SPECS · PICS · REVIEWS · RATING
SPECS · PICS · RATING
|
Kawasaki Z 1000 discussion forum:RE: Love my KZ1000ST |
| RE: Love my KZ1000ST |
| Dirtguy said 2004-08-25 21:58 |
| What do you know, I´m not the only person in the world with a shaftie! I bought my ´79 as a left over the summer of ´80 and left of a 4,000 mile trip three days later. 24 years and 100,000+ miles (sat unused for 8 years, kids, hospital bills, you know)I believe I can offer a few suggestions. The only time it ever left me walking was my own fault; passed up a gas station, stupid me. I´ve adjusted one valve and have another one ready needing it soon; dealers are usally amazed at this. At 35,000 miles I had to lap the oil pump body to increase pump pressure and the stator conked out many years ago. I had to braze patches on the muffler crossover at 60,000 and was totally shot at 87,000. Had to put KZ1000 chain drive mufflers on. Not real pleased, had to heat and bend mufflers downward to fit and rejet the carbs. They´re more restrictive and louder which I don´t like. I can hear the exhaust now and never could before. The speedo was 10% fast, so I took it apart and adjusted the spring until it was dead on. To reduce mirror fuzziness, I cut solid iron rods 6-8 inches long, put a slight bend in them and inserted into the ends of the handlebars. The left is quite clear to 75 but the right gets fuzzy at 65. To handle heavy touring loads, I put Koni shocks on the back with adjustable dampening. Not quite as smooth but doesn´t bottom out when loaded and doesn´t wallow on curves like the OEM´s. One leaks some, but you can compress the spring, disassemble and refill with oil. To handle a loaded down fairing, I inserted 3/4" i.d. nuts on top of the fork springs. Tougher to get the caps on but helps. Never have had any fork seals leak. Early on I took a strip of foam carpet pad and placed under the dust boot. Don´t know if that helped, but makes me feel it did. Had to replace the brake pads at60,000 miles. Theorganic replacement pads don´t wear the discs like the semi metallic OEM´s, but don´t work quite as well in rain. The bike came with a Vetter fairing and the mount was too limber allowing the fairing to flop around on bumps. All it took was a small aluminum angle iron bolted to the mount(after drilling hole) and using an existing threaded boss on the frame. Why they didn´t do this to start with I don´t know. I do know there were two different fairing mounts made for the Vetters. Saddlebags were already on it which flopped too. (Not Vetter, Ancra?) Took a piece of electrical pipe conduit, bent and drilled holes in each end and bolted between the saddlebags using existing holes. Cured that. The trunk (not vetter) flopped. Put an aluminum plate on top of the luggage rack and under the trunk which helped. The tail section of the frame which the rack bolted too cracked and broke behind the direction light brackets. Welded a brace from the bracket to the end of the frame which cured that. Crosses railroad tracks with a loaded trunk once and snapped the luggage rack bear where it attaches to the shocks. Cut pieces of a lug wrench handle and inserted into the tube, just the right diameter and now you could load cement blocks in the trunk and not worry. The latches on the bags and trunk are sorry, as the rubber seals flatten out, they allow the bag lids to blow off in 100 mph runs and the trunk lid to fly open in stiff side winds. Added an over center latch to the trunk (doesn´t look real hot but works)but what worked best was when I fabricated a speaker enclosure from wood, fiberglass and uphosltery and mounted on top of it. Helps the passenger to hear something and the weight holds the lid shut. The boy´s dog ate the seat up and I replaced it with a touring type seat. Standard KZ1000 or Z1 seats are much shorter but I couldn´t find a replacement so be prepared to cut and add foam and sew upholstery. The orginal seat was much more comfortable after I removed the cover and cut the crown from the seating area with a hacksaw blade. Replaced the fuel petcock diaphram once and they´re tough to get a dealer. I had ride with a drippy petcock for two months. I got some cold engine piston slap at 30,000 miles but hasn´t hurt anything. When new, oil consumption was a pint/2000 miles but is now closer to a quart/800 miles. The engine is now noiser than when new and I think the cam chain is getting worn. I had to put a bolt in to lock the automatic cam chain tensioner since it wouldn´t stay tight. My biggest complaint is the gearing keeps the engine reving too much. Much like a hyperactive child. Anytime you can run 60 mph loaded up a 5% grade at 8,000´ elevation in high gear is overgeared if you ask me. I would really like a Voyager XII, but I feel guilty anytime I think about it. The old Kawi has never let me down. |
| <<Previous Answer Discussion overview Report spam Next>> |
You can post your question, answer or comment as a guest. Or
enter your e-mail to join the forum and get notifcations of new messages.
|
Enter a comment or answer to this message