Test ride today. KZ1000 elec. Ign. into a KZ650

I've just won a '79 KZ1000 Electronic Ignition and Advancer on ebay, and am hoping to swap them to my '78 KZ650 with points. I'm also getting the Igniter as well. I found this post in the Archives: Ign Swap Thanks for the info there guys.

Is there anything else I may have to look out for in this swap?

Post edited by: rstnick, at: 2006/03/10 19:45

It would probably be a good idea to check the total advance and the rpm at which the advance occurs on both bikes to make sure they are somewhere near the same. You may be able to use the rotor from the electronic advancer on your mechanical advancer, or you may just need to swap the weights. I have done a couple of 750 twins using 440 advancers, but I have not done a 650-1000 swap so I don't know if it will bolt on.

Why not just keep his current mechanical advance? I see no reason to swap it out... You need the pickup coils, the igniter box. I think the wire colors should coincide pretty much with the wire colors off the KZ900/1000 points ignitions and you do need to split power off to run the thing as I recall.

Why not just keep his current mechanical advance? I see no reason to swap it out..

It ain't gonna work without the rotor that replaces the points cam, and I don't know if the rotor will fit on the mechanical advancer shaft, so I just covered all angles

The ignition back plate is far smaller on the 650's - but other than that they are very similar. One of the local riders here neatly cut the 1000 back plate to the 650 size and used one.

As sleepy said, you just have to be good with a jig saw. To drill the mounting holes, you have to time it visually. Leave the plate off, rotate the engine so it is set to the firing point on 1-4 (F mark on the advancer). Make sure the motor does not move from that point. Re-assemble the rotor and plate. The rotor should be generally pointing toward the rear pickup (the pickup closer to the rear of the bike, it has a blue and black wire to it). In the direction of rotation, thecenter of the point of the rotor should just barely be past the center of the metal core of the pickup. The alignment of center-of-point to center-of-pickup is usually off by about a mm at idle.

Thanks for the info guys. I thought I would need to modify the mounting holes and such. Just wanted to make sure it was possable. For $19, including shipping, it's worth the attempt.

Will I need to switch Coils or will the Stock Coils be OK?

stock coils for points should work.

stock coils for points should work

Sorry loudhvx. Do you mean the Stock Coils I have which are meant for points will be OK to use with the KZ1000 Electronic Ign? I though maybe the Ohms or whatever may be different.

Post edited by: rstnick, at: 2005/12/28 15:21

Yes. Your stock coils should be about 4 ohms. The electronic ignition can likely be used with coils in the 2.5 ohm range. Using 4 ohm coils will reduce the current and put less stress on the ignitor. The tradeoff is that the coils may not produce as strong of a spark with the ignitor because the ignitor has slightly less dwell angle than the points did.

I'm working on the KZ1000's mounting plate mods.

Points setup:


Post edited by: rstnick, at: 2006/01/01 22:53