Month: October 2008

Sweet Old School Reader Ride! KZ750 Cafe!

Before

After…
(mostly) 1980 Kawasaki KZ750-H1 “LTD”.

Long story short, I traded a $50 Peavey guitar amplifier for this bike, then had to dig the bike out of a sand dune in a junk yard in Amarillo, TX. I moved it around with me for a few years while I was in music school before I had the time to get into it. I replaced bearings and rebuilt brakes and carbs, found a seat for it and bought some tires, got it on the road and went around for several years like that, and didn’t even have to get into the engine!

Fast forward to April 2008. I decided to freshen up the top end, replace some leaky gaskets and such. I found that the forward cam chain guide was broken in two, and apparently had been for some time. The engine never complained!

One thing led to another and I ended up taking it down to the frame and redoing a whole lot of stuff. Now the only things original are the wheels, frame, and the top end of the engine! The bottom end is from a 1982 LTD750, tank and fork is from ’82 GPz750s, the seat is an Airtech Streamlining fiberglass piece for a Yamaha TZ250-U.

In honor of Nicky Hayden’s last ride on a Honda.

American MotoGP star NickyHayden is now at the end of his run with Honda. It’s been a good run with a MotoGP championship and an AMA championship but it’s clear that Honda is enamoured with the smaller riders from the 250 ranks and are not going to build him a bike that fits his slip sliding style. So now he’s off to Ducati for some italian/american action and a partnership with another former champ Casey Stoner. I hope he has great success and sticks it to Honda (and former teamate Pedrosa) next year. Go NICKY!