Cast wheels on a GT250A ?

[daxman]

HI all

Do any cast wheels fit this bike e.g. from an X7 or GSX250/400? The rims on my newly acquired GT 250 are badly rusted and I have no spare money to have them rebuilt.
(after factoring in a likely crank rebuild and fork re-furbish etc..)

Cheers

J

[sportston]

They might fit on GT250. I've got a set of GS400 alloys on my GT380. The front was a straight swap, but the rear needed some cobbling together to make the different size drum and rod operated brake work.
Count the bolt holes. Some later bikes have 5 bolts holding the disc and the sprocket on, while older suzies often have 6.
At the end of the day you will have to take a bit of a leap of faith, but ask prospective sellers to tell you what diameter the drum, disc, wheels are etc. I would suggest you may need to replace the sprocket carrier and the inner brake drum assembly for matching ones if you start getting rear wheels from different models.
I didn't have to change the wheel bearings or spacers if I recall. The speedo drive was the same and fitted without hassle.

[daxman]

Whoops - forgot to thank for your reply!

I've got a few other priorities atm but it's good to know there might be options down the line.

Cheers

James

[sportston]

You're welcome. I think the GT250A shares the same discs as on the 380/550/750. So that would mean you should look for wheels with 6 bolt holes for the disc.
So that gives you a couple of choices from the Suzuki parts bin

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/suzuki-gs550 ... SwcUBYS-tA

or this is the style I got on my GT380

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Suzuki-GS550 ... Sw6VRaAzUD
You'll find many front wheels can be used with twin or single discs, but not all.
The rear wheels are often made for a disc setup, drum brake rears are harder to find.
Check the diameters. X7 front is 18" while many of the 1970s Suzukis had 19". An X7 rear would probably fit and has a drum but might be different size than older gt250s.
Good luck

[daxman]

Thanks again. I was focusing on the GSX250 wheel for front as I think it's also a 15mm spindle. BUT the disc is on the opposite side. If you turned it around then wouldn't the speedo drive then run 'backwards' ?!

Cheers

[sportston]

Thanks again. I was focusing on the GSX250 wheel for front as I think it's also a 15mm spindle. BUT the disc is on the opposite side. If you turned it around then wouldn't the speedo drive then run 'backwards' ?!

Cheers

Yes but the alternative would be to get a similar style wheel off one of the larger GS models that has the opportunity of running twin discs (that is what I did). It fitted fine with the standard spindle, disc and speedo drive. You can then run with the speedo drive on the correct side and choose whichever side you wanted to run the disc on. I chose to run with my disc on the left as this is the modern and better way of doing things, but Suzuki had the caliper originally mounted on the right and before the stanchion. I swapped my forks around and mounted mine on the back of the leg instead. The black plastic cover that you use to cover the disc mounting holes on one side of the wheel on a normal GT380 fits the alloy wheels fine.

[jabcb]

Thanks again. I was focusing on the GSX250 wheel for front as I think it's also a 15mm spindle. BUT the disc is on the opposite side. If you turned it around then wouldn't the speedo drive then run 'backwards' ?!

Cheers

No. You switch fork tube assemblies & keep the wheel with the speedo drive on the left. You can also upgrade to a twin-piston caliper while you are at it.

That’s what we did on the GT250 cafe build (except we stayed with a spoked wheel). See: viewtopic.php?f=21&t=12998

[sportston]

You switch fork tube assemblies & keep the wheel with the speedo drive on the left. You can also upgrade to a twin-piston caliper while you are at it.

That’s what we did on the GT250 cafe build (except we stayed with a spoked wheel).

It does look pretty good with the larger disc and twin pot caliper, though I imagine that is more expensive.

[jabcb]

The twin-piston upgrade originates with salty_monk of the Suzuki GS forum. It can be done fairly cheaply by getting a used disc & caliper from eBay. Salty_monk sells the adapter bracket needed to make this setup work.