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No eBay APP ID and/or Cert ID defined in Kunena configuration1981 KZ650-CSR.  48-spoke wheels w aluminum rims.  same as the 1000M CSR.
Any opinions on the spoke set below.  Cadmium plated w chrome plated nipples out of Thailand.  says cadium in the description but that's probably a typo.   The seller only lists a set for the Fr, so I would also need to source the same type for the Rr.  There are oem spoke lots, but it gets expensive doing that & right now there aren't enough available to do an entire wheel.  I'm also considering zinc plating the original spokes or whatever plating is appropriate.

The spokes are zinc plated.
Cadmium is dull silver, mostly outlawed in usa as enviromental hazard, still available in the third world.
 

Thanks.  Item listing says cadium (sp) plating, so I would assume they're cadmium, not zinc. As for the legality & not that I prefer Cd or anything, but the ban was lifted kind of recently but with regulations attached to alleviate the bio-hazard.   Buchanans sells cadmium plated spokes & there are plating services who use it.  I hadn't researched cd yet, just saw the listing yesterday. I'll pass on those.  Thanks again.

Cadmium plating is still in the marketplace but it's mostly focused on the aircraft industry.  A lot of aircraft parts were qualified with cad parts and once something is qualified it's costly to change.

Buchanan's lists stainless steel, chrome plated carbon steel, and raw carbon steel spokes on their site.  I don't see any plated spokes.  Stainless spokes would be the way to go in my opinion although they are expensive.

Thanks.  The Indian page has cad spokes.  www.buchananspokes.com/products/spoke_kits_indian.asp

I did see an old EU page about finding alternatives to cd for aerospace.  Not sure how far along they've gotten in the last 25 yrs, but they were expecting to come up with a variety of alloys with each suitable for a particular application.  They didn't anticipate finding just one to replace cadmium.

Nobody should buy any of those spokes from that Ebay company - They do not fit and are way out from fitting.

I bought a set for a KZ650 B2 I was rebuilding and tried to lace the front hub with those - COMPLETE GARBAGE !!!
The bend angles are way off so the spokes do not even touch the hub faces when tightened, I even tried bending them but they were too far out to be useable. If the spokes do not touch the hub faces the wheel will be weak as hell.
The other thing you might not notice is the nipples are not yellow zinc like the stock nipples are, they are also a odd size, smaller across flats than a stock nipple which makes me think the nipples would be weaker as well. Another thing, if you look real close, they are not "double butted" like the stock spokes are, so weaker still.
I could not even return them because I waited too long between the time I purchased and the time I tried to lace the wheels.

I ended up replacing those ones with EMGO brand, those have the correct bends, the nipples are yellow, and the spokes have the extra butting.

Stay very clear of that company!!!!

 

Thanks a bunch.  That's great to know.  I have to admit that actually getting the wheels done, especially the Fr, is kind of a pipe dream at the moment.  Just started collecting info this week & I've been wondering about the bend angles.  I don't even know what gauge the stock spokes are or how Kawasaki measures them >> the Fr are listed as 175MMX, while the Rr are 77MMX1 & 75MMX6.   I assume the MM is mm, but I don't know what the X-stuff means or why the Fr are both 175 but the inner/outer Rr are different  From the way Kawasaki does the diagrams it's entirely possible that the part descriptions are incomplete & some of the info was lopped off.  Plus I've been wondering if it's possible some other Japanese model might use the same spokes.  but it could be that these spokes are unique to the 650/1000 CSRs.  The oem pickings are slim on EB, otherwise I'd go w the stock parts.  which I may very well end up doing anyway after going thru all of this rigamarole. doh.

what about nichecycle sets? Are those spokes any good? I was able to source NOS spokes for rear wheel, but looking for front wheel set for my 650B

wrote:

Thanks a bunch.  That's great to know.  I have to admit that actually getting the wheels done, especially the Fr, is kind of a pipe dream at the moment.  Just started collecting info this week & I've been wondering about the bend angles.  I don't even know what gauge the stock spokes are or how Kawasaki measures them >> the Fr are listed as 175MMX, while the Rr are 77MMX1 & 75MMX6.   I assume the MM is mm, but I don't know what the X-stuff means or why the Fr are both 175 but the inner/outer Rr are different  From the way Kawasaki does the diagrams it's entirely possible that the part descriptions are incomplete & some of the info was lopped off.  Plus I've been wondering if it's possible some other Japanese model might use the same spokes.  but it could be that these spokes are unique to the 650/1000 CSRs.  The oem pickings are slim on EB, otherwise I'd go w the stock parts.  which I may very well end up doing anyway after going thru all of this rigamarole. doh.

The front wheel is symmetrical side to side but the rear isn't.  The image below is showing a bicycle wheel but apparently your bike has offset flanges which are similar since the spoke lengths are different.

 

No way Id run plated spokes.  Stainless is the way to go.

Thanks.  SS would be my preference as well.  6-7 yrs ago there weren't any ss spoke sets available for the csr & I'm not seeing them now either, although I haven't spent much time searching.  Back then, the pricing for other models was at least $125 per wheel just for the spokes & nipples (40 spoke wheels).  The csr has 48 spoke wheels, so it would have been more.  So I went with the cast alloy wheels from a 550-Ltd >> they were a direct swap plus tubeless & they were cheap ($40T for the pair).   at the time I didn't want to deal w tubes any more.