The universe seems to have a funny sense of humor with me and my workspace. Every time it empties out, something new fills it back up again. Nature abhors a vacuum as the saying goes and that seems to be what happens with my shop.
It started innocently enough when I took the Super Hawk down the hill to the annual Mods and Rockers bike ride/show last Sunday. The groups had been having events and get togethers, starting Friday night, but I was otherwise occupied, so just waited until the groups all merged together at the local Hooley’s pub in Rancho San Diego. This is about 6 miles from my house, so the CB77 was barely warmed up by the time I arrived.
As soon as I dismounted from the bike, I had a steady group of admirers come to check out my little blue beauty and tell me their vintage Honda stories. After about a half hour of sharing information and seeing old friends, I took a quick scan around the parking lot to see who/what had showed up of interest to me in the way of vintage Hondas. Something that caught my eye was a vintage Kawasaki Z-1, strapped to the back of a Silverado Pickup with a for sale sign hanging on the back license plate. All it said was 1973 Kawasaki Z-1, $2200. I took a few moments to evaluate the bike, which was obviously modified to a great extent, then left my card on the truck’s driver side window. Before I had walked 60 feet, the bike owner collared me, wanting to tell me all about it.
He and a buddy had brought the bike down, along with a CB750 café bike from Gardena, just to participate in the event, and hopefully sell the Kawasaki, which was a project beyond his means/ability to bring back to life. The license plate tags were from 1999 and it hadn’t been run for quite a while, from the looks of it. There was no battery in it and the fuel smelled stale when I opened the gas cap. He was willing to take a little less than the asking price and we made a deal, then and there. I went to the bank, which was about a mile away and got as much cash as the ATM would allow, then went back and gave them the directions to my home. I took off ahead of them, as the loaded the other bike up.
They arrived promptly, unloaded the bike carefully (front brakes were not functioning) and we exchanged money and paperwork. I received a folder with fresh title, current tags and both the factory shop manual and owner’s manual from 1973 sale.
In the spare parts box, there was an unserviced DieHard battery, so I opened it up, added acid and then set it up for charging the next day. There was also a set of the original, but rusty, fenders, new cables, a set of Progressive shocks (new), the original factory air box, oil filters and a few other small bits. Nice start on what should be a decent runner, once I went through the revival drill.
I checked with the VJMC.org forum to contact some Kawasaki experts, as I had only a passing knowledge of early Z-1 Kawasakis. The only ones I have ridden like it were KZ1000P Police models, which our Honda shop serviced regularly, back in the 1980s, when I was service manager there. Fortunately, I had some quick feedback from the forum about who to contact and when I sent photos and descriptions of what I had, it became clearer as to what I had actually purchased. The bike was a low 8, xxxx serial number 1973 (first generation) Z-1 900cc model, which had been modified with a different swing arm that allowed for a wider alloy rear rim/tire, a similarly wider rim on the front, dual disc brakes with drilled rotors, 29mm smooth-bore carburetors, electronic ignition conversion, probably a 1000cc bore kit, shorter handlebars and abbreviated fenders on both ends. Of bigger interest was the powdercoated frame, which showed numerous “bracing” modifications to strengthen up the chassis which was notorious for flexing under load. There were a number of other mods and parts from later model machines added in, plus a nicely painted fuel tank and original side covers with correct emblems. Someone had spent a lot of time and money to build up a fast and good handling machine, but somewhere along the line, the effort was abandoned.
So far, I had to pull the front end apart to service the steering head bearings, which turned out to be tapered bearings but the grease had hardened into to a solid, causing the steering to be amazingly difficult to turn in either direction. Once that was solved, I flipped the forks back to the original forward mount caliper configuration and am working on rebuilding the hydraulics.
I removed the carb rack to inspect them for contamination and found them to be pretty clean, but the central fuel fitting, sealed by o-rings, seemed too loose to me, so I went about disassembling the carb rack to access the fuel connector for o-ring replacement. That’s when I discovered that the carbs were not the OEM 28mm mixers, but the rare and expensive 29mm smooth-bore racing carbs.
Once the carb rack was completed, I discovered the reason they were not fully installed in the first place; the manifolds had hardened and they completely resisted my attempts to get them to fully register inside the manifold spigots. Supposedly heat and some lubrication might get them to finally seat all the way in.
Compression readings are 200/200/190/190psi which indicates high compression and probably bigger bore piston kit parts installed. With the fresh battery installed, all the lights and system functions seemed to be in working order, so all I have to do is to get the fuel system to bolt up.
Well, this story came to a screeching halt 3 days after acquisition. I sent out a few teaser messages to some collectors, along with placing a Craigslist ad, just to gauge the “value” of this somewhat hybrid machine. Apparently the fact that it is a low-numbers 1973 model was the big draw, even with mods and parts that needed to be substituted back to OEM configuration. A kind Kawasaki enthusiast zoomed down from LA on Tuesday and scooped it all up, leaving me a big envelope full of cash.
I’ll never hear it run, but considering my previous experience of owning a Kawasaki, it is probably all for the best. Back in 1983, I bought a near-new condition GPZ-550 and a week later it spit me off on black ice, with a passenger on the back. I tried to outrigger the bike with my left leg and wound up tearing ligaments off the bone where they anchor. I guess you can’t blame the bike, but that was the last motorcycle accident I have had since.
We’ll the money is in the bank now, so we’ll see what shows up next.
Bill “MrHonda “Silver
Comments