81 kz650 CSR

Got the new project home tonight, and it's in much better shape than I anticipated (what, for $75 and a clean title, how much could I really expect!?!?). I was really hoping for an F1, but it turned out to be a CSR (H1 I believe). The seat is trashed (but the pan looks good) and it's' been flat black kryloned at some point in it's lifespan. Nothing is rusty, the tank looks pretty good inside, the chrome all looks to be in good shape (haven't gotten all the dust cleaned off it just yet, but the spots where it got rubbed in transit are shining pretty well). It's only got 13K+ on the clock, and the break in sticker is still on the tach. I haven't pulled the wiring harness off, but from looking at it on the bike it doesn't seem to have ever been hacked (a HUGE plus!!!). The shocks are clean and all the parts are there. One of the rear turn signals is busted (but I think I have the parts I need already to replace that). I need to pull the carbs, wiring harness and various engine covers before I know exactly where I stand, but it looks pretty promising! And to top it all off I just bought a factory service manual on ebay for $17 shipped!
More to come, for now here's some pics.

and another

one more

speedo

and the tach

Good SCORE!:woohoo:

This is looking better and better all the time. When I was picking up the bike, the guy I bought it from said that it never ran quite right for him, like it was running on only three cylinders, so in the process of pulling the carbs off I looked at all the vaccum lines and noticed an open vaccum port, which would explain it running kind of crappy. I'm going to rebuild and clean the carbs (my first time working with the accelerator equipped carbs, so I'm thinking I'll wait for the service manual to show up before I dig into them) and plug the open vaccum port and see how that goes. The motor spins free, the tranny engages, the clutch seems good (as near as I can tell without it running), it's an 81 so it came stock with an electronic ignition so I shouldn't have to worry about that. The wiring harness and all the electrical connections look to be in tip top shape. The front brakes are out, looks like the master cylinder is shot, so it's either rebuild that one or dig one up on ebay to do the trick. It needs new grips and throttle cables (was missing the return cable) and a fresh coat of paint (promised the wife I'd make it purple pearl, which doesn't even sound that horrible!) as well as new rubber (it's been sitting in storage since 2000).
I dare say that this one is in better shape than mine was, and it only set me back $75 instead of the $500 I paid for my 77!
Oh yeah, everything looks like it's going to clean up nicely as well. The chrome is all good, not pitted up bad or anything, I just have to work at getting the blue paint marker off the front fender that the pawn shop the guy I bought it from marked the price with.
All in all, I'd say this turned out to be quite the score!

Nice score you will enjoy that bike. I picked up the same bike about a year ago and to date it remains my favorite daily rider. That is not the original speedo however it looks to me to be off a Honda of some kind the giveaway is that it reads 140 mph where it should be an 85 mph unit. As long as you are planning to change out the rubber you might want to think about changing over to mag wheels as well. I put a set off a 550 LTD on mine and it is a 100% bolt on swap, that is unless you like cleaning spokes:P . Someone here has a set for sale in the classifieds for $50.00. Here is what mine looks like after swapping the mags.

Some progress to report:
Got the carbs rebuilt (not tested yet, but they're all back together and look good, still crossing my fingers till the other parts I need show up to test them). Put the stock bars from my 77 b1 on instead of the pull back bars that were stock on the CSR. I was going to go with a superbike bar that I had laying around, but couldn't fit the turn sigs on the shorter bars, so I had to compromise and go with these. Also got the paint started today, the wife picked out the color (it's actually a matte finish but the flash from the digital made it look a little glossy...it looks much better under natural light!) and I must say it's a good match for the bike!!!
Still trying to find a master cylinder on the cheap, so if anyones got one for a single piston/single disc set up and you want to part with it cheap please get in touch!!!! Once the other parts that are in route get here, it should only take about an hour or so to get her to fire off (I hope...please be nice to me KZ gods!!!!)
Also figured out that the speedo that was on it quite possibly came off a 82 750 CSR twin. I picked one of those up for $50 and the whole front end looked identical to the 650 CSR so I thought I'd swap the speedos and drive units if need be, and after swapping them out realized that they are the exact same unit!!!
And now the pics you've all been waiting for...

here's one...

and another...

I see this is an older post, but I came across it searching for a CSR with spoke wheels. I've got a KZ550 with mag wheels that I want to replace with spokes. From one of my posts I found out that the wheels on the 550 and 650 CSR will swap out no problem. Interested in an even trade?

Post edited by: slater_kz550, at: 2008/02/15 11:55

Post edited by: slater_kz550, at: 2008/02/15 11:56