Another amateur build thread

Welp, here is the beginning of my long overdue build thread.

I struggled a bit over the title of the thing. World's slowest build? Another amateur hatchet job? Murdering a KZ?

If you love a 100 point, trailer queen restoration, you will want to avert your eyes to avoid psychic trauma. If you love to watch the design and creation of one-off custom parts, you will be sadly disappointed. If you are entertained by watching an incompetent rube blundering along toward an unclear vision of the final product, then stay tuned.

This "process" began about 30 years ago when I acquired a pair of KZ1000 LTDs, one 1981 and one 1982.



 

Lesson number one, do not try to load a pdf.

 

The purple one would start, and it had a badly abused Kerker system and 29 smoothbores on it, so I could have easily freshened it up an juts rode it as it was. But what is the fun in that?
Honestly, much of it would have had to come apart anyway. The fork seals were long gone, and all the fork oil was on the front brakes and all over the engine. The cam cover gasket was leaking so much that the po had tied a couple of shop rags on the frame cross member to catch some of it. The chain and sprockets were several thousand miles past needing replacement. the exhaust system was fairly well smashed on the bottom and about 20% of the chrome was peeling. Et cetera.

I began to slowly disassemble, taking note of what needed to be repaired or replaced, carefully bagging and tagging as I proceeded.

I bought the bikes from a friend who owned a repair shop. Both had been brought in for repairs, then abandoned. As you can see, the shop had already begun parting out the black one. Th owner of the other one, finally decided to cut his losses and brought the title to the shop to have them sell it. I began talking to the shop owner, and his mechanic who had built a number of drag race KZ engines, about what I wanted to do. I decided on a mild performance upgrade of the engine, consisting of a Wiseco 1075 kit and some bumpier cams. I also knew that I wanted to improve handling and braking, and hoped that i could change the wheels so I could use more modern tires. I was in grad school at the time, so money and time were not plentiful for me. Every now and then, I could purchase some parts, slowly adding to the collection.

I knew that I needed a clearer picture of the end result, so that I could make rational decisions along the way. I began poking around on the interweb and finally stumbled across a website belonging to a fellow in Indianapolis, who had a modified KZ1000 that really caught my eye.

 

I don't love everything about it, but he really inspired me. I continued poking around, looking for more ideas, and stumbled across KZR. My checkbook may never recover.

So are you saying you're a "hobbyist" in a shed on a mission to make an 82Ltd into something "cooool" that sounds familiar. Are we related some how 

I can not and will not say if you 2 are related. Will say all of us here (KZR) have been bitten by the Kawasaki illness and there does not appear to be a cure, no matter how long or short it messes with us. It never goes away.

Im In    Be watching.

Wookie58 wrote:

So are you saying you're a "hobbyist" in a shed on a mission to make an 82Ltd into something "cooool" that sounds familiar. Are we related some how 

I think we all are related by our affliction

Great intro posts(s). Looking forward to more!

TexasKZ wrote:

Wookie58 wrote:

So are you saying you're a "hobbyist" in a shed on a mission to make an 82Ltd into something "cooool" that sounds familiar. Are we related some how 

I think we all are related by our affliction

 

Common symptoms of being infected with The Dreaded Z-Bug.  You're among friends here.  We understand.

Good Ridin'
slmjim & Z1BEBE

I'm in. Looking forward to it.




Just FYI... I think there's a 12 step program for people like us, but I always land back in rehab and start all over again!  

Looking forward to seeing the "blundering"