Hi everyone, I'm Mac!

Hi there folks. I'm a brand new bike owner and stoked. I've never ridden or worked on a bike in my life, but I picked up an 82 KZ550 Ltd from a buddy of mine this past Saturday. I rented a trailer and drove the hour and a half to pick it up. Here's the catch; it's in pieces haha. I guess he'd decided to cut the bike down into more a Cafe style, altered the frame, and was beginning to chop into the harness when he got a second bike and the KZ was left in the shed.

The good news, he'd recently had the carbs cleaned and had the ignition system (retrofitted?) with a better electronic ignition system.

The bad:
The controls are completely off of the bike and are in a box.
The brake and clutch levers have disappeared somewhere.
The electrical harness is in pieces, and so I'll be rebuilding that. I've already posted about this as I'll probably need help doing so.

Now, I have no clue what l'm doing. I ordered a manual that'll be here in a week to help me make sense of everything, but I'm completely unfamiliar with motorcycle mechanics so it'll be a process. If anyone would like to help me get this bike up and running, I would forever grateful.

Thanks everyone!
Mac

Howdy. You can probably find oem control levers on EB. many KZs used the same levers, but check the x-ref at Partzilla.
MotionPro, Emgo or BikeMaster should be available as well. Z1Enterprises.com may have something.

Here's a Fr br lever. searched the oem part number. BikeMaster brake lever
There were about a dozen others. searching by model & part name etc should yield more results.

Clutch lever There were plenty more of these. same type of search.

Welcome. Let's see some pics...

Welcome aboard! You are at the right place, very knowledgeable people here and eager to help.
Pictures is also welcome...
JL

Welcome Mac.

Please make sure your new to you bike is brought up to a good mechanical condition. Follow the maintenance section of your manual. Consider new OEM or braided brake hoses and new fluid. Last thing you want to find out is man this thing runs great, wholly crap it won’t stop. :S

I still have to get pictures once it's up and running, but for now, I've got it running! Definitely needs an oil change, and I'm still waiting on the clutch lever to show up. Next I'll start wiring up all the lights on the bike and fixing my wiring because as of right now the ignition cylinder doesn't lock the bike at all.

If anyone could give me a run down on how to prepare to use LEDs on the bike before I start, that'd be great.

I would change the oil and oil filter asap. you never know what the po did or put in there. or when.
Shell Rotella T 15W-40 regular in the white jug is a what I use. It has the JASO-MA rating & is less expensive that most others.
Chevron Delo is another heavy duty engine oil that I use. Both are readily available & often times go on sale.
Both are marketed for diesel engine use. I don't know if the Delo has the Japanese rating, but like most heavy duty oils
it has the anti-wear compounds found in motorcycle oils. usually zddp of some sort.

If you need an oil filter right away, an auto parts store or wm might have a Fram CH-6012. maybe a Wix 24941.
Kawasaki oem part number = 16099-003.

I use Royal Purple full synthetic oil and it is good for wet clutch. For the LED lights, lots of info on YouTube. Check Classic Octane channel, he covers it up pretty good. If you use 1 indicator light for both flashers, you will a diode.





JL

Royal Purple is probably rather expensive. A motorcycle oil I've considered using is Mobil 4T Racing. the name is kind of a misnomer.
It's been a while since I've priced it, so I have no idea if the 4T racing is on a par with the purple stuff or not.

I've got everything ordered to do an oil change, should hopefully be here early next week. I bought some Rotella 10W-40 per the oil cap, but that's just to do a full flush of the system. I'll probably end up putting Royal Purple in it since it's what I use for my cars, but I'll check out the Mobil 4T since I've had good experience with Mobil oils in the past.

Another question I have, is there a specific fuel additive that's good to use? The bikes been sitting for over a year so I imagine it would be good to run something through it.

Seafoam comes to mind!

JL

In your first post you said the carbs were already gone thru and cleaned. If so, you don't need an additive. If you are worried about gas going stale then Sta-bil or using non-ethanol fuel is your best bet.