KZ1000 Carb Clean Up Question

So I am at the point where i want to get these carbs presentable for the rest of the season and saw a video which showed them being soaked in GUNK Carb Parts Cleaner. Now I don't want to wait for a rebuild kit so my question is Can I soak the entire assembly and clean and spray with air and reinstall or does the GUNK cleaner screw up the rubber seals inside?

Straight Pine Sol for 24 hours works.  Just remove the bowls and jets.  Ive done it before, works great.

Removing all the brass parts like the pilot jets, main jets, emulution tubes, air/fuel mixture screws, enrichment plungers,float valves is a main task.
Those parts need to be as clean as possible or you will get a lot of trouble and headache later.


 

Shortcuts are long cuts when it comes to carburetors.  Best do it right ONE time.  I rebuild a lot of carbs and, no disrespect, see red flags all over your post here.  

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Shortcuts are long cuts when it comes to carburetors.  Best do it right ONE time.  I rebuild a lot of carbs and, no disrespect, see red flags all over your post here.  

Completely agree. Break them down is the only way, a few days more upfront will result in many years of correctness. Get some brake clean, spray every passage. Find out, if you spray in this port where does the fluid exit, then spray again but plug the found exit, more then likely it will exit somewhere else. Continue this till you have completely stopped the spray. Do this frontwards and backwards. You will be amazed at how many ports are connected. Then take a second body and spray that one, taking notice to compare the volume and sound of a similar passages from your first carb, to the second. This will ensure you have clean clear passage ways. Meticulously inspect the brass Jets and make sure they are 100% clean. Check the jet needles for ware and straightness, and make sure they are all on the same clip notch. Inspect your main Jets for correct size, I have seen lots of numbered Jets drilled out. Check the floats, bend as necessary to get them all straight and consistent. Mock up the floats and pins and bowls, making sure the floats are not hanging up on or rubbing on the bowl sides. Check the float pins and floats for bind and smooth free pivoting. Clean and polish the float needles and seat. Have the choke plunger seals replaced. Replace all O-Rings and gaskets. Once they are reassembled, set a steel ruler across the bottom of the bowls and make sure every float is hanging down the same distance, bend the brass arms to correct. Bench sync. Set float levels. Set pilot screws to factory settings. There are no shortcuts when doing complete, competent, quality work. 

Let me clarify, they were rebuilt completely and drilled and jetted when the build started by a professional, but he only addressed function not appearance. This is why I rather not mess with the insides if I don't have to and risk screwing something up. I'd rather just try to get them looking half decent especially when everything else on the bike looks good.

To be honest I have been using "Gunk" ENGINE WASH for the last 40 years on and off, it is made for that purpose so giving the outsides a scrub with a stiff brush and rinse off should do the trick from a "cosmetic" point of view if you are happy the internals are all good

Cosmetic restoration is far more difficult than a functional rebuild, in my experience.  The carb bodies are cast zinc, and they tarnish easily.  Carb dip and a hot ultrasonic will turn the bodies dark.  Media blasting works, but grit gets everywhere.  There is no easy answer that I'm aware of.

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Cosmetic restoration is far more difficult than a functional rebuild, in my experience.  The carb bodies are cast zinc, and they tarnish easily.  Carb dip and a hot ultrasonic will turn the bodies dark.  Media blasting works, but grit gets everywhere.  There is no easy answer that I'm aware of.

I totally agree but I think for what this guy is looking for (half decent), a scrub with gunk engine wash and a stiff brush will remove the road crud etc and make them a bit more presentable (obviously not to the standard you would get with blasting) and I don't believe from experience that the gunk would discolour the bodies (only my opinion)

[Shortcuts are long cuts when it comes to carburetors.  Best do it right ONE time.  I rebuild a lot of carbs and, no disrespect, see red flags all over your post here.]


+1 This exact thing.
The saying 'A job worth doing is worth doing right.' was invented for carb cleaning.

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Let me clarify, they were rebuilt completely and drilled and jetted when the build started by a professional, but he only addressed function not appearance. This is why I rather not mess with the insides if I don't have to and risk screwing something up. I'd rather just try to get them looking half decent especially when everything else on the bike looks good.

With all do respect. You just contradicted yourself. This original post stated you wanted to disassemble them to a point of being able to blow out passages, while your waiting on “rebuild kits”. Now you just want to spit shine the exterior. Which is it. The responses you received were correct biased on your original post. It took time to post those responses. It would have been far easier to answer a post, “how do I clean the outside of my carburetors”. 

I may have missed something in the OP's question, but here goes.  Soaking the entire carb in a bucket of some type of cleaner would be a no-go in my opinion.  Too much chance of something breaking loose and finding its way into the internals of the carb and screwing it up.  If the bike runs good and you are happy with the carb function leave them alone and definitely do not soak them.  Take your chosen cleaner and spray then brush the outside of the carb bodies getting them as clean as you can.  I would probably tape the carb openings to try and keep as much junk out of them as possible realizing some cleaner may still find its way into the carb and have to be dealt with.  Hopefully this residual matter will just be run thru the carb with no permanent problems.  Bear in mind different cleaning agents can have an impact on the appearance of the carb body after cleaning them.  In any event, just cleaning the outside of the carb bodies is going to be a down and dirty crap shoot that may create more problems than what you started with.  Unless you like creating problems for yourself you may consider just leaving them alone until you can tear them down properly for a cleaning.

Rick H.