Trying to Rescue a Late 1970s (1977??) Kawasaki KZ1000

wdhewson wrote:

Thanks guys, those are some very pretty bikes.

My efforts go mostly into the mechanical side (to avoid calling friends with trailers), but I'll try harder than usual to make things look good.

I started with the brakes, which is my habit, just to make sure she's safe if it ever rolls at speed.The rubber brake lines certainly need replacement and those little friction pads in the front calipers don't have much "meat" left.

Those are some crusty calipers, even worse than mine were. All of the pistons were gouged on my 77' KZ 1000B1 LTD and we got stainless steel caliper pistons for all 3 calipers from brakecrafters.com. My bike is an early 77' #500442 and with the help of them we figured out that my bike has the same rear brake caliper and mount as the KZ 750. It's original as far as I know since the bike has been in the family since new.

 

I do not have an answer for you but will say have seen like info on (K)Z650 

You have found a nice looking machine!  I look forward to following what you choose to do with it.  

I cleaned up the head tube a bit and think the manufacturing date of 4  77 is visible on the side opposite the serial number, so you guys were quite right about 1977.

Here's the rear sprocket, which looks like an aftermarket JT one with a count of 41 teeth.  Do you think this will be good gearing?  I live in flatlands with lots of "nice" straightaways!!

And I rebuilt the rear caliper and everything looked pretty good, so lots of cleaning but no new parts.  With the exception of a bleeder valve repair insert which uses a 1/8" pipe thread brass insert.  Hard to buy these now due to liability.

With my 18" wheel I ran 16//35 for HWY and 15/35 for short rides. When I switched to a 16" alloy wheel I'm running 15/33 and will switch to a16 tooth countershaft sprocket for long rides. Drops the RPM's at 70 MPH to around 4500 where the 15 is at 5000. Lose a bit on takeoff but smoother at speed.   You could pull tree stumps with that 41. 
Steve

wdhewson:

from the JT sprockets website it looks like your sprocket  JTR488-41 is for a 530 chain.
If indeed so then  a PO probably did the conversion from 630 to 530 chain and sprockets. I'd suggest you count the teeth on your front sprocket and then divide the rear 41 by the front # which will give you the gear ratio which you can compare to Steve's #s

To convert 630 numbers to 530 numbers divide the 630 #s by 5 and multiply by 6.
Thus a 630 34T rear sprocket becomes 34/5 x 6 = 40.8 or 41T to the nearest whole # for a 530 chain

and then of course your rear wheel diameter will matter also.

Thanks guys, great helpful input.

The chain on this project bike is such a big butch looking thing that I just assumed 630.  But I think the chain just looks big due to thick side plates and thick O-rings.

In 530 I think pin to pin is 5/8ths inch and the width of rollers between inner plates is 3/8ths inch.

Armed with an old tape measure, I think these pictures do tell us she's a 530.

This pleases me as sprocket and chain selection should be greater for the 530.




 

630 and 530 chains are pretty much the same width. Yes pin center to pin center on the 530 is 5/8 inch and on the 630 is 6/8 inch

 

RB Racing and Gearing Commander offers a chain length and final gearing calculator.

rbracing-rsr.com/chainlength.html
www.gearingcommander.com/index.htm
 

Gentlemen,

Here's a bunch of instrument photos.

At first I thought the speedometer wasn't working but I think it was OK, just needing a higher rpm input than I anticipated.

A few questions............

Do these look like the correct instruments for a 1977 KZ1000A?

Both instruments have these screw tightened bezel clamps, which made disassembly, cleaning, and inspection quite easy.  But is this a one off repair or an aftermarket fitting?

Thanks for the advice.............

 

Look genuine to me. That's how they were mounted originally. The clocks also look genuine. Repop don't have the nippon denso (ND) logo bottom centre of each clock face. 

Gauges look correct for 1977.  In 1978 they went with 8500 rpm redline but 77 was still 9000.