A two wheeled project
 

I don't know how many motorcycle enthusiasts are here, but you might like this. Some know I was a policeman for many years. I always wanted to get paid to ride, but unfortunately that didn't happen, for several reasons. Anyway, this popped up on Facebook Marketplace. It's a bit of a project. I want to get the red and blues wired up. There's a bit of rust in the tank and the carbs need to be cleaned and balanced. Anyway, I was pretty excited to pick it up. I've also got connections to my old department and am going to get a sticker set to reflect that department. I certainly don't want any Portland PD stickers on it :). The owner was the same, now retired, officer who rode it from brand new to when he and the bike retired. He bought it at auction and then it sat. So, as is usual, his wife wanted him to get rid of it. Oh, it's a 2000 KZ1000P.

Re: A two wheeled project
 

First off, thank you for spending your career serving us citizens! Truly appreciated, and I hope you have a long, beautiful retirement!

AWESOME bike! Less work than my '84 Honda Sabre that I got in boxes! LOL

Re: A two wheeled project
 

Cheers, thank you!

Re: A two wheeled project
 

neat project, keep us posted with your progress

Re: A two wheeled project
 

Is it legal in your state to run the cop lights?

Re: A two wheeled project
 

Probably not, but I'm not terribly worried about.

Re: A two wheeled project
 

I've been messing around with the bike. I added LED brake, tail light, and turn signals. I also got the red/blue emergency lights wired up.

Re: A two wheeled project
 

nice,

how is the motor?

Re: A two wheeled project
 

The engine is in pretty good shape. It's been sitting a while, so a carb clean and then balance is in the future. I received a repair manual for Christmas and have also watched a couple of balancing videos. I've rebuilt the carb on my thumper, so it shouldn't be terribly difficult, since it's the same make cark, just 4x as many. All the lights have converted everything to LED. MUCH better than the incandescent.

On that topic, I was having an issue where the new headlight wasn't working. I bought a Power Pro4 some time ago. This tool has been great! I was using it probe the headlight socket. I had been reading and saw where the headlight switch was the #1 suspect. I back probed all the connections and they were good. However, when I probed the ground wire on the headlight socket, there was no reading. Odd. Started checking all the grounds. Bingo!! Found one was loose. Tightened it up and now the headlight works.

So, for anyone following this, the moral to that story is, if you do some electrical work, I'd highly encourage you too look at one of these tools.

Re: A two wheeled project
 

I'm watching, cool bike!

Re: A two wheeled project
 

Nice bike!

Re: A two wheeled project
 

Thanks. It's been a bit cold here, but not too bad. I ordered some brake parts. The front rotors were fried. They got so hot they turned blue. So, new rotors, pads and brake lines. I also have rebuild kits for the calipers. I rebuild the front master cylinder yesterday. It obviously had not been bled in a while!! There was buildup on the interior walls of the master cylinder. Cleaned it all out. Hopefully today I can get the brake lines put together. I used Summit for those parts. Russel sells universal brake lines, by length. I hope I measured correctly. :)

Re: A two wheeled project
 

I rebuilt all three calipers and changed out the brake lines. I wanted braided lines, but nobody made any for this bike. I wasn't terribly surprised about that. I started searching and behold, Summit offers universal Russell brake lines. One end comes fitted with a banjo fitting, the other end you buy and it threads on. Great. Got those ordered and installed.

I also rebuilt the front master cylinder and ran into some problems. The previous owner cooked the front discs, so much so, they were blue. I tried bleeding the front brake and the master cylinder would not build any pressure. Turns out the extremely small return hole inside the master cylinder was boogered up. So, now a new master cylinder is on order.

Needless to say, I also installed new rotors. The old ones were 1mm to 2mm past the minimum thickness. There was also a "lip" on the outer edge of all the rotors. You can sort of see it in the closeup photo.

Aside from that, I removed the rear swing arm. It was covered in caked on lube and grit. I didn't take any photos, as I think most are familiar with this. I cleaned and lubed the swing arm bearings and got that reinstalled.

I wasn't going to change out the clutch cable, but I did. The old one was stretched the limit of the adjuster. I found this when I removed the cover over the front sprocket, again to clean it up.

While waiting on the master cylinder, I have a new blade style fuse block that's going into today.

Re: A two wheeled project
 

I'm starting on the carbs now, but first decided the engine covers looked terrible. I tried to polish them on the own, but that wasn't working out very well. I took them off and found a local polishing guy. He did a fantastic job! I also purchased an ultrasonic cleaner for cleaning the carbs. Looking forward to getting that job done. Engine cover before pictures..

Re: A two wheeled project
 

After polishing...

Re: A two wheeled project
 

looks great, keep it going

Re: A two wheeled project
 

You very well might be able to legally keep the lights but, it may require you to join a group that does funeral escort work. They usually have to attend a class and have a certification. I had a friend who did that for years here in Oregon.

And while you may not care for the city of Portland, I personally know for a fact that their law enforcement people are hard working, dedicated, professionals doing a tough job everyday.

Re: A two wheeled project
 

Being a retired policeman myself, I do not bad mouth police officers. These days, most agencies are EXTREMELY understaffed. Nobody wants the job, unlike years past, due to all the extraneous crap that they are dealing with.

As long as the lights aren't use, and they wont be, I will be keeping them on the bike.