16 inch rear tire

elfmagic17 wrote: It lowers the rear a little bit. lowers the final drive to road gearing, Numarically higher (Tire is about 2 inches shorter give or take). The origonal front sprocket is a 15 Tooth and rear sprocket is a 35 Tooth with a 630 chain according to Kawasaki.com. A higher number tooth on front or lower number on back will lower engine RPM for the same crusing speed. Hope that helps.

Kenny

I retract my statement. It sure looked like it was a lot smaller than the 18 would be as I do not have an origonal 18 rim and tire for the rear for comparison. Not trying to give false info, but if it was shorter it would apply. Not sure why the 82 550c would have a such a small rear sprocket compared to the 650b1 considering its the same engine only smaller. But they also have a smaller drive sprocket too. Just adds up to powerband I guess.

Dunlop recommends a D404 110/90-18 in place of the original 400-18 because they don't make the correct tire. They should say "we don't see the sense in supplying the correct tire due to the age of the bike", but they reinforce the bogus concept that a 110/90-18 replaces the old 400-18. Putting a square peg in a round hole works too if you are not too particular about the fit and look.

RonKZ650 wrote: Dunlop recommends a D404 110/90-18 in place of the original 400-18 because they don't make the correct tire. They should say "we don't see the sense in supplying the correct tire due to the age of the bike", but they reinforce the bogus concept that a 110/90-18 replaces the old 400-18. Putting a square peg in a round hole works too if you are not too particular about the fit and look.

Dunlop and some others do recommend 110/90-18 in place of the original 400-18, but that really is not a good replacement. Some other tire makers (see Continental below) recommend 120/90-18 as a replacement, and this is actually a much better choice since it fits the rim properly but is not as narrow as the 110. I have used numerous tire brands/models on my KZ650 in the original sizes as well as several metric sizes, and I have found that if the tires one wants are not available in the original 325-19 or 400-18 "inch" sizes the best metric replacements are 100/90-19 and 120/90-18. BTW, I don't run Continentals; I run Pirellis, but I have also used various flavors of Dunlops and Michelins in the past. Ed