18" wheel '81 750 ltd

So I'm in the process of turning an '81 750 LTD into a cafe racer-ish. I like the look of the front and rear wheels and tires being the same size and I'm trying to keep with as much Kawasaki parts as possible not to change the look but just the overall appearance if that makes sense. My bike came with a 19" front and 16" rear. Ive looked and looked but havent found anything really straight forward on the topic but what would be the pro's and con's of going to an 18"rear since that seems like the easiest option, and is there a direct fit from another bike? Im new to motorcycles so any help is greatly appreciated.

The 750E model uses an 18" rear wheel. You should be able to do the swap with original Kawasaki parts. I'm not sure exactly what parts will transfer over between the LTD and E model so you may want to look up the various rear end part numbers and see what parts are common between the two. Partzilla has a good part fishe, or you can use Kawasaki.com and look up the parts manual that way too. ebay has scads of used parts for cheap prices so it shouldn't be difficult to gather what you need on the cheap.

good luck

would doing this cause me to lose much power or cause me to have handling issues?

As a rear tire increase in height, it would reason that the gearing would change as well, equivalent to going to a bigger rear sprocket. I have done that 16" up to 18" swap with larger KZ's with no noticeable handling issues. I can't really see a 750 being much different.

calegg wrote: would doing this cause me to lose much power or cause me to have handling issues?

I did that swap on my 80 1000 LTD and all it did was improve the handling (raised rear ride height=quicker turn in) I did drop one tooth on the counter shaft sprocket to compensate for the taller wheel and tire combo. It's MUCH quicker now and any top speed loss is meaningless on this bike, as its really not "top speed" fast anyway. I'd rather have it quick... Lol

PDXDave wrote: I did that swap on my 80 1000 LTD and all it did was improve the handling (raised rear ride height=quicker turn in) I did drop one tooth on the counter shaft sprocket to compensate for the taller wheel and tire combo. It's MUCH quicker now and any top speed loss is meaningless on this bike, as its really not "top speed" fast anyway. I'd rather have it quick... Lol

The increase in bottom end torque can make for a better wheelie-bike! VROOM-VROOM"!!!

How much taller would the rear wheel & tire have to be to make a noticeable difference? I did the math using the recommended tire sizes & they're about the same. A 750E rear wheel/tire is about a 1/2-inch larger in diameter than the Ltd & the circumference is about 1.75 inches greater. The actual tire measurements will most likely vary depending upon the tire mfg, so the difference could be more or less ---- but a 1/2 inch height difference doesn't seem like much.

The difference was more like an inch on my 1000 LTD, plus it was over geared anyway. The re-gearing made it a far nicer bike to ride in the real world... At least for me.

As far as wheelies go, my primary rider is a Aprilia Tuono... Nuf said.

My '16 ZX14R does wheelies sitting still...I was talking old school bikes. But still hard to top my H2 tripple, no matter what era.

My advice would be to get an 18" rear wheel complete with axle spacers and sprocket carrier, to be certain everything will fit together, my wheel swap was even held up by the cush drive from the original wire wheels not working with the Kawasaki alloy rims because it needs some little semi circle cutouts to fit right.

I worked out for my KZ1000 that the difference in tire diameter between the 16" and 18" was such that 15/33 gearing with a 16" is the same as 15/35 with the 18" wheel. using Avon tire sizes. They quote a 130/90/16 at 25.1" diameter and a 120/90/18 at 26,6" in diameter. So the rear of the bike will be lifted about 0.75". The handling should be better with an 18" wheel, fitting the wide tire on a 16" was done for for "show than go". Depending on how your bike feels now, you may find the higher gearing from the 18" wheel to be desirable.

If he gets a 750E rear wheel, i bet everything will swap. He can double-check at Kawasaki.com or partzilla to confirm, but I'm pretty sure the stuff is the same.

I think if you are going Kawasaki Alloy rim to Kawasaki Alloy rim you are most likely correct, but sometimes on older bikes things have got swapped around over the years. Buying the whole assembly is easier and cheaper than piecing bits together if it doesn't go to plan and then you can always sell the bits you don't need on eBay.