81’ Suzuki GSX 250 ‘Jinx’

Hi all, ive been a reader and a contributor here for a while now and thought it’s time to post up my build.

I bought a 1981 Suzuki GSX 250 from a bloke $500 here in Australia. Im planning on building it to use as a daily ride to and from work as its cheap rego for anything under 300cc.

It had been sitting for about 5 years outside and looked a little worse for wear. Most of it looked like grime to me and not so much rust. The bloke I bought it off also hooked up a car battery to prove it turned over, which it did so that was a plus.

I got it home and madly started stripping the bike down. About halfway through I realised that I should probably have tried to get it running so that I knew everything worked properly before I stripped it. So I started putting so bits back on and hooking the wiring back up… Long story short the electrics had me by the balls for about 4 months and between my race bike and accident I didn’t have much time to look at the poor girl. A couple off weekends ago I took it up to my GF’s dad and we traced all the wires and discovered that I had managed to get them all right apart from one wire… Once we fixed that the starter motor was turning over so that was a good sign. We hooked up a funnel with some fuel and a little “start ya bastard” in the carbs and away she went! Turns out I did actually know how to clean the carbs and bench set them.

Anyway I left her there for me GF’s dad to play with as he already had the tank and fairings that he is painting. So we’re now in the process of figuring out the seat just before we strip her right down.

Couple more pics.

Cool little scoot, sir.

The tank looks great - any problems with the top of it being rusted though?

Thanks mate!

Nah somehow it managed to escape getting any rust.

All the best with this project, I've owned about a dozen of these and they are great little bikes and dead easy to fix up. The biggest thing to watch out for is the exhaust studs or bolts snapping on you and the charging system burning itself out but otherwise, they just keep on going
Like the GS450, a great basis for a cafe racer

Sweet thanks for the advice. Im heading up to the GF's parents place next weekend so i'll have an update then and take some more pictures.

I want your tank for my GS400X

So a brief update. Went up to Sydney last weekend for some racing and caught up with the GF's dad and had a bit of a chat. We're basically in the process of designing the seat as we're going to keep the stock back plastic. Im going to make it so that it has two different rear seats. One being cafe racer style with the hump and brake light built in and the other being a flat seat so that the GF can come along when she wants to. Both will have their own brake light and i'll mount the indicators off the frame.

Ok so a bit of progress was made on the weekend. Finally have a mock up of the seat and the tank back on the bike to give us an idea of how it will all be laid out.

We're using the stock seat hoop at the front of the bike to mount two different seats. One will be the cafe racer single seat version and the other will be for a pillion.

Some more progress on the rear. We're trying to intergrate the rear taillight and use it.

So recent update. Went to Sydney again last week and checked out the frame that the gf's dad has resprayed. Its looking really good! I got some new tyres for her aswell, some dunlop tt100gp's so once the new fork seals turn up we will have a rolling frame! Im looking to get everything together so that i can get her rebuilt and rideable over the christmas period while we're doing the family thing!

Hi All!

So over the xmas period i managed to spend a bit of time working on the bike up in Sydney. Its getting closer but we're having some difficulty getting the tuning right. Just lots of trial and error but we're getting closer. Got an updated picture below.

Cool liitle scoot

Hi all so the build is almost complete. Cant wait to start using this as my daily ride to work.

Finally completed.