My, my, my......What Do We Have Here?

As some of you may know, I bought a 1977 Kawasaki KZ-1000A1 from a retired motorcop who lives in California. He had it for sale on Ebay and from the pictures he posted and his verbal description it looked like a very nice bike. I quote the seller, "It has 5500 miles on it and you could ride it anywhere." Well I bought the thing for $6500.00 and had it shipped to Wisconsin for $500.00. In all honesty the bike didn't look bad but I immediately discovered issues, like a oil leak from the head and out of round wheels and several other things. I decided to keep the bike and fix it up replacing and repairing what I could without doing a full blown restoration all the while hearing the previous owners words echoing in my brain that it has 5500 miles on it. If anyone here has followed a few of my posts you already know this "ride anywhere" motorcycle has turned into a major fiasco.

One of the things I loved about my old '75 Z1B that I bought new was that it was a super fun bike to ride, but it lacked a rear disc brake and a dual disc front brake. So I rounded up the parts to install a second front disc on my '77 which I did today. The install went well however I can't take it out for a ride because I don't have the head back yet from APE. I sent it to them to do their magic which ended up being replacing all the exhaust and intake valves and guides and seals etc. Can't wait to see the bill but supposedly they know what they are doing so hoping for the best. So after I finished installing the second disc brake today I flipped the seat up and decided to pull the old air filter out and put a new one in that I bought. There was some printing on the old air filter and when I read it I almost went into orbit as we used to say. Please see attached pics and give your thoughts.... Thanks, Rick H.

P.S. Lesson learned. Please excuse the second picture of the speedometer. It shouldn't be there.

You worried about the date on the air filter? That's most likely just the date that it was replaced. I wouldn't worry too much about that. The missing brake parts and the fact that the head was trashed raises WAY more concerns.

Nessism wrote: You worried about the date on the air filter? That's most likely just the date that it was replaced.
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More likely the other number - 19312 - which may be true the mileage at which the new filter was put in ?? and blows the claimed 5500 out of the water..

You got it Zed1015! If things weren't bad enough with this bike. The first numbers I saw on the filter related to the date and I had to laugh a bit thinking Holy Cow this filter is an antique. Then I noticed the other numbers and thought you have got to be kidding. No one puts a date on a filter without putting the mileage down also. So if this bike had 19+ thousand on it in June of 1990 I wonder what it REALLY has for miles on it? I know in the big scheme of things it shouldn't matter, but the seller who is a retired motor officer, sold the bike to a fellow retired motor officer albeit in a different state. How ironic is that? No honor amongst thieves I guess. I will never hear the end of this from my better half that's for sure.....

Rick H.

Here's a picture of the bike that the seller had posted.

Rick H.

That sucks.

So he turned back the speedo ? by the way, here's mine, 77kz-1000A1 that I know is real...

urankjj wrote: So he turned back the speedo ? by the way, here's mine, 77kz-1000A1 that I know is real...

Mine's almost the same as yours...only with an extra zero! :laugh:

Well I can't say with certainty that it was turned back, or the speedo was replaced with another one with lower mileage, or it really has 105,500 miles on it. In any event the bike doesn't have the quoted 5,500 miles on it. Several things began to add up after I found the writing on the air filter though regarding the condition of the bike and the advertised mileage. Like the fact he told me the bike had never had any work done on it, yet every screw on the engine cases had been messed up from using the wrong type of screw driver on them and the dead give away for me was the fact one of the cooling fins on the cylinder block had been broken off. Cooling fins obviously don't just break off by themselves. There was also a spot under the 1015 CC casting on the block where a screwdriver mark is present from someone who used that location as a pry point to get the cylinder block off.

I mention this episode not so much to vent off anger or frustration, but to show the levels which people will stoop to in order to sell a motorcycle. And in hindsight I should have done a much better job of investigating this bike BEFORE I bought it. I haven't purchased a used bike in over 35 years so I was an open invitation to getting ripped off. Plus until I received the bike and garnered a ton of information from this website and some other helpful individuals I really didn't know what to look for when researching an old KZ-1000. Homework is everything with these bikes today if you are looking for a decent one. Needless to say had I have put to use what I know now this bike would not be sitting in my garage at least at the price I paid for it. Perhaps the best tid-bit of information I received from a well known individual was to never, ever buy an old Z or KZ unless you see it in person and hear it run. No truer words have ever been spoken. I learned a hard, costly lesson.

Rick H.

I do sympathize with you if you indeed were duped by the PO, but there are are wayyyy too many other hands in this deal to vilify him completely. Buyers remorse is like hindsight.. 20/20. I don't follow every post on the forum, so I have no idea of any other discussions on this bike. There are a lot of assumptions in this thread though.

Shippers are not as careful as owners while handling a collectible riceburner and may have been the culprits breaking off a cooling fin during shipment. God only knows what happens to a bike when a shipper hops on for the obligatory joy ride. YeHa!

These engines are notorious for leaking from the heads as most KZriders / owners can attest to after 40 + years. The leaks are bound to rear their ugly heads soon.

Replacing all the valves and guides is something that is subjective to the machine shop's opinion, and may not have been because of mileage / wear, but instead of pitting of the seats and valve margin area's. Some shops will do this just to be through, and to make sure that it is truly refurbished to their specs. Not necessarily because it's worn out, yet pitted seats and valve margins from the usual corrosion. Something one machinist may use in his own bike would be unacceptable to leave in a customer's engine. Then of course, companies stay in business by making money, not from consultation and parts inspections.

$7K is a LOT of money to pay for a bike sight unseen. I would NEVER buy a bike long distance without personally looking at it first. As you are finding all of the little things like pry marks and broken fins are pretty obvious. I would have spent the "shipping fee's" on a road trip in a pickup truck and looked at it before shelling out any money on the bike. I would then load it into said truck and haul it home myself. That's just me.

At any rate, I hope you get your old / new bike back together soon and are able to enjoy it as it should be. Beautiful bike BTW!

You could have bought my KZ650 for $4,500 and It's in perfect conditon. Wow that is quite a sum of money for an unseen / unknown condition bike. Wish you the best on getting it fixed up.

old_kaw wrote: I do sympathize with you if you indeed were duped by the PO, but there are are wayyyy too many other hands in this deal to vilify him completely. Buyers remorse is like hindsight.. 20/20. I don't follow every post on the forum, so I have no idea of any other discussions on this bike. There are a lot of assumptions in this thread though.

Shippers are not as careful as owners while handling a collectible riceburner and may have been the culprits breaking off a cooling fin during shipment. God only knows what happens to a bike when a shipper hops on for the obligatory joy ride. YeHa!


These engines are notorious for leaking from the heads as most KZriders / owners can attest to after 40 + years. The leaks are bound to rear their ugly heads soon.

Replacing all the valves and guides is something that is subjective to the machine shop's opinion, and may not have been because of mileage / wear, but instead of pitting of the seats and valve margin area's. Some shops will do this just to be through, and to make sure that it is truly refurbished to their specs. Not necessarily because it's worn out, yet pitted seats and valve margins from the usual corrosion. Something one machinist may use in his own bike would be unacceptable to leave in a customer's engine. Then of course, companies stay in business by making money, not from consultation and parts inspections.

$7K is a LOT of money to pay for a bike sight unseen. I would NEVER buy a bike long distance without personally looking at it first. As you are finding all of the little things like pry marks and broken fins are pretty obvious. I would have spent the "shipping fee's" on a road trip in a pickup truck and looked at it before shelling out any money on the bike. I would then load it into said truck and haul it home myself. That's just me.

At any rate, I hope you get your old / new bike back together soon and are able to enjoy it as it should be. Beautiful bike BTW!

All very true, but I only have buyers remorse when I don't get taken for a ride and wonder if I really needed what I bought, such as a small knee mill I added to my basement. There was nothing wrong with the mill, but for a period of time I wondered if I really needed it. In the end I have used it a lot so bye-bye any remorse. The cooling fin that is broken off is in the left rear center of the cylinder block just above the engine case. Pretty difficult for a shipper to damage that area, but I will add the shipper is well known and widely used. I suppose they could have been responsible for the spoked wheels being out of true had they strapped the bike down over the wheels and ran the straps down too tight and left it that way for almost four weeks. $450.00 to true up the wheels was an expense I never anticipated and one I can't blame anyone for.

Knowing what I know now I would have asked for many more pictures of the bike including closeups of areas I (now) know are suspect to damage. I could have perhaps seen the damaged cooling fin and the myriad of messed up screw heads on an engine that was never supposedly worked on. I may also have seen the oil running down the front of the engine block, but it's water under the bridge now. I have my fingers crossed that once the motor is back together that it runs good and then I can decide what to do with the rest of the bike. Who knows, it may be an outstanding runner worthy of a full blown restoration. We will see.

Rick H.