speedometer

Mine is broke and I Need a cheap replacement. Does anyone have any ideas. I ride 84 ZN1100 LTD. Will a GPS work.

What is broken about it?
Does the shaft still turn?
Is the the casing smashed?
What have you checked?

Folks here tend to like to fix stuff, and are good with recommendations for more specific problems. More info please.

I have no ideas regarding a GPS... How does your old speedometer work? Is it driven off the front hub? Is it electronic? I am too lazy to go do research to look up info that would be helpful in making a suggestion.

barksdaleammo wrote:

Mine is broke and I Need a cheap replacement. Does anyone have any ideas. I ride 84 ZN1100 LTD. Will a GPS work.

Generally not. Permanent mountable GPS units often rely on offboard speed signal. Portables generally don't care or use rough estimates to generalize your transit time.

Almost none have a properly calibrated accelerometer, probably wouldn't present a reliable speed to you either way and if it did, would certainly not be cheaper than replacing what you have. Unless you need an excuse to buy one, anyway. I can totally respect that.

the gears in the speedo are broke and it is mechanical. Is there anything ya'll can think of.

i feel for you.
my speedometer was broken when i got mine.
i trooled e-bay for 7 months before one came up.

but guess what?
there is one for the zn700 up right now


if not, i still have my old one for parts.
maybe there is somthing in it you need to fix yours.
the 700 speedo only goes to 150 and the 1100 goes to 160 so i don't know if you need the drive to be accurate. other than that, they look the same.
good luck!

can't get the damm link to work!
item number is 280133797571

Post edited by: kawsakiman, at: 2007/07/16 17:52

Post edited by: kawsakiman, at: 2007/07/16 17:55

I thought my speedometer and or cable were bad until I discovered the drive unit on the front wheel had retired.

when the speedo cable is on and you spin the tire the line in the cable spins with it. thats why i think its the speedo.

Not hard to figure out what is wrong... since you have already seen the cable turning with the wheel turning, remove the cable from the drive on the hub. Put the cable into an electric drill, PUT THE DRILL IN REVERSE, and put the cable into the speedo. When you turn the drill on, the speedo should turn. If it doesn't the speedo is trash. The speedo is magnetic and the little bitty parts inside are not very fixable. Problem with Kaw speedometers is that they all LOOK the same but few of the are. There are generally two mount studs and these are mostly all different offsets and they mount different on different bikes. The sizes (diameter) of the speedos is different as well. You might want to run a parts search on kawasaki.com to find out what part number you need and see what bikes used the exact same speedo unit.

does anyone know if that speedo and tach will work. also the tach that i have hooked up now doesnt really work. It just kinda bounces around the rpm the motor is at like + or - 2000. does anyone know why this could be. also the gas guage shows half when and empty when half full. so would buying this fix all that.

Like I said, do your own research using part numbers. Your tach problem is common. The tachs are driven mechanically on most models but the innards are magnetic I think. Many of the older tachs bounce around and are terrible as a result. You just have to replace them with a good one. The gas gauge is another matter. The problem isn't really the gauge but the sending unit. I think there is an electonic thing inside the sender; possibly a resistor that creates variable resistance when the float arm moves. This electrical signal goes up to the gas gauge. I think the problem is that most of the resistors are goofy with age. I tried three sending units before I found a good one that worked for my 79 shafty's fuel gauge which now works. It isn't very accurate but behaves sort of normal... when full it shows full... when 1/4 tank, it shows empty.

his tach is electric.
as long as the speedo on e-bay is in working order, it is a direct bolt on for yours.
the fuel gauge problum is in the sender,not the gauge.
the problum with mine was someone used a drill and spun it in the wrong direction and wound the spring on the inside up.
pick up your bike on the centerstand and spin the front tire forward and verify which direction your cable spins first.