About the speedo, yes, I'm aware of the preload tension. The needles need to be placed exactly where the old were, which is a bit tricky without those little knobs. But apparently it's been successfully done many times, and now I don't have a choice!... The old needles just shattered. They were both like long curvy eyelashes way above those stop pins. Thank you for getting the drill idea out of my head KB. I have to sleep on it and think. More reasoning about it below..
The mileage per Richard's question. Not sure about the 'odometer culture' here, I just have no idea. But one thing I've heard is that motorcycles competing for originality are very closely scrutinized. For example, stripes applied to the tank must reflect on the era and can't be too pretty. When some old bike gets new lines painted, they should be done the same way by hand mimicking sometimes the shaky hand that painted them decades ago. I've heard judges will look even if the washers are original. When doing repairs welding, the welds must also resemble the old sometimes not so pretty welds, not be so beautiful and even like they come out using modern tools. My KZ has some really ugly welds on it for example! There are even a couple places where the welding core wire got stuck and broken of, never cleaned up afterwards. That's definitely some personalized history to see right there! haha In my bike's case, I definitely crossed the line, I guess I don't need mention having a black engine for starters! hahaha And I am definitely not going to apply any of the ugly warning and instructional stickers all over the bike. But I agree, my gut wants to keep the odometer numbers original.
Maybe other Canadian fellows could educate us about how the originality works here?
Yes, ideally, I'd like to keep the numbers original. And I have the original numbers well documented. I am totally with you on this. The problem is the new speedo, which I want to install, comes with a totally different mileage. It has 54044 kilometers on it, while the original one about 8500 miles. So, I'd like to convert those miles to kilometers and set the replacement speedo to the correct corresponding number. I guess I just threw that 'zero start' idea up in the air without a deeper thought nor seriousness.
And I see this might be tricky. I didn't plan on digging into the gears this much, but maybe that should become a plan.
The carbs and start. I will experiment more and see. The general finding so far is it needs leaner mixture when on choke, and the vacuum mod might be the culprit sucking in too much fuel, which gets helped with some extra air already at start up by opening the butterflies but keeping the choke not fully applied. I'll see today what happens at 1/2 point, but I think the mod has to come out eventually in my bike's case. Which doesn't mean it a flawed mod, I'd say it's probably a good solution for bikes with higher mileage and already cold start problems.
I am sticking to my new/original plan - put together another carb set and make a switch. I will have to do it anyway, to test and tune the new set to keep as backup (or for sale to recuperate some funds). When this proves to work well, I will remove the mod from the original set and this would be interesting to see exactly what impact that would have.
As to setting the carbs, I have spare boots which and I will make a manifold with a hook up to a vacuum for bench synchronizing. I haven't seen your set up scotch, but I have an idea how I'm going to go about it. I am also working on contacts to have a place where I can do the float levels without worrying about stinking the place up.
