1977 KZ 1000 b1 LTD running rough

i put a half can in the gas tank and ran the tank dry. i put a couple ounces in the oil as well. i rode it hard even when up to the top of a small mountain here in NH.

It did not like the mountain much. my buddy said i had blue smoke coming out the left pipe.

I get the most popping backfireing when its cold.

with the bike up over 3500 rpm it runs much better.
If im at 3500 and i goose it the kz just takes off like a rocket every time. at this point i believe it has to be running on all 4.

I took new compression readings. after my ride. i did forget to take them after the valve adjustment.
1-4 left to right was 120 120 120 125. i put a little oil in the plug whole of #1 and the compression came up to 140 on that cylinder.

so i decided to check the carbs again. this is what i found. there is a lot of play in the slide needle in number one carb. i compared it to number 2 and here are pics. you can see that numner one is not centered like number two.

here is a pic of number 2

another thing i noticed was the the main jets o ring in number one was a little chewed up and the jet did not seat as well as the others.
I will never buy an aftermarket rebuild kit again.

davelKZ1000 wrote:

so i decided to check the carbs again. this is what i found. there is a lot of play in the slide needle in number one carb. i compared it to number 2 and here are pics. you can see that numner one is not centered like number two.

how do i fix this?

Hey Dave, When I forst got my Kz1000, it had been sitting for a few year too. Gas tank had a couple of inches of rusty sludge. Drained and flushed out tank, replaced petcock. Drained carbs and still do every few day just to see what comes out.
I initially had a lot of smoke from the exhaust and popping and backfiring. After a few day of running on hi-test with a bottle of fuel injector cleaner in the tank it stopped popping and smoking.

Still had a problem with #4 cylinder cutting out and sometimes #1 or both. Just replaced all the sparkplug cable with wire core cable and new plug caps and she doing pretty good.

After reading stuff about Seafoam on here, I think I'll get me some!

My tank is really clean....I have inline filters......I'm waiting on some parts but I believe my problem is a missing needle jet in Carb 1.......well see.....thanks for the tips