Tweet
81 Xs1100
Last summer, when I was getting my eyes checked, I mentioned to my eye doctor that I had just purchased my first motorcycle. He happenned to be a motorcycle enthusiast, so we had a pretty nice conversation about motorcycles. It ended with him giving me a motorcycle that he'd had in storage for about 8 years.
It turned out to be a 1981 Yamaha XS1100 Venturer. It has 38000 miles on it and didn't run. The fairing was missing the windshield and radio (both looked as though they had been torn off). One saddle bag was broken, but the other was fine. It also had a luggage rack that was in decent shape. I removed all the above the day I got it and then took a couple of pictures:
They were taken after I began draining the oil, which it had about 8 quarts (for whatever reason, I don't know). It suprised my father and I, which is why there is the big puddle (that bucket only holds about 5 quarts).
Anyway, we changed the oil, charged the battery, adjusted the timing chain, put new spark plugs in, and cleaned the airbox out and tried to start it. It flooded horribly, with gas running out of the carbs into the motor and into the air box. After taking the carbs off and cleaning the float valve and seat and the main jets and an attempt at the pilot jets, we retried. With much better results. The bike started, but wouldn't run well at idle due to the fact that the pilot jets were still clogged. But as we revved it up above about 3500 RPM, it evened out and sounded decent.
After this, I went about buying different turn signals, a headlight, a new battery, recovering the seat, a new tank (discovered the old one was horribly rusted far down inside), and rebuilding the carburetors. I did this myself a few months ago.
This project has some time (nearly 11 months now) due to the fact that I'm in college and I don't have much to spend. And also, the bike is stored at my parents house, which is a 3 1/2 hour trip from here, so I don't always make it back due to work scheduling and such.
This weekend, I return home to a newly painted gas tank, and finally get to see if all the work and money has paid off. I was careful with the carburetors and I borrowed a synch tool from an older coworker of my father's who works on Harleys quite a bit (he's also the same guy who painted my tank for free
). I've got about $350 into the bike right now, including all oil, and carb cleaner and such.
If everything works and it runs well, I'll be posting new pics of it here next week.
If you guys have any suggestions, as I near the end of my project, they would be well recieved.
It turned out to be a 1981 Yamaha XS1100 Venturer. It has 38000 miles on it and didn't run. The fairing was missing the windshield and radio (both looked as though they had been torn off). One saddle bag was broken, but the other was fine. It also had a luggage rack that was in decent shape. I removed all the above the day I got it and then took a couple of pictures:
They were taken after I began draining the oil, which it had about 8 quarts (for whatever reason, I don't know). It suprised my father and I, which is why there is the big puddle (that bucket only holds about 5 quarts).
Anyway, we changed the oil, charged the battery, adjusted the timing chain, put new spark plugs in, and cleaned the airbox out and tried to start it. It flooded horribly, with gas running out of the carbs into the motor and into the air box. After taking the carbs off and cleaning the float valve and seat and the main jets and an attempt at the pilot jets, we retried. With much better results. The bike started, but wouldn't run well at idle due to the fact that the pilot jets were still clogged. But as we revved it up above about 3500 RPM, it evened out and sounded decent.
After this, I went about buying different turn signals, a headlight, a new battery, recovering the seat, a new tank (discovered the old one was horribly rusted far down inside), and rebuilding the carburetors. I did this myself a few months ago.
This project has some time (nearly 11 months now) due to the fact that I'm in college and I don't have much to spend. And also, the bike is stored at my parents house, which is a 3 1/2 hour trip from here, so I don't always make it back due to work scheduling and such.
This weekend, I return home to a newly painted gas tank, and finally get to see if all the work and money has paid off. I was careful with the carburetors and I borrowed a synch tool from an older coworker of my father's who works on Harleys quite a bit (he's also the same guy who painted my tank for free
). I've got about $350 into the bike right now, including all oil, and carb cleaner and such.If everything works and it runs well, I'll be posting new pics of it here next week.
If you guys have any suggestions, as I near the end of my project, they would be well recieved.
. But it looks decent. I should have some pictures by the end of the week.
Comment