found my vintage! got questions

well ive been looking for a vintage bike for about a year now, on again off again. as background i have two ninjas an 06 zx10 that is a road and track bike, and an 01 zx6r that i personally built into a streetfighter. i want a totally different experience now . i would like to build a cafe racerish bike and have been looking at the kawi kz's honda cb's and suzukis.

the only thing im really not knowledged on is engine work besides basics. ive found a great little kz650 and the guy just wants to cut his losses and is asking 400 for it. its fairly low miles, and heres his story of whats going on....
he says it ran fine before a long sitting period, when he started it again it was having this issue (and still is since he said he cleaned the carbs) its running ok at an idle but the minute you gas it it dies out.... what are going to be the common causes and fixes of this? is it going to be expensive to fix?

i can do all my bodywork and mods no problem but if this issue is going to cost me a butt load its not worth the deal!

It sounds like a carb issue. He may not have gotten them clean enough. Might be old gas. Doesn't sound like anything tragic.

first things first, welcome to you ninja chick a kz650 is a great little bike to play with . and you most definitly have come to the right place help assistance or just bullshitting we do all of that on here. we might need a bit more back ground on your prospective bike good price by the way. pictures are a must. what year isd it does it have round slide carbs or c.v carbs this would be a good place to start from if it's c.v carbs check to see if cuckles has assembled them properly i have seen this problem your describing many times over the years and most often it due to some not reinstalling the diaphrams properly.

Welcome, That is a good price on the bike. Roy

Thanks for the welcome guys!

He listed it as an 81 kz650, black. How do I tell the diff betweenthe carbs? I'm going to get my hands on it after work today. If the title checks out n stuff looks decent you will be hearing lots. N lots from me!

if they are c.vs they will have big square king of tops held in place by 4 screws if it has slide type carb's then it will be shaped sort of like a jelly bean and be held down with 3 screws if it's and 81 it should have cv carbs and what i described before could be happening.

I love it when everyone says I just did the carbs so thats not the problem. Truth is I used to think like that untill I cleaned the carbs 4 times before getting then right, and this happened on two different bikes. It gets old pulling carbs so often but I figured out that just because I did them they must be right is just an ego thing, and being hardheaded.

i've been doing this for years and i still have to on occasion pull a set of carbs more than once. so when an amatur says he's cleaned them so it has to be timing,i usally just laugh.

i was able to get my hands on more pics and im thinking about heading out now to take a look at it (he has someone coming tomarrow that offered 300). from the pics the only real problems i can see are rust on the wheels and it looks like some hopefully surface rust on the tank where the emblems were and some rust on the engine in a few spots where water would just sit. i dont know from the pics that its ever been garaged. how hard is it to find parts for these? can spokes be replaced or wheels be found?.....

Quick, match the $300.00 offer!

I'm sure you can get that to clean up well, and yes, you'll be able to find parts for it, if needed!

Remember... pic's!

Tony

the answers to your guestions rust on the tank no biggie unless it's thru all the way. spokes are replaceable. and tons of parts are still around and available look at the classified section on this forum.

whatcha think?