One of my very best buds had to move away for a new job! As excited for him as I am, I was bummed to see him go. Furthermore, he had a half-finished 1983 Kawasaki GPZ550 Cafe Racer project in the works. The bike was left here so that I could finish it up.
If you've been following this project you'll recognize a lot of this mega-edit! There's riding footage to be found at the end of the video.
First, the Shorai Lithium battery is relocated to under the cafe racer tail, requiring a new custom battery tray be fabricated. That includes a new home for the start solenoid as well. Next a mount is made for the Motogadget Motoscope Pro gauge. The bike had already been outfitted with an M-unit.
Then we move onto the biggest project: the 615cc big bore kit from Wiseco. The kit replaces the existing pistons and requires the cylinders to be bored out. I had that done by a machinist buddy. The head was also sent out and rebuilt by a reputable shop. A number of wear items, such as the cam chain tensioners, were also replaced at this time.
To accompany the new big bore pistons, we mated the engine up to a set of Keihin CR race carburetors. These puppies are rad as hell! That was paired up with an old 4-into-1 Motec exhaust which I replaced the muffler with a Supertrapp.
I also painted the tank myself, based on old Kodak camera film logos. We call it the Kodakasaki! (Kodak + Kawasaki) I did not include that in this video, but I do have another video documenting the process. In fact, I have several videos about this bike that go into much more detail than what is shown here! Thanks for watching!
I have a series of videos that covers this same bike in much greater detail: • Kawi GPz550 Cafe Racer...
I'm on Instagram @roodlum / roodlum
4 июл 2023
