, the workshop at college has a dial gauge and lots of vernier calipers to check them its just getting it there that's the issue. 


Ah right yeah our tutor said something similar today, he suggested getting some mole grips on the bolt and downward force as you say. He knows that he will have to replace the bolt anyway and doesn't need the bike on the road asap or anything so will have to order a new one when we see what it is.


To be honest, I totally agree with you. I am really not a sport bike fan but I really like the SRAD 750 and he is a big fan of them too. He looked at one in a dealership just to get a measure of it, sat on it etc and loved it. Then was looking at much newer gsxr 600's and similar and practically had pen to paper on a real nice one with a finance deal, expensive though. Then literally out of nowhere he posted this GSX R 750 on facebook and I was like...what? I wasnt there when he bought it but I cant imagine he tried to haggle the guy down, I guess he took a test ride and the straight line speed was so mega in comparison to his bandit he lost his brains. He's since tried to sell it and been offered £700 maximum so he acknowledges he's stuck with it now unless he takes a big loss. Quite a shame but when it's sorted I'm sure it will be lovely, he was considering getting a Fazer 600 too but i've already converted one mate so I think he didn't want to be seen as copying us or whatever.

[flyboy]

       hey  up
you may be able to remove the sump plate from the bottom of the engine with it still in the frame,  you can then re cut the thread with one of these kits
ebay Item number: 320948002404
+1 for knackered brake caliper seals
[/font]
 
 

[chris.biker]

You would get a pretty good idea if the discs are warped by spinning the wheel and holding a pencil point up to disc, hold the pencil with it side held tight to the fork leg.