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working title: gl1000

ok. this project isn't dead.
i'm going to take some credit again for progress i made YEARS ago, but since i put it down in the mean time there was some measure of starting over inertia that had to be overcome.

i decided that the front end had to come off of the bike to finish welding the frame mods because i needed to flip the thing over for access... welds are ugly but will probably work.... for as long as i care to ride this thing. if i'm taking the front end off i'm not putting the original back on, nope. time to resume the swap upgrade of my dreams. it's been at least 7 years since starting this. it's time to finish.

so, i printed the lastest version of the hub to rotor spacer (white plastic) to verify fittment and as before, it's fine.
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it would be a lot easier to adapt the native cbr900rr rotors to the gl1000 hub because then the original calipers 900rr would bolt on the forks no problem but.... they'd hit the spokes. also they're not spiffy enough being slightly smaller diameter. bigger is better afterall, that's why i want to ride a porky 70s goldwing?

original 900rr caliper, so close yet so far:
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likely candidate Nissen 6 piston caliper from a MV F4 because why not?
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annoyingly the nissen 6 piston uses i think an M8 fastener where the original 900rr uses M6, so i won't be able to use 1 of the existing mounting holes like this. drilling out the fork bracket hole wouldn't leave enough wall thickness for rules of thumb engineering, and i'll be dipped in shit if i'm going to do the calculations myself. this ain't that kind of build.
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next up, finalize the spacers. i got them a little skewed to one side, no biggie they're PVC for the moment.
also get the rotor adapters carved out of some metal for realzies
also also work on the adapter brackets for the calipers, or maybe find some of the 6 piston tokicos that are a direct swap for the original 4 piston nissens that might let me use one of the original bolt locations. decisions decisions
 

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Spacers made!
Did I machine them accurately?
Did I do the math properly, before machining them?
Will they fit?

No clue, I should have a few minutes to check sometime this year
 

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It's like they say, measure 5 times, cut 10?
Spacers are wrong but I have more material and I measured again so that's good.

Caliper brackets needed a tweak, good thing I have a 3d printer eh?

At least the modified triple trees and bearings went perfectly? Right?

Nope. Stem is a bit shorter than I want it. I'm pondering throwing money at it and buying a later model 900rr lower triple and adding a cognito moto adapter stem which offends my cheapskate nature, bit saves a lot of time and futzing. Time is the only thing I can't buy more of so... Maybe buying is actually cheaper?

Anyway, triples fit well enough to put the front end on and I do like the look so far. Steering stop needs a little work tho :laughing
 

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A little closer

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The spacers need some fiddling to get it all centered, the rim isn't centered over the hub and centering the hub between the legs has been my goal, so some adjustment is needed. One caliper is much closer to the spokes than the other so I'd like to even that out a bit as well. Baby steps I guess.

Feel free to comment about how precise the spacers need to be before binding is a problem over in the garage
 
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As a former owner of a 79 Wing, I approve.

Mad
 
Possibly a dumb answer, but, since this is a spoked wheel wouldn't the move be to adjust the dish of the wheel to center the rim over the hub?
 
Maddevill said:
As a former owner of a 79 Wing, I approve.

Mad
Click to expand...

they're really fun to ride, even stock!

N4teTheGreat said:
Possibly a dumb answer, but, since this is a spoked wheel wouldn't the move be to adjust the dish of the wheel to center the rim over the hub?
Click to expand...

you could do that, but for one i don't know how and i don't know if there is that much latitude available. more importantly, i would also like to have the option to use the lester mag wheel that was available for the 75-77 gl1000, which would use the same spacing including relative position of the hub and rim. if i dish the spoked rim the spacing would be all wrong for the lester when i find one.

there's also a chance i'll put a mechanical speedometer drive on the thing, and part of the spacer weirdness is making room for the speedo drive on the right side. or maybe it's the left.... the brake disk is probably in the way of the cable but i'll burn that bridge if i get to it.
 
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Well. This complicates things

no it doesn't. given the lack of confidence in the gl1000 i bandaided i have been looking for a better engine to swap while i slowly get the front end swap sorted out.

as usually happens, a "parts bike" came along in better shape in every way than the bike i'm working on AND it has some cool upgrades i've wanted to find for my bike anyway

weber 40IDF down draft carbs already installed and sorted (plugs indicate it is running really rich, but better that than lean eh?)
C5 electronic optic trigger ignition (only available for a few years. company still exists though)

whole bike has been cleaned in general. however it has a clutch problem which should be straight forward once i have time to get in there. the ignition is also not sparking, and the manufacturer still answers tech questions so i have some ideas there...

so new plan: get this 1981 gl1100 running and safe probably forget about the 1976 for a very long time. eventually, make cbr900rr forks work on this gl1100 frame but not sure which wheel to use. the "backwards" comstars are well and truly hideous on their own but ther aren't many options for this bike. the 1983 gl1100 cast 7 spoke wheels look pretty good and are a straight swap if i stumble on a set someday. wire front from the 76 would be cool, but difficult to match with anything on the rear as it was never an option for the 1100 bikes.
 

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I’ve always preferred the original comstars over the reversed despite the smaller size.
 
as hoped, parts bike runs and is indeed in better shape than the donor engine. thanks to some very sage advice from the ignition vendor, that still supports discontinued products! and a little fettling with the clutch the bike runs and can be ridden. Carbs need some tuning for sure, it pops on deceleration and under load, think 2nd gear roll on from ~15mph

my kids like to sit on whatever bike i'm working on and both want to ride with me. they're a little young, and i don't like riding with passengers (i'm not comfortable with it, lack of experience) but the 4 year old actually helped with some electrical diagnosis by holding the multimeter leads, and the nearly 9 year old... well he's just awesome so when it was time to put the bike away they helped me ride it the 50 feet to the back of the driveway. so fun.

[YOUTUBE]sJyp1s1TXes[/YOUTUBE]

the unfortunate part is i finally checked dmv fees. not exactly non-op, $1k due. seller still responding so maybe he has proof of non op somewhere. if not and dmv doesn't play nice i may end up stealing the engine for the other, actually is on non-op, afterall
 
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