1979 XS1100F Fixer Upper Project Begins.....

[jetmechmarty]

Thanks that will work great.
How much did you put in the tank and what else did you add with it?

I put about 3 lbs media in the tank. Nothing else in the tank with it. The vacuum cleaner removed what didn't fall out.

[CKlamer]

Here are a few more pictures of the disassembly.

[natemoen]

You could use those petcock filter towers still. You should always use inline filters anyways since those towers don't filter anything but big chunks anyways.

[mikubuilder]

with petcock filter tower you have to make sure that they are for your standard, as the ones for a special are different

as to your gas tank, I would clean it out with any kind of degreaser, like Simple Green or Purple Power, and media of your choice(bolt, nuts, ball bearings, etc.), but because of how extensive rust is I would plan on coating(lining) the tank

mine looked just like yours, except it had 20+ year old gas in it, I lined with Red cote, Caswell is good too, POR 15 has some good reviews

looks like petcocks were leaking and PO added manual shut offs, with good cleaning and polishing you can remove them, but I would still keep inline filters

[DGXSER]

I think the tank pic was mine from the SG I sold this spring. That tank needed no liner when completed. That's the beauty of the MR type products.

If a liner is needed, I highly recommend the epoxy type liners like Caswell. Others have had poor performance from Kreem type products.

[CKlamer]

I have used the Caswell liner on a fiberglass tank on my Cafe racer.
But I hope to not use a liner on this tank.
It seems to be mostly surface rust in this tank.

[CKlamer]

Thought I would add a few more pictures.
Started soaking the tank yesterda and looks like it should be ready to go tomorrow.
The new carb boots came in on Friday along with my GSXR 1300 front end for my new Cafe Racer.

[CKlamer]

Okay one more.

[jetmechmarty]

With the tank being that rusted, I believe I would save the metal rescue for other valuable pieces. Fill the tank with water and about two cups of phosphoric acid. In a matter of hours, that tank will be clean. Follow with a Caswell liner. Rusted that bad, you have to line it anyway and the phosphoric acid is far cheaper than Metal Rescue. You have no shortage of parts there to give the Metal Rescue treatment. My opinion here is based only on $$. Metal Rescue will clean that tank perfectly.

[IanDMacDonald]

With the tank being that rusted, I believe I would save the metal rescue for other valuable pieces. Fill the tank with water and about two cups of phosphoric acid. In a matter of hours, that tank will be clean. Follow with a Caswell liner. Rusted that bad, you have to line it anyway and the phosphoric acid is far cheaper than Metal Rescue. You have no shortage of parts there to give the Metal Rescue treatment. My opinion here is based only on $$. Metal Rescue will clean that tank perfectly.

I was hanging on till the veey end till you said MR would work great, lol. Other posts by Gabe (Down$hift) spoke of this and found that it was not the greatest idea.

[CKlamer]

Well I finally poured the Metal Rescue out of the tank and it went in absolutely clear and came out completely black.
Did a great job of getting rid of the rust in the tank though and I would highly recommend.
Put some of their rust inhibitor in the tank since I will not actually be putting it back on for a whil and it will keep it from rusting while it sits and waits.

Had to replace the battery box and electrical mounting plate. They were so badly rusted I had to cut them apart. The screws and the plates were one piece of rust. The pieces had started breaking off also.

Seems like everything on the right side of the battery was in horrible rusty condition. Looked like something had been dripping down behind that side cover for some time.

Also have a guy in Florida that did the ceramic coating on my exhaust for my Cafe Racer and he said he could media blast my exhaust and clean it up and ceramic coat the entire thing for way cheaper than buying a new exhaust.

[CKlamer]

Okay I have to say I am very happy with the Metal Rescue. I did call Metal Rescue about the fact that after I had it in the tank for two days I still had a few spots of rust left in the tank. So they said just strain the sediment out and out it back in the tank for another 24-36 hours.

So I took some chees cloth and strapped it to the top og my bucket and got rid of most of the debree. Oh and I also found out that during the second day the temperature had dropped outside and inside and that might have made the Metal Rescue stop working as well.

So I put it back in the tank and topped it off with an extra gallon I had bought that was new and clean. So after another 36 hours the gas tank is completely clean. I have to say I am very impressed with this stuff.

So here is the before and after pictures.







Also removed the exhaust.



I also had to cut the battery box and electrical connector mounting piece off of the bike because the rust was so severe on that side of the bike none of the screws would release. So took the Dremel and a drill and cut it off.

[CKlamer]

By the way are the front shocks normally pretty mushy feeling and soft?
Pretty sure I will need to at least cgange the fork oil. Mainly because if it is anything like the rest of the bike it hasn't had a lot of TLC and the fork oil is probably what was in there in 1979. If it has been changed at all it might be once.
I really hate it when people don't take care of motorcycles and are just oblivious to taking care of them.

[CKlamer]

I am probably going to keep the exhaust it doesn't seem to be rusted through anywhere so I have someone that will media blast it and then ceramic coat it. So after I clean up and paint the engine the black ceramic coated exhaust should blend right in.

[Garagamus]

I have the battery box and various other "between the side covers" items in decent to good shape (81 Standard). Didn't figure anybody would have use for them, and I just bought an Odyssey AGM battery to install in the bump seat. If you can use any of it, send me a PM, pretty much shipping costs will get them.