Oil pressure/level switch. 85 zn1300

So, there is no oil pressure switch on a ZN, or am I still missing something?

This kind of makes sense to me. The early 1300's were oil burners and could be run low on oil with the pressure showing just fine (did this exact thing on my 79) resulting in internal cooling issues. My guess is Kawasaki recognized the oil burning issue so added a level sensor to mid 1300 models to keep the rider notified if the level dropped. The mid 1300 models had shown oil burning was no longer an issue so Kawasaki got rid of the oil pressure sender in the later model 1300's.

No, wait- that doesn't make sense - wouldn't keeping the pressure sender and getting rid of the oil level sensor (if they felt they really had to get rid of something) have made more sense?

Yes it would make sense. I see no reason to not have a pressure switch, what if the line gets clogged or something? Why would that be eliminated? Especially with the zn being as expensive as they were. Eliminating an oil pressure switch is stupid.

I've been working on engines my entire life (so over 57 years) and I have never seen an engine which was fed with oil pressure, that didn't have a oil pressure warning system. Especially on an engine on a motorcycle where if the engine seized and the rider was not quick enough to pull in the clutch and coast to a stop, a serious accident would occur.
My comments on this post was strictly findings when looking through the parts catalog. Most of us on this site have little experience with the ZN and the electronics on this bike are more complicated than the KZ. The boys over on the American Voyager site would be more up on all things ZN than we would. I enjoy the challenge of trying to help when a ZN question comes up. It's a learning experience for me and I'm a good Hound Dog when it comes to looking in manuals and on line.
My gut feeling is that there is some kind of oil pressure sensing, just not where we would expect to find it. Looking forward to hearing how this post turns out.

KB

Kawboy, I have a 2008 Yamaha MT-01, a 1700cc V-twin & it doesn't have an oil pressure warning light or any other means of low oil pressure warning which I found a little alarming, but there are bikes out there as such :S
Incidentally, I've had a search through the supplement manual & can only find reference to the "oil level warn" switch on the ZN, so it looks like it didn't have a pressure switch, whereas the ZG did, yet they share the same engine architecture :blink:

Not sure why this didn't occur to me before ....

I just flipped the ZN ignition on and after the initial lamp test ( not really Lamps as their actually LCDs) in which all 'alert indicators' are cycled, the Oil alert (along with all the others) goes out. Like most vehicles, if oil pressure is sensed, I would think the alert should stay on.

It's probably possible to add the pressure sensor back in. An oil pressure switch simply provides a path to ground, just like the level switch, so a pressure switch could be simply 'Y' ed it with the level sensor feed. The wiring diagram shows the level switch going directly to the instrument cluster and I suspect there nothing magic going on in the cluster other than a bit of extra circuitry for the 'lamp test'.

Well I have a pressure switch now. 8 bucks thank you amazon. Now to get the plug out. Casual attempts have failed so far. 5mm was a lil too small and started to roll over. 5.5 was too big. Gonna try and tap a T30 in there next attempt.