Valve adjustment 84 550GPz. I've never done it

Can anyone walk me through the process? I've got a few sets of feeler gauges in my tool box. I've never done it and not afraid to try and learn. Bikes been sitting since 88 and I believe 12,000 or 16,000 miles.

Shim under bucket. If you do not own a Kawasaki Service Manual for your bike don't even try it. Ed

650ed wrote: Shim under bucket. If you do not own a Kawasaki Service Manual for your bike don't even try it. Ed

Could "measure" the existing clearances, and might possibly find clearances to already be within specs and therefore not in need of any adjustments.

Just insert thickness gauge between bucket and cam with lobe pointed directly away from the bucket.

Adjusting -- as opposed to simply "measuring" -- shim under bucket models entails removing the camshafts in order to remove the buckets in order to access the shims.

Replacing the camshafts requires precisely locating the cam chain onto the cam sprockets (in order to achieve correct cam timing and avoid bent valves) and NOT stripping the soft aluminum female threads in the engine head when tightening the cam shaft bolts.

One tip that might not be in the FSM (Factory Service Manual) is to blow out the cam bolt holes with carb cleaner, compressed air, or whatever, to assure these blind holes are clean and free of any debris or excess oil before inserting and tightening the cam bolts.

When tightening the cam bolts, to avoid risk of stripping, some owners have reported successful reassembly by applying somewhat less torque than specified in the FSM.

Good Fortune!

Trying to locate a manual. Is there anywhere else to buy one besides ebay?

KZr member loudhvx has several links in his signature to provide info about KZ550.

Here's one of the links with downloadable manuals:

Click here > home.comcast.net/~loudgpz/GPZweb/Mnls/Mnls.html

ebay is a popular source.

Might also consider creating a want ad in KZr Classifieds forum.

Good Fortune!

Check out the link in my signature about KZ550 valve trains. It's very important to prevent damaging the chain and guides. It's not obvious that simply bolting the cover on at the wrong time damages the chain, guides, and maybe even the tensioner. That link also has better/corrected images for cam timing.



I have at least 2 different manuals for the 550 in my manuals link. Get them all and read them all.

Get a decent dial caliper too. You'll need to measure the shim sizes you already have under the valve lifters. Even if you have a shop measure them for you, it's good to re-measure yourself (they can and will get them wrong).

Actually, what you want is a metric micrometer. The digital ones are really nice: digital micrometer
They will switch between SAE and metric, a useful feature.