Must be nice to be able to just go and buy a 900 RS to ride out your frustrations. I like that !!
Timing light - Good idea. It will work even if the bike won't start. Just turn off the garage lights so you can see it timing mark better.
Resistance checks- Anything I would give you would come from the Service Manuals, both the KZ and the ZN manuals apply. You can think of the ZN manual as a "supplement" to the KZ manual.
You need to apply the KIS principal here. Keep It Simple.
You drove it and put it away one year ago and didn't do anything to it in the mean time, so what could have happened?
Gasoline? Did you use a fuel storage additive like Sta-bil 360 which is specifically formulated for Ethanol enriched fuel. If not dump the fuel and put in fresh fuel to eliminate that possibility.
Timing both Electrical and Camshaft-
Camshaft - If a chain was loose, the timing of the camshaft can jump just by the sudden stopping of the engine. When the engine is running, all the parts are turning in the one direction then by shutting off the engine, the crank stops but the cams still have momentum and they can advance since the slop in the timing chain moved from the backside to the front side which allows the cams to jump timing. Most common times for any camshaft timing to jump is on changing gears or engine stopping. It's a dead giveaway when an engine fails during shifting or on startup.
Electrical- Back to the KIS principal -
You put the bike away last year and go to start it up and trouble. What happened? Was the battery at full charge when you went to start it? If the battery was down on charge, as soon as you go to start it the amp draw from the starter will drop the battery voltage and if it drops below 8 or 9 volts during cranking, there won't be enough healthy voltage to start the bike from cold. So charge the battery to eliminate that possibility.
Ignition Timing- If I remember correctly, the pick up coils are on the left side of the engine and the reluctor that triggers the coils is mounted on the starter clutch which is bolted on the end of the crankshaft, so highly unlikely that the engine timing is off, but never say never, so check the ignition timing sure.
Backfiring This is a true "backfiring" when it's flaming out the throttle bodies. It can only happen when the spark plug fires and the inlet valve is open, so either the cam timing is off or the inlet valve is open (think bent valve or a tight valve lash) or strangely enough dirty wet oil soaked spark plugs. One thing that happens often when an engine sits for a long time before it's run again, is that oil runs down the valve stems due to bad valve seals and then drips off . Then on start up, it usually burns off but if there's a cold start problem happening at the same time, you end up with more trouble between the cold start problem and oil soaked combustion chamber. Wasted Spark Systems work great when everything's running fine. Oil fouled sparkplugs and wasted spark systems don't play well with each other, so in this case, I would put in a fresh set of sparkplugs to eliminate that possibility.
That's all I got for now but really, KIS it first. Think what could have happened over the time span and look for the simple stuff before trying to root out a disaster that never happened.
And here's a story I'll share - 20 years ago when I owned a Porsche 928, I had it stored for the winter in a garage in Ontario. Wasn't put on a battery tender but I did disconnect the battery. Go to start it in the spring and the battery was low on charge and the engine was spinning over slow. So like everyone else, I go and grab a set of booster cables and fire up the pick up truck and now have the truck running and hooked up the booster cables to the Porsche. Fire up the Porsche and no sooner get it running and it starts backfiring plus exploding out the tailpipe. Me being stupid tries to keep it running hoping it will clear itself and then I smell paint burning. Stop the Porsche and look where the smoke is coming from and under the Porsche the catalytic converters are white hot, not orange or red but white hot and the paint on the undercarriage is on fire. SHIT !! Run for a garden hose, put out the fire, kick my own ass, shed a tear, then stop and think KIS. What happened?? Found 4 dead cylinder spark which related to one of the 2 ignition coils. Traced out the problem which happened to be the igniter in this case happened to be an ignition computer. Now a computer from the junkyard was going to cost $3,000 CDN but thanks to the internet I found a specialist in North Carolina who rebuilds these computers with upgraded transistors for a mere $500 US. Bottom line - You NEVER NEVER NEVER boost a Porsche with a running car. Any running voltage over 18 volts will fry the transistors in the igniter, and this happens when you have 2 charging systems working in parallel and not in a master / slave situation like on the late KZ and the ZN Kawasaki .with the dual alternators. Now you know why there's a guy who rebuilds Porsche computers for $500 and the parts are probably worth $40 to do the work. Lesson learned the hard way.
Good luck and keep us posted
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