Hesitation

Hi guys, I bought an 83 kz550 last week and I'm loving it! This bike has been sitting since the early 90's and only has 3,200 miles on it and surprisingly after cleaning the carbs out has ran great, minus a slight hesitation in 1st when going from a stop. which I figured might clear up after some miles were put on it. but it only got worse. Well the other night I think I figured out the problem. Since it was dark out I could see that spark was arcing to the engine so as a temporary fix I took electrical tape to the plug caps, which made the hesitation practically disappear. I found the caps online but I also sprayed the wires down and they are arcing as well so I obviously want to replace the wires as well but I can't seem to find any wires that screw onto the coil, does anyone know where I might be able to find them or if I can/should just use some push on boots. (I have looked at the vendor directory and have not seen any screw on wires)

Also in my experience usually a miss gets worse under load not better. If anyone has any insight into why the miss would clear up when revving the engine and come back at idle I sure would like to know.

Lazy wrote: ...83 kz550...sitting since the early 90's...3,200 miles...spark was arcing to the engine...plug caps...wires...want to replace the wires...can't seem to find any wires that screw onto the coil, does anyone know where I might be able to find them or if I can/should just use some push on boots....

Hello, Lazy, and WELCOME to KZr!

Many stock coils include integrated spark plug wires, which wires aren't intended as a replaceable component part.

Where the existing integrated wires are deteriorated and leaking voltage, it's usually best to renew the coils and plug wires.

Imo, Dyna coil and Dyna plug wires are a good choice. Dyna wires include built in caps. All being available from Z1 Enterprises. Click here > www.z1enterprises.com/

Good Fortune!

7mm sparkplug wire will fit the ignition coils. If your coils have ridges on the caps where the sparkplug wires go into the coils, then those caps will unscrew, but some Kawasaki's had the plug wires molded into the coil body.

Dyna and Accel make popular 3 ohm ignition coils. www.z1enterprises.com sells the Dyna coils along with sparkplug wires. Now the choice is going to be supression or non supression sparkplug wires.

Non supression will produce a snap or pop heard on radio's and T.V.'s. and is usually made of copper wires,Supression reduces the audio noise, but is mostly a carbon fiber construction.

Possible: When you said "clean the carbs out", how, complete tear down/ new rebuild kit?
the fuel left in the carbs/fuel line evaporated, leaving as sludge.
New gas, things seem fine but begin to deteriorate as that sludge gets dissolved and stuff starts getting into the various areas not designed to have sludge.
next: easy, cheap, start on one end, to the other. Remove each and every clip, spray with elec contact cleaner and inspect. Remove and clean all grounds. Any wire stiff that doesn't bend, replace.
New plugs and as you guessed, look at it run in the dark

and, around here, Pics or it didn't happen. Post up!

Thanks for the quick reply. So I do have the wires that screw onto the coil, so I went to Napa and picked up a set of 7mm universal plug wires and cut the ends off, then I put the cap that screws onto the coil on the wire, with the plastic washer that came off of the old wire, then I took the coil boots that came in the kit and cut the small end off and used that as the grommet to keep the wire in the coil. It worked great. Now I'm just waiting for the plug caps to show up and see if that takes care of my problem.

u may want to look carefully in the tank for rust. it is common when a bike sits for so long. make sure u have an inline filter and check the petcock filter if u find rust in the tank. also clean every electrical conection so u dont get stranded somewhere.