My 82 GL 1100 Maiden Voyage

[56michael]

I’ve been working on my 82 Interstate for the last couple of months. Replaced the rear brake rotor, rebuilt front and rear brake master cylinders, rebuilt all three brake calipers and installed new brake pads, replaced the fork seals. I had rebuilt the carbs last winter. The guy I got the bike from told me there was a issue with the bike occasionally popping out of gear. I rode the bike around on side streets today for the first time it ran great and brakes worked good too. When I first took off from home I let the clutch out and worked nice, made a couple stops at stop signs everything was good. Then I came to a complete stop at a light and when I let the clutch out it made a squealing noise and seemed to strain to get going, pulled the clutch in and let it out again and took off a bit better. I put 10 miles on it on side streets and made several stops. The squealing on takeoff was intermittent. The bike never popped out of gear. I did go through all the gears a couple times. Shifted nice going up and down the gears. I had it up to about 45 mph a couple times. Thoughts? 49,000 on the bike, been sitting about 7 years.

 

[AApple]

I gotta ask...have you changed the oil? If so, what kind did you use? It's possible the clutches are sticking, or "skipping" on the steel plates, and making that noise. That noise might also be the release bearing for the clutch.

 

[zman]

I thought the same thing, hopefully used 15-40

 

[56michael]

I used 10-40 in my 81 an I used 5-20 in this one because I heard they start easier in cooler climates. Do you think I should try something different?

 

[AApple]

Does it only make this noise while letting the clutch out, or does it continue after it is fully applied?

 

[56michael]

Only while letting out the clutch.

 

[mcgovern61]

My '82 made a tiny "squeal" on occasion whenever I started off in 1st gear. Mostly if I was letting the clutch out with too much throttle. Right oil, right maintenance and 75,000 miles later, it still squealed! On occasion, it popped out of 4th gear. I just rode it anyway!

 

[56michael]

I’m going to try the recommended 10-40 today and see how that works.

 

[pidjones]

Good move. Many use Rotella T4 15W40. Make sure it is JASO MA2 rated, whatever you use.

 

[56michael]

This morning I took it for a spin to get it warmed up hood still squealing on take off. Drained it all out including the filter. Added the 10-40 that I had on hand. Went for a ride. No squealing at first after a few take off from a dead start noticed a little squeal noise. Ride snout 20 miles and seemed to get much better. I did notice that if I give it minimal throttle and let the clutch out slow no noise at all. I’m going to ride it more snd report back.
Do I risk making anything worse by riding it?

 

[mcgovern61]

Nope. Just ride it. The reality is, these old girls DO NOT like to sit around. The more they are on the road, the better it gets.

 

[detdrbuzzard]

did you use a t4 oil

 

[zman]

The recommended oil would be 15-40 diesel rated oil because it has no friction modifiers, any 15-40 oil is diesel rated and fine to use but the rotella is very good.
Maybe I am wrong and there is a 10-40 diesel oil nowadays?

 

[56michael]

I don’t think it’s T4 oil. I’ll be going today to get the Rotella. I’ll see how that works.

 

[56michael]

Is this the stuff.

 

[zman]

yes

 

[TMF]

I don't like that oil and weight for two reasons. First, my '03 Suzuki SV1000S had an audible bearing knock at idle on that oil once hot and at only 2K miles on the oil. That was 15K miles ago. The knock went away after changing away from Rotella and has not returned. The Suzy has 30K miles on it now and again there's no knock. I'm currently running Castrol 0W40 gasoline engine oil on several bikes. It's not an energy conserving oil and offers much better cold startup protection and is good enough for the best European turbo engines. Reason two: I acquired an '02 Ducati 900 sport with 10K miles and changed to Rotella. The Duc's aircooled engine topend was noisy at startup but I didn't think much of it. By 15K miles rings were shot and massive blowby overwhelmed the underseat oil tank and flowed down into the airbox then began leaking everywhere. Diesel engines have different requirements than gas engines and 15W oil at startup is a bad idea. Use gasoline engine oil.

 

[mcgovern61]

I tried the 15W-40 once and found good old fashioned 10W-40 worked better. Here are the recommendations directly from the manual:

 

[56michael]

im going to run the 10-40 that I put in yesterday for a while and see how it works. I’m out on a 100 ride today and not much squealing.

 

[56michael]

On a side note can anyone tell me what this is for? Some sort of button.