Testarossa's 78 KZ1000 Fighter Build

A quick update. The smoothbores are installed on the bike. :woohoo: Did I mention that I dislike setting float levels? Well, they're set, the carbs are synced, and I think the jets are pretty close. I have #122.5 mains, 0-6 needle jets, 5DL31 needles on the third clip, and #17.5 pilot jets. Haven't had much time to ride it since I just got the carbs vacuum synced today. Initially, the pilots might be a touch rich, we'll see. Damn, is that ever an improvement over the VM26 carbs. I lost the stumble just off idle and the bike pulls a lot harder. Worth it!!!!



I also picked up a set of take off rearsets from a fellow member at zx-10r.net. These will replace my funky fabricated rearsets that have served fairly well, but not perfect. Just have to make up some adapter plates and figure out how to hook up the shift arm. I may have to go to GP style shifting. I am running into a lack of space between the sidestand and the shift arm.



BTW I will have to customize those heel guards. Way too big.

after all the work you did on the handmade ones? well the new ones look nice anyway.

I bought all my rod stuff at a drag race shop. I think it is 1/4 inch with heim joints. rod came with left hand thread tap. just make sure shifter is set up with kick stand in up position

i had too grind a bit off of the kickstand mount. But u know how much i like my grinder. :lol:
some guys just mount the link arm upwards rather than pointing down. Larry C did it that way with a GPZ link.
Congrats on an EXCELLENT JOB on the carbs my man.

glad the carbs did what they should.

can't wait to see how the new rear sets turn out. :evil:

leon

A week or so ago I posted a witty comment about you being one of only a handful of active members that could have resurrected those carbs. Somehow it didn't post, but I stand by my comment. Excellent job bringing that rack back from the dead! I am glad to hear the performance increase was worth the effort and money you spent on them :woohoo: I like the rearsets, but you're right, the heal gaurds are too big. Thats nothing a man of your talent can't mitigate (look it up Joe!) Fantastic work Bud!

Great to see the new carbs working good. Can't wait till I have a complete running bike I can ride around on and do upgrades one at a time like that. Congrats!

Nelson wrote: after all the work you did on the handmade ones? well the new ones look nice anyway.

I know, I know, but there are a couple of things that I would change about those to be truly satisfied. Plus I feel that I have too much black, and I like the silver contrasting against all of the dark colors.

I bought all my rod stuff at a drag race shop. I think it is 1/4 inch with heim joints. rod came with left hand thread tap. just make sure shifter is set up with kick stand in up position

Thanks for the pointers camaroguy. I was looking at this situation with the bike on a rear stand. It's tight quarters in between the shifter and kickstand.

Great to see the new carbs working good. Can't wait till I have a complete running bike I can ride around on and do upgrades one at a time like that. Congrats!

This is a lot more gratifying than all that work to get the bike together. I can make one change, and immediately test it, then move on.

Well it only took me two weeks to get my new rearsets mounted. Half of that was waiting for parts to come in. I had to make a new link arm from a piece of 3/8" aluminum, and I ordered new 6mm heim joints. I also had to get a M6x1 LH tap to make the link arm a proper turnbuckle. Not that you could twist it without disconnecting one end. It has to have two bends to clear everything in there. I just made up some adapter plates from 1/2" aluminum to make these fit my existing mount points. Happily the shifter is quite a bit smoother than the one that I had fabricated. I think most of that is due to the fact that it has brand new heim joints and the shift arm isn't as flexible as mine was. I cut mine too thin and it was possible to bend it slightly with a good stomp.

Pay no attention to the fasteners used at the moment. They were just what I had in the garage. That's one of my next goals to get new or re-plated fasteners throughout the bike. It's all about incremental improvements now that the bike is running.

I'm pleased to say that the Smoothbores are right at home in there. The bike is running much more smoothly at lower rpms. Particularly the transition from no throttle to part throttle is much better. I think that I was underestimating the influence of the needle jet and jet needle in that whole equation. I left the old ones in my 26's because they "seemed" to look pretty good and they cleaned up just fine. On the 29's I replaced all of jets, including the needle jet and jet needle. I figure those carbs are worth spending on proper jets. I actually found a website that gives the actual dimensions on Mikuni jet needles. It might be worth it to pull those from the 26's and measure them to see if there has been any wear. That's def. a rainy day project. Weather is too nice to be jacking around in the garage more than necessary right now.

Here's a few cell phone pics of the bike with the new rear sets. Matching passenger pegs will follow in the near future.








BTW I plan to customize the heel guards as well. The left side one in particular is HUGE.

testarossa wrote: Well it only took me two weeks to get my new rearsets mounted. Half of that was waiting for parts to come in. I had to make a new link arm from a piece of 3/8" aluminum, and I ordered new 6mm heim joints. I also had to get a M6x1 LH tap to make the link arm a proper turnbuckle. Not that you could twist it without disconnecting one end. It has to have two bends to clear everything in there. I just made up some adapter plates from 1/2" aluminum to make these fit my existing mount points. Happily the shifter is quite a bit smoother than the one that I had fabricated. I think most of that is due to the fact that it has brand new heim joints and the shift arm isn't as flexible as mine was. I cut mine too thin and it was possible to bend it slightly with a good stomp.

Pay no attention to the fasteners used at the moment. They were just what I had in the garage. That's one of my next goals to get new or re-plated fasteners throughout the bike. It's all about incremental improvements now that the bike is running.

I'm pleased to say that the Smoothbores are right at home in there. The bike is running much more smoothly at lower rpms. Particularly the transition from no throttle to part throttle is much better. I think that I was underestimating the influence of the needle jet and jet needle in that whole equation. I left the old ones in my 26's because they "seemed" to look pretty good and they cleaned up just fine. On the 29's I replaced all of jets, including the needle jet and jet needle. I figure those carbs are worth spending on proper jets. I actually found a website that gives the actual dimensions on Mikuni jet needles. It might be worth it to pull those from the 26's and measure them to see if there has been any wear. That's def. a rainy day project. Weather is too nice to be jacking around in the garage more than necessary right now.

Here's a few cell phone pics of the bike with the new rear sets. Matching passenger pegs will follow in the near future.

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BTW I plan to customize the heel guards as well. The left side one in particular is HUGE.

i like it

Looking good, have you done any afr data logging with the new 29's yet???

Sexy sexy.