KZ750 noob engine disassembly - what work to do?

Steell, I think you've got me and Brown Bear mixed up

For me they honed all four, yes, and everything's copacetic. You said you have standard piston rings.. I would have bought those in a heartbeat but it's too late. $185 later, I have a set that the shop ordered for me.

You don't happen to have pin circlips, do you? Or know of a place in the US to get them? All the places I've looked seem to be shipping overseas and the Kawasaki dealer wants $35 for 8 of them and a seat damper.

steell wrote:

staniel wrote:

GLORY day!

I got a call from the shop today. The bump honed out. I need a new set of piston rings (original size), but that's pretty much it from here.

So, why do you need the cylinders honed if they have already honed them? Surely they didn't hone just one cylinder?

I'm pretty sure I have 4 sets of new standard 750 rings around here somewhere.

If you can't rotate the crank to move the pistons up then the cam chain is probably wedging the crank at the bottom. Pull the cam chain up.

would these for sets of rings fit the z400j? they must all be the same?

oh after losing my temper dn wanting to smah the engine i pulled the chain and they moved..s tupid thing. haha

staniel wrote:

Steell, I think you've got me and Brown Bear mixed up

For me they honed all four, yes, and everything's copacetic. You said you have standard piston rings.. I would have bought those in a heartbeat but it's too late. $185 later, I have a set that the shop ordered for me.

You don't happen to have pin circlips, do you? Or know of a place in the US to get them? All the places I've looked seem to be shipping overseas and the Kawasaki dealer wants $35 for 8 of them and a seat damper.

That's the problem with a thread hijack, things get confusing :laugh:

No new ones, only used ones, and you really don't want to use old circlips, they do a job on the cylinder walls when they come out. Spend the $35.

Thankfully I found the exact part numbers I needed (92036-005 for circlips and 92075-1313 for rubber seat dampers) and Cheap Cycle Parts is gonna send them to me in the mail! Yay!

Buying feeler gauges tomorrow to check valve clearances, even though I won't get to that point for a while. I wish I had more guidance on how to put a gasket on very securely and could see exactly how clean a surface needs to be before proceeding. I don't think I can get any farther with gasket cleaner and a razor. Sandpaper seems a bad idea except on the area I gouged.

I love this forum. It's nice to have a little diary of my project with intermittent advice from knowledgeable folks.

sooo no idea where to get gummed pistion rings then? lol. myne uses 3 on each the lowest one i kinda a double with a gap in the middle. lol. god i need top find these or i am totaly screwed....

So, I was thinking about how I'm almost to the point I can start building back up and I realized I hadn't put any time into taking off the base gasket. I looked at it and found this:



Is all that black stuff gasket material I need to remove? It's the same color as the engine... someone please tell me it's just the enamel they used. That stuff is not coming off...

That is your gasket and it takes time. It took me many evenings with a razor blade and some "Sisters of Mercy" playing on the stereo to come off....geez, I sound kind of emo there...anyways, soak it in the permatex gasket remover, it works ok, it's main ingredient is DCM, so it gets really cold and slowly degrades the gasket material. Then take one of those one sided razors and at about a 45* angle get off the big shit, then once it's all gone take the razor and hold it perpendicular to the gasket surface and scrape the rest away. It will be like nails on a chalkboard but it gets it really clean, no more black stuff. Just be careful not to gouge the aluminum as the razors will cut into the aluminum case.

I was afraid of that. I guess you're not much of a white liar.

I started going at it with the razor and I think it's starting to come up. Total PITA (I picked this acronym up on this forum ).

Did you take any pictures of the finished surface after you'd scraped it? Obviously it won't be as nice as having it machined, but no one would be able to machine this in-frame...

Sure, here is the before:



and here are some after shots, the bottom of the jugs was just as bad




that literally took me a few days of straight scraping, you get cramps and shit, it's not cool, but needs to be done - I have no leaks at any gaskets now.




And btw, I recommend getting a ball hone, it's cheap and really easy to use and did a great job deglazing and renewing my bores

a ball hone?

i thought they only did the 3 arm type?

AHA, my thread is useful again!

Corey Clough was present in the early goings of my thread and was instrumental in my purchasing and using a ball hone:

kzrider.com/index.php?option=com_kunena&...mit=20&limitstart=40

somewhere in the middle there corey gives a couple links to more info. The brand name you want is flex-hone, they have sizes ranging from brake master cylinder bore sizes all the way up to richard simmons' "bore" size, I got mine on eBay for like 30 bones, and I have it sitting in a coffee can full of oil for next time