AHRMA Vintage Superbike Middleweight Racer

So I've been thinking out a paint scheme for the bike. I think I'll be doing a classic Kawasaki green with white stripes. The paint I'm looking at using is from Eastwood.com and is called Lime Squeeze Green and is part of their Muscle Car color lineup.



I've also been thinking about giving the bike the name, but realized that my wife has already named it. I'll have a sign shop make up some stickers for me from one of the following. Of course, the Kawasaki name plates will stay on the bike after being cleaned up and touched up.

that should look great. i like her name too.
any luck with the spark plug yet ?

I also found some cool articles that I think RonKz650 had posted over on the kz650.info site that I thought I would repost here:

mark1122 wrote: that should look great. i like her name too.
any luck with the spark plug yet ?

Thanks for reminding me - I need to email the rules folks and ask about the 750 head. I'm also looking at buying another engine for parts that *should* have a good head, cylinder, and piston set as I'm concerned about the rust on the #2 sleeve.

Going to try to clean up the sleeve tonight to see if it might be serviceable, but I'm not betting on it.

for some reason , i can see the green paint pic but i cant see most of your other pics. i'm at work and they block all the good stuff.

Yeah, they must be blocking PhotoBucket as that's where they are coming from.

Dopped an email to the rules committee guy. From the sound of it (no clear answer yet as he had a few questions) since the Kz650 and Kz750 heads are almost identical I should be ok to use it. But I'll wait for the final answer before moving ahead with the head at all.

I'll see what I can do about the spark plug anyways. Hoping to do some wrenching this evening. I'd really like to get the frame stripped so we can start working on bracing.

Started taking apart the 750 head to clean it - the ports weren't covered in the past (before I got the engine) and it almost looks like there is red clay in them.

Anyways, things went just fine on 3 of the valves, but on the other five I can't get the buckets to budge. Just wondering if you guys have any tricks on freeing up a stubborn bucket...

Spent a little bit working on the rusted sleeve with a greeny and some lube. No luck, there is way too much rust in there for it to survive anything but a bore job.

Going to have to find a new liner (at a minimum) and/or good jugs with liners. I have talked with member here who is selling a motor with damage on the cases but good compression, might have to pull the trigger and get it. More spare parts never hurt anyone, right? :dry:

Fun With A Cylinder Head

I started tearing apart the Kz750 head in preparation and found the head full of sand and what looks like clay. I think all the parts need is a good washing and it will be ok to run for a season. Pics are attached below. None of the grit/grime appears to have been there when the engine last ran as I don't see scoring marks or gouges from it - I'm fairly certain it got in the engine because the intake/exhaust ports weren't covered. I do have one lifter/bucket that is stuck and I’m trying to figure out how I can get it to release. Five of the other buckets were stiff, but I was able to work them free and remove them. I have a feeling there is some sand or dirt trapped between the bucket and the head causing it to bind. Hopefully it doesn’t score the bucket much as I try to remove it.





Also got most of the peripheral stuff stripped down on the front. The brake master cylinder will have to be replaced or rebuilt. I have an aftermarket unit but I need to make sure it is big enough to power two calipers.

Had to drill out the screws on the headlight shell. It’s in pretty rough shape on the inside and will need to be blasted before being sealed and repainted. I need to retain the headlight shell without the the headlight and blinkers for the AHRMA series.

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KZ250LTD wrote: Yikes looks pretty gross. For the money (reasonable KZ650 heads can be had for $25-75 on ebay) I'd probably get one that isn't full of clay. JMHO tho

Likely what will happen since my cylinders need to be swapped also. Just trying to see if the 750 head is salvageable. I'm going to give it a good soap and water bath once I get it all disassembled and then see how the valves seal. If it needs works, it will get put on the shelf until I can send it out to have it worked on/ported, etc.