FZRSupport: the FZROnline Archive

Here we go guys and ladies:

As some of you know, I bought a 1994 FZR600 Airtech R1 convert from a close friend (and housemate) at college a few weeks ago. I had seen pictues and heard stories about the bike, so naturally I was very excited about buying it. He asked only $850 in order to buy a nice road bicycle.

When a friend (owner of an '06 SV650S) and I went down to pick the bike up, I realized it was in fairly rough shape - much rougher than what I had been led to believe. All the fairings were off (no big deal), but they were scratched and cracked in more than a few areas. He said he had it running last summer, but he never put it on the road because he didn't have enough money for the insurance... We tried to jump it, but of course it didn't start. Still, I remained optimistic.

Now, I have a hookup with fiberglass work and a full paint job (SV650S owner's father) for free!! I only have to pay for materials.

However, I've had more trouble trying to figure out why it won't start...There is no spark to the middle cylinders (2&3), but it's not the coils because I've crossed the "bad" coil with the plug from the "good" coil - giving me spark in cylinders 2&3... Some guys suggested that it may be a faulty CDI, so I'm in the process of buying a used but working ignitor. Now, R3TARD said he has similar issues, but his source was the wiring harness.

Now, in relation to more junky electrical work - the single sealed headlight for the Airtech kit will only work on hi-beam, the right blinker is always (not blinking), and the left blinker will stay on unless I throw the switch over to the right side (all the while, the right blinker is still stuck on).

Now that I have half of the bike apart, I realized there is a little more rust than anticipated on the swingarm, as well as some random spots of rust around the frame. I was originally planning on sanding the rust off, and spraying the spots with primer and silver paint to match the original frame paint.

Now here's the real question: Do I finish tearing the whole bike apart to do a legit ground-up rebuild? Or, do I get the bike running and throw it all back together in the same mechanical condition (replacing some missing nuts and bolts along the way)?

If I do a ground-up, I can have the frame and swinger sanded and powder-coated to match my custom paint, but of course it will cost some serious cash and, more importantly & more sadly, time away from riding.

I'm stuck. What do you guys think? I'll add pictures of the tear-down thus far to help you guys make a decision...

since you've got it most of the way apart i would just clean up everything , put it back together , and get it going , if you really wanna do a ground up wait untill it gets cold again .

And here are the pictures...


I'm also swapping a rear suspension...so keep that in mind when thinking about how much more I'll be tearing apart.

Well, it all depends on whether you've got the time and money to get all the work done, and the patience to know that you won't be riding anytime soon.. Me, I've got all the time in the world right now, and I'm still under orders not to ride, but I've got most of the work done and it's almost ready to fire up when I get my gas tank in.. If I had to do it over again, I would have stripped EVERYTHING off the bike down to bare frame and swingarm.. I would have sandblasted, powdercoated or at least painted black like I did the subframe.. Then I would put everything back together.. But because I got tired of having 100 different pieces of the bike all over the place, and I was originally going to be allowed to ride sooner than I actually am now, I wanted it back together..

Damn, I'm rambling... Anyways, If you wanna ride now, put it back and ride for the summer and tear down in the off-season.. If you wanna get everything right before starting to ride alot, be patient and take the time now that you have it mostly apart anyways..

That's my

Summer's here - get riding!

Deal with the teardown in winter.

darrin

ragedigital wrote:Summer's here - get riding!

Deal with the teardown in winter.

darrin

+1 Rig and ride Bro! plenty of offseason time to figure out what you want to do and to get it done..

dang... looking at these pics makes me REALLY appreciate how clean and well taken care of my bike was by the previous owner. I thought I had MY work cut out for me but you have a real task ahead of you. good luck with whatever route you take. personally I'd get it rideable then determine if the bike is even worth putting the time and effort into or finding a better bike to start with.

Ride now and tear it down in winter. And start real early in winter cause it will take you much longer than you think to do it all correctly.

Especially since you live in Buffalo. Try to enjoy riding now if you can, because your winters are really long and you'll want to do a lot of work on it during that time. Assuming you CAN get it running now. Also it allows you all summer to test / fiddle with things so you can diagnose other parts you may need and to save money for them.

That's the best case scenario anyway, I sure hope you can get it running. What's the mileage on the bike? Hopefully those electrical problems are what's causing the missing cylinders, and hopefully you can get that fixed. You'll know more as you start to piece it together, like a puzzle. Fortunately a lot of guys here have been thru that and hopefully can help out. While you're getting it going you can shop around for jacket, helmet, boots, gloves etc., unless you already have stuff.

ALSO... you may want to invest in a CLYMER manual if you can find one. They're well worth the money, especially if you plan to do a lot of work yourself. Usually you can find them on E-bay.

Welcome aboard.

the bike has 21,000 on it. I'm hoping that electrical issues are all that's holding it back. I already ordered a manual! Thanks for the support guys! I'm sure I'll be asking more questions soon enough

I would try to get it running correctly first. No use putting all this time and money into the frame, and then not being able to get it running. Since it appears you have a garage, I would definatly wait til the weather gets cold a tear it down later. But like I said, since the motor is still in the chassis and everything is hooked up, I would definatly get her running now and enjoy the summer.

The valve check interval is 15,800 miles I believe. So with 21,000 you definitely need to check them. When putting it back together you'll need a new gasket also. (not sure exactly what this gasket is called)

I had a shop do mine a couple years ago, valves were in spec, but I only had 13,500 miles on it at the time. If you have a shop do it, be SURE to have them install a new gasket, don't re-use the old one. While they have it apart be sure to have them check to see if the valves are scored, dented, or damaged in any way, apparently the metal is quite soft, and this happens quite often.

Keep us posted on your progress.

Thanks for everyone's input! Here's the route I'm leaning on taking: Making it run ASAP! (with the help of R3TARD's CDI he's shipping out Tuesday! )...Also fixing the Airtech cracked-up fiberglass and spraying it the gorgeous deep cherry red/black paint of the '06 R6.

While nearly everything else is off, I think I may just drop the engine down in the rack but leave it completely together for now. I also have a cheap and efficient powdercoating company just down the road from me, so I'll take the main frame, subframe, and swinger there to get sanded and powdercoated. I'll bring the motor rack later on (winter) to be done in the same color. This is all theoretical of course since I don't have my manuel yet and I'm just eyeing everything up - thinking that I can drop it down all right. Please correct me if I'm wrong so I can stop dreaming!

Of course, I won't even think about powdercoating the frame until I'm sure the bike is running. But I do plan on keeping the bike as a customization project, so I don't mind putting a little money into it...besides, I'm amazed at the unbelievably cheap prices on ebay for this bike. I'm also presently buying some racetech .90's and a hayabusa rear shock to compensate my rather large 215-lb frame on this smaller bike.

Wish me luck! As I said earlier, I'll be asking a lot of questions I'm sure...

94fzr600convert wrote: Wish me luck! As I said earlier, I'll be asking a lot of questions I'm sure...

Thats why we're all here What color you thinking of powdercoating the frame?

I'm thinking that flat black will flow best with the rest of the scheme I have in mind. Although, I have a tendancy to be flashy...so who knows - I might change my mind to a close red...or maybe white?? My rims are going to stay white since I don't want to deal with remounting the tires. I was already planning on using white decals to tie it all together, but what do you think about a white frame?? Too much??