Hello from Colorado

Hello, I thought I would introduce myself.

I have two Kawasaki KZ's: a 1979 KZ650SR and a 1976 KZ900.
I also have a '74 Yamaha TX500, a '78 Yamaha TT500, two parts bikes, and my good old 1980 YZ80.

I have been around motorcycles for my whole life. I started riding dirt bikes when I was 6 or 7 with a YZ50 with an 80cc engine on it and it went from there. My dad has a 1977 KZ1000 LTD that he bought new. I always loved that bike and I guess I was destined to get one for myself and now I have my 900! It's not my first bike, it is just another that I added to my collection.

The KZ900 has almost 23,000 miles on it and it had been sitting for 26 years before I picked it up from a guy. The original owner went down on the bike in 1985 and never got on it after that. When the bike went down, the engine took most of the hit, busted the entire points housing, bent the bolt that held the advance mechanism in place and sheared the guide pin off the end of the crankshaft. Glad I paid what I did for it because it is going to take some work to fix that.

One mod that I will be doing is the front brakes and I have not decided on the standard twin disc or doing something a little more.

One big question... Is there any easy way to pull the stupid carburetors off these KZ's? I swear it takes me two hours of fighting every time I try to do anything with them. Still using the air box at the moment.

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Welcome to KZR! Looks to be in great shape for not running in 26 years. Original pipes which look to be in great shape. If the pipes are as good as they look, they could be worth more than the entire bike.

Welcome aboard. Get new carb to airbox ducts. They are soft and make the job way easy. Keep the airbox on it; if you do you should not need to remove the carbs except on very rare occasions. I have only taken mine off twice in 35 years - once to clean them because I screwed up and let fuel sit in them over a winter, and once to replace the carb holders that were leaking. Ed

Hey CrazyDuck, welcome to kzrider! I'm up in Fort Collins and currently ride a '76 900 Ltd. New rubber on the intake side makes taking off the carbs alot easier. Let me know if you're up here in the NoCo area!

Welcome CrazyDuck.

Do post up some pictures of your other rides too.
Specially that KZ650 SR.

KZJOE900 wrote: Welcome to KZR! Looks to be in great shape for not running in 26 years. Original pipes which look to be in great shape. If the pipes are as good as they look, they could be worth more than the entire bike.

One of them has some scraping from when the bike low-sided and there are some small holes in two others. Not sure what they are worth but I don't want them.

The rubber is still very soft on the boots, maybe I am not being violent enough. I'm keeping the air box and using the K&N filter that goes with it but not that stupid sticker on the side cover. It needs a bit of money put into it but the engine is good other than the key for the points has been sheared off the end of the crank, I need to check to make sure the crank is not bent at all. It runs well and smooth so it might be okay.

I am in Longmont, Colorado. I think the whole town heard my 900 yesterday. :laugh:





The KZ650: It needs a lot of work!



My TX500! Love this bike, looks great and has the most outrageous sound.




Edit: Time to figure out why I am having issues with posting pictures
Edit #468: Well, I guess attachments work but the image tags do nothing.