Oh no! Another green KZ A1...

Hello Folks,

Time to say hello (form the UK), as I've started to explore the disturbing consequences of having bought a ratty-as-hell KZ13 A1.

The poor little thing was a badly butchered bobber-job, including elegant ape-hangers, velcro-attached single seat and a (harley?) rear guard only attached by the two shock mounts so you could swing it up'n'down like a giant duck-bill !

Rest of the bodywork naturally pretty ropey too, tank and side panels present but flakey, front guard chopped to death, short shocks, 6 into 1 collector partly crushed due to lowering, rear frame rails cut-off, all seat bracketry cut-off, grips / pegs all cheap aftermarket junk, oh and it's got an oil c-o-o-o-ler.

Aside from that, all perfectly 'factory' !!


Now begins the long painful and somewhat expensive task of getting it going..

Carbs glued shut all over the place, one pair of needles glued to jets, 4 mains glued shut, a quick mechanical clean of these got it to fire, rough as anything although no bad rattles, and doubtless due to glued-up idle circuits only ran above 1800-ish.
They're now resting in a relaxing bath of diesel, maybe the odd blast in the ultrasonic, time will tell.

Cylinder pressures desperate; 15 / 60 / 110 / 140 / 140 / 130 psi, so the proverbial 'left bank' seems to have gone home early.
Oil-in-bore test doubled #2 but no change on the others, so either head work due, or bad rings / bent rods, or all 3!
(middle carb was leaking so could be classic side-stand-tsunami..)

Question; what sort of cold cylinder pressures would you expect on a worn but otherwise OK jap engine of 1970s vintage?
The right-bank of cylinders are hovering around 130 / 140 psi, curious if this is OK for an old hack.

Then spotted one coil was unbolted (duh!) and resting on the head, so those cylinders can't have run but also suspect some PO ignition problems, guaranteed by me when I attempted to replace the HT leads by rotating... double-doh!! as I've subsequently learned they are not removable so I've certainly destroyed that coil... : )
Hey-ho, did the AW82-TR1 swap-out plus new leads and caps so that's ready to go and hopefully a stronger spark than OE anyway, may even have 6 cylinders this time, if they ever decide to squeeze some air.

Bought a hundred & one various bits'n'bobs to get the beastie back into some semblance of normality;
Front guard, rear plastic guard (shorty but OE), seat (lucky find) tail light NOS (last in the world? price suggests so), pegs, grips, Z9 high bars, OE shocks (old but cheap for the mo), clutch cable and 100s of little brackets & bespoke bits from the 3 or so main Z1300 web suppliers.

Shortened (back to OE) the comedy handlebar looms and front brake hose, still have forks - seals / general rebuild to do.
Got all the metal fab yet to do for the rear frame tubes and seat hardware and exhaust, not much cost there but no doubt hours of fit'n'fiddle.

That lot's taken me to the brink of financial ruin and I've only just started! : )

I'll keep you appraised of my spiral downwards into restoration-depression!

Welcome RChaloner! I can relate on more than one level... I hope you will post some photos later. Good luck with the project and glad to hear that someone else shares my misery! haha

I'd like to echo Stan's welcome! Which part of the UK are you in?

It's not ' Oh no! Another green KZ A1' - but Oh YES! The more, the better! And never become depressed whilst working your way through the difficulties you might encounter. There are many exceptionally knowledgeable members of this forum ( we have to thank KZQ - Bill - for the existence of KZ1300.com) and they will be ready and able to give advice when needed, I am sure.

Regarding compression pressures, I believe the Kawasaki manual only quotes pressure readings with a hot engine. However, if you have a look at the FAQ section on this website, there might be some more information there. Hopefully, somebody else will chime in here.

Restoration costs always reach far above originally anticipated levels. But, you'll forget all about the cost when the bike is back to how it should be. And just think of all the looks of amazement which will come your way whenever you go for a ride on your 1300! Most folk have never seen one of these bikes!

As a fellow UK owner of yet another green z1300, welcome to the forum. Just remember your'e not a fully fledged 1300 owner until you've flung it back in your shed, had a massive tantrum, and promised yourself that the pile of junk is going on e-bay as soon as you can manage it. This has to happen at least three times before you can even consider yourself a true 1300 rider. The up side is once you get it running as it should there's no other bike like it.

Thanks Stan, am capturing various pictures so will have a play with uploading them.

There is that expression about treading a fine line between inspiration and madness hmm...

Congratulations on your bike. I wish you the best of luck. So many of these bikes have been abused, abandoned, or cobbled together very poorly.

I'm not sure what the compression is supposed to be new from factory but I've had several of these now and the healthy ones had compression ranging from 120 to 140 depending on the bike. My current running bike has all the cylinders at 130 +/1 a few lbs.