New bike!! Woot wooo

[bumpinranger]

so the other day i bought a 89 suzuki gs 500 for $1000. (sawwweeet!!) he threw in a jacket, and some spark plugs and a adjustable rear gas shock.
im gonna upload pics a little later but the thing is in great shape, he just put a rebuilt engine in it that has less that 20-25 hours on it. starts up GREAT!!!
theres a couple things that its gonna need though, like:
fork seals (thought i would upgrade the springs as well....any suggestions? brands, where to buy, what strength,...etc)
it might need a new battery, its about a year old
and its missing a speedo cable, so the ODO is stuck at 26K miles.. we wrote 26,999 on the bill of sale and he only owned it a year and the bike seemed like it hasnt seen the road much since he bought it..
i just thought i would tell ya'll
peace, David

[NiceGuysFinishLast]

'89 is the only year they came stock with clipon bars, nice. I've got a pair of custom clipons on my '02. Fork seals, I'd recommend OEM, and definitely DON'T use Leak Proof brand seals, they're guaranteed to leak. I've used both Sonic and Racetech for straight rate springs (you can go progressive if you plan to commute, but for aggressive riding, I prefer straight rate), and I can recommend them both. I'm about 135 without gear, and I went with .85 springs and I don't remember which oil. Sonic has a spring rate calculator on their website.

Take a look on the forums at gstwins.com/gsboard for ideas on common mods. I've got the K&N filter and appropriate Jets (assuming I can find them) laying around, and I'll let em go cheap. I'll shoot you a PM when I find them. Speedo cable should be cheap from ronayers.com or bikebandit.com Be sure to use a decent bit of blue loctite when you put it on at the end that connects to the speedometer, they tend to vibrate loose, kind of annoying.

Congrats on the new bike! And good choice for a first bike, they make EXCELLENT learning tools. Get that gas rear shock put on ASAP, the stock ones are weak and pogo-y. Keep the shiny side up!

[ramm]

congrats man :up:

[secondgen7]

Congrats man and good choice! A GS was my first, as well.

[bumpinranger]

thanks guys!!
and thanks A LOT niceguy. that information was very very informative!
the bike has been GREAT i love it. and he ran full synthetic in it, the bike calls for 10-40, i have 10-30 for my 4 wheeler, could i put that in it?

[wallypiper]

Probably not a great idea on an aircooled bike to go lighter on the oil. It's not a huge difference but if I had an aircooled bike in Atlanta in the summer I'd be more inclined to go up to a 50 than down to a 30.

[DICKIEDOO]

Probably not a great idea on an aircooled bike to go lighter on the oil. It's not a huge difference but if I had an aircooled bike in Atlanta in the summer I'd be more inclined to go up to a 50 than down to a 30.

What he said.

[ramm]

Probably not a great idea on an aircooled bike to go lighter on the oil. It's not a huge difference but if I had an aircooled bike in Atlanta in the summer I'd be more inclined to go up to a 50 than down to a 30.

yep. agree with that! My Buell is air cooled fwiw

[bumpinranger]

ok, cool. what kind of bike would mine be considered? standard/sport touring? or just sport?

[bumpinranger]

what brand and weight of fork oil should i use?

[NiceGuysFinishLast]

what brand and weight of fork oil should i use?


a gs500 is classified as a standard. Upright seating, bars vs. clipons, low torque/hp numbers, banana seat... Oh yeah, and it's slow hahaha.

Fork oil: Again, you need to research to figure out what's right for you. Check sonic's site. As I recall, they tell you what weight oil to use with the springs, based on your weight and riding style. Brand doesn't matter too much, I used Motul cuz that's what the shop had.

Engine oil: Run the 10w-40 recommended in the manual. Also, in gs500s, you can use the cheapy non-synthetic oil they sell at wal mart or pep boys or whatever. It's less important to use nice oil than it is to keep the oil at the proper level and changed at the proper intervals. Just make sure you don't get anything that says it has "friction modifiers", they don't agree so well with wet clutches. The GS will burn oil, it's air/oil cooled, it's to be expected. Make sure you keep an eye on your oil level. Make sure that when you check the oil level, you do it with the bike UPRIGHT (either on a center stand, or with a friend holding it upright... once you've done a few oil changes, you can do it yourself too haha), NOT on the side stand.

[bumpinranger]

they previous owner has already put synthetic in it, dont i need to keep changing it with synthetic?

[Seca]

I would be careful with synthetic on an engine with unknown mileage. You could be asking for gaskets to start leaking.