Anyway, I managed to get three of the four bowls off.  The fourth has unfortunately turned into an opportunity to test out one of those tools guaranteed to remove stripped screws.

Toward the bottom of the picture, just below the fuel line, you can see the corrosion around the main jet on the last carburetor.  Other than that, these LOOK pretty clean, but I’m sure they’re not.

Does anyone know if you can just soak the entire rack of carbs in something for a few days to let the liquid penetrate all of the crevices prior to ultimate disassembly?  Acetone?  Too strong?  I think obviously I’d remove the vacuum seals and anything else that isn’t metal.  Any suggestions are much appreciated…I’m very much a newbie with engine parts, but I”m determined to quickly become knowledgable.

After some careful persuasion, some WD40 and a pair of pliers, I finally got them to move.  After some more WD40 and manually opening and closing them about 30 or 40 times, they now move freely and spring back into the closed position as they should. 

As you can see from the picture, the two end throttles aren’t in alignment with the other two.  That’s because there’s a spring missing from each one and they flop around.  I have both of them (they fell out)…should be interesting trying to get them back into place.

Garden Shed turned Workshop

I don’t have a garage but I do have a rather large garden shed that is bigger,inside, than some bedrooms I’ve had. It should be easy to heat, when I need to but it’ll only hold one bike. The other 79 750 will be going over to my Landlady’s garage which is a big double in which she only uses 1/2 for her new pickup. 

So, I decided that rather than standing around in my garage looking at the GSX-R and sighing thinking about what I got myself into, it was time to get down to business.  This is that magical time when you first start on a bike project and you’re shaking your head, knowing that it would have been cheaper in the long run to buy something that isn’t a basket case.  But, where’s the fun in that?

It’s late, so I’m keeping this brief….I have a lot more pictures.  Below is one of the two frozen and rusty front calipers.  I took them off so I can start the rebuild of them over the cold months.

Another picture below is of the carbs…smelling strongly of rotten gas.  One of them (at least) is also frozen.  You can see a ton of corrosion holding the valve closed.  No problem…another good project for the winter.

The big plan is to fix all of the electrical issues, the calipers, and the carburetors over the winter.  Hopefully in the spring I’ll be ready to start addressing whatever may be wrong with the engine.

Mentally, it scares the crap out of me since it was not only a fast bike from the factory, but is now a retired racing bike and will be scary fast once it’s running again.  On the other hand, just looking at it and thinking about the potential that it has is very exciting.

I guess I could de-tune it and try to get it back to factory specs….but that could be a ton of money.

Any suggestions?  Should I just try to trade it for something more civil?

I do have the tank and some of the body work, but it’s not on in this picture.    The back tire is a nice fattie!

So..I’m not sure where to begin with this thing.  I tried jumping the battery just to see if the lights and starter work, but it’s absolutely dead…so obviously a fuse or electrical problem.

All three calipers are frozen as well.

My immediate plan, aside from kind of chilling out for the winter, is to maybe get the calipers off and rebuild them over the winter.  I’ll poke around at the electrical issues, but not much until the spring (my garage is not heated).  The gas tank has no cap so it’s all rusted inside…another good winter task.  There’s really not much I can do I guess until it has a working electrical system and the ability to put fuel into it.

Another good task is cleaning out the carbs.  There is no way they’re not totally gummed up.  Does anyone know how to get the air box off of a 1989 GSX-R 750 so that I can then proceed to get the carbs off?

I almost forgot to mention – the guy told me this was a racing bike before he bought it in 1994.  That seems to be accurate since it has a racing seat, front slick, and little twisted wires through and around most of the bolts.  Supposedly the engine is build and has Wiseco pistons and some other crap and output is (was) around 130+ horsepower.

That’s too much.  If I need to do a top end rebuild, I’ll de-tune it.  I don’t need or want that kind of power.  The stock 102 HP is more than enough.