Kawasaki Zephyr 550
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Spanner
New Member
Plan is to cut the the suspension mounts off of the old subframe, and weld them under the new one. Even though it had sat for a fair few years, and most of the rubber on the frame had rotted, the rubber on the suspension mounts seems to have been preserved somehow, so they should be fine
Chuck78
Been Around the Block
Ahhhh dude, don't chop the shock mounts off!!! Those Zephyr's are incredibly awesome handing bikes due to a very well engineered suspension (& amazingly equipped swingarm, shocks, forks, brakes, exhaust STOCK.), why would you want to botch up the geometry and make it handle like piss?
Put it back with stock shock mount locations, get some rectangular box steel tubing, trim to fit the vee notch in frame by front of seat where it sits so low to get your lines where you want them back to the shock posts, then take a pie slice out of the bottom of the frame rails just behind the shock mounts & tilt them downward using the metal left on top as a bendy hinge to create the lines you want & reweld the area of the cut at your desired angle. Then alter the fender mounting so you still have the proper tire clearance at full travel, and recess that into the new seat pan to keep the flat stance you want.
It kills me to watch people make psuedo-cafe "racers" that have botch jobs done to them that make them less race capable (worse handling) than stock. Trying to save you from that.
Put it back with stock shock mount locations, get some rectangular box steel tubing, trim to fit the vee notch in frame by front of seat where it sits so low to get your lines where you want them back to the shock posts, then take a pie slice out of the bottom of the frame rails just behind the shock mounts & tilt them downward using the metal left on top as a bendy hinge to create the lines you want & reweld the area of the cut at your desired angle. Then alter the fender mounting so you still have the proper tire clearance at full travel, and recess that into the new seat pan to keep the flat stance you want.
It kills me to watch people make psuedo-cafe "racers" that have botch jobs done to them that make them less race capable (worse handling) than stock. Trying to save you from that.
Chuck78
Been Around the Block
Looking at your paintshop sketch, the amount you were suggesting to "raise" the shock mounts (lowering the bike drastically) would effectively make the bike handle/steer like a poorly raked out chopper build. Lowering the front an equal amount will restore the rake, but kill your handling due to no ground clearance and severely altered trail measurement. A stock Harley with that rake would steer better because it's triple tree offset and fork length would be engineered to give it the proper amount of trail.
I seriously would weld the shock area back on in stock position with the parts to be scrapped as an alignment jig, then chop off the parts you aren't happy with, then get some nice tubing from eBay or a good metal supplier (or worst case chop up a wrecked or untitled frame for the bare steel stock) and give it the cosmetic look you want.
Sorry to come across as being forcefully opinionated, but I want to see your project end up being something that is a blast to ride, not another ill-handling aesthetics-only build. I REALLY DIG those Zephyr's from a handling/engineering standpoint, but I agree the seat/tail area leaves a bit to be desired.
I was trying to convince my bud to buy a pristine Zephyr 550 @ AMA Vintage Motorcycle Days this past weekend at the incredible 20+ acre swap, but the seat and tail & my wife calling it a "turd" due to that got him swayed to buy an 80 kz550 ltd "cafe" build instead. Cafe meaning rip off seat/gauges/fenders/tank paint, leave kerker 4:1 & Ikon shocks on, throw on clubman bars, aftermarket headlight, & mount a crappy uncomfortable fiberglass surfboard/hump on with a 2x4 & zip ties, & don't re-jet carbs for emgo pods... Was more solid that it's sibling that had a nice brat seat install & terribly short gsxr forks that left the beautiful Yoshi 4:1 1.5" from the ground. Also stock carb jets w/pods&pipe (poorly running)
Are those Mikuni BST31 carbs with the aluminum flatslides? I have a pair from an 89 Katana 600, looked like rad carbs to swap to a vintage bike (673cc gs550/gs650 hybrid in the works)
I seriously would weld the shock area back on in stock position with the parts to be scrapped as an alignment jig, then chop off the parts you aren't happy with, then get some nice tubing from eBay or a good metal supplier (or worst case chop up a wrecked or untitled frame for the bare steel stock) and give it the cosmetic look you want.
Sorry to come across as being forcefully opinionated, but I want to see your project end up being something that is a blast to ride, not another ill-handling aesthetics-only build. I REALLY DIG those Zephyr's from a handling/engineering standpoint, but I agree the seat/tail area leaves a bit to be desired.
I was trying to convince my bud to buy a pristine Zephyr 550 @ AMA Vintage Motorcycle Days this past weekend at the incredible 20+ acre swap, but the seat and tail & my wife calling it a "turd" due to that got him swayed to buy an 80 kz550 ltd "cafe" build instead. Cafe meaning rip off seat/gauges/fenders/tank paint, leave kerker 4:1 & Ikon shocks on, throw on clubman bars, aftermarket headlight, & mount a crappy uncomfortable fiberglass surfboard/hump on with a 2x4 & zip ties, & don't re-jet carbs for emgo pods... Was more solid that it's sibling that had a nice brat seat install & terribly short gsxr forks that left the beautiful Yoshi 4:1 1.5" from the ground. Also stock carb jets w/pods&pipe (poorly running)
Are those Mikuni BST31 carbs with the aluminum flatslides? I have a pair from an 89 Katana 600, looked like rad carbs to swap to a vintage bike (673cc gs550/gs650 hybrid in the works)
Spanner
New Member
Using the old pieces as jig is exactly my plan. Will be welded then all the bits I don't want shall be cut out, with tubing replacing giving me lines I am looking for. With regards to you being forcefully opinionated - I respect that, and that is exactly why I like these forums. People aren't scared to go 'Do not do that you'll ruin it/it wont work/you will die' and I think overall that's a better environment for something like that, where if not done properly something like this can easily be very dangerous. And on the carbs, I literally have no idea - this is the first bike I've ever worked on, are there identifying marks/numbers/stamps on them anywhere I could check for?
