1988 Kawasaki KMX 200 - A2 - rebuild/restoration

[stevo as b4]

I'd want to see a dyno chart before I believe it TBH. It's like when people claim that fitting splitter plates in the carb mouth gives much better low end and throttle response. It's possible, but I cannot see big gains in my head anyway.

I'll have to throw up some pics of my pile of KMX bits lying on the floor I suppose. Still sidetracked with lots of car issues and things I want to do to get my 4wheeled toy how I want it for now.

I have been hacking my cylinder barrel to bits with a dremel and some small files etc. I think it can be saved, but I will have to get the port windows matched up where I went a bit mad and made them all jagged and lopsided. I just hope the bike will still run with Stevo's special porting mods, as I just looked at it and read a page in CMM about inlet ports written by Stan Stephens, and thought lets attack everything with the dremel until it's bigger and obviously better!

[WJE]

Haha, I also saw that Stan Stephens bit in CMM, I work with 2 stroke petrol saws, and I was tempted to try on those before ever touching a bike ha ha.
Ive seen a couple of KMXs on ebay, with work done by Stan Stephens, but, Ive also heard he doesnt do that anymore? He passes the details of other friendly tuners instead.

I believe on the BDK website they have a KMX dyno graph with and without the mod.

The amount of times I have seen Dangerous Dave and yourself talking about KMXs on here, and I have only just registered Every time I google KMX tuning, or KMX supermoto, it comes to a thread between you 2

[dangerousdave]

Said dyno chart.

showing up to 6% increase from 3.5 - 5.5.

not going to snap your neck of lol but not knocking an extra pony at 4750
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[dangerousdave]

[dangerousdave]

ok so the USD forks are now installed, so can show a bit of work in progress. A lot still to do.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[rzsteve]

Looking good. Am hoping this will spur me on to getting mine sorted for spring but RZR is taking up what little spare time I have atm.
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Current bike: Honda Goldwing 1500/6 (dont hate me!) Thunderace gone to South Africa!
Current headaches: 89 KMX200, RZR250/350 Hybrid
Puch Magnum, Minimoto and Moto Minarelli thingy!

[KLR600]

Been following this and it's good to see an old dirt bike getting some love!

Are you not worried about machining the steerer tube down? I'm not an expert but I would have reservations about machining something like a steerer tube down.
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Now: '00 Kawasaki ZRX1100R - Past: '84 Yamaha DT125, '89 Kawasaki KLR600, '97 Yamaha XJ600N
<My Bikepics Page> <My Yootoobes> <My Websites> <My Photos>
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[dangerousdave]

[KLR600]

I can imagine having something like that custom made would be a bit of a hit on the old wallet!

Will you be doing any off-roading at all on it? I've had a lot of experience with mountain bikes and have snapped a few steerer tubes myself which is the only reason I ask. The trend in mountain bikes now is a bigger steerer tube or at least a flared tube which is bigger at the bottom than it is at the top.

I wouldn't be too worried about a smaller tube as stock just I'd be a bit worried about making an existing tube thinner. I'm no engineer though and I'm sure those race engineers have science to back up their work

Keep up the good work on this bike, like I said I've been following it from the start and it's looking great.
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Now: '00 Kawasaki ZRX1100R - Past: '84 Yamaha DT125, '89 Kawasaki KLR600, '97 Yamaha XJ600N
<My Bikepics Page> <My Yootoobes> <My Websites> <My Photos>
<Take Cool Photos!>

[dangerousdave]

[WJE]

Those forks look great on there, will work so much better than the little kmx ones!

Cant wait to see some more pics

[dangerousdave]

[rzsteve]

At least if the tank glows in the dark, you wont need to wear a fluorescent jacket! I know what you mean about the green (poetry?) though as mine has a powdercoated tank and it stands out badly!
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Current bike: Honda Goldwing 1500/6 (dont hate me!) Thunderace gone to South Africa!
Current headaches: 89 KMX200, RZR250/350 Hybrid
Puch Magnum, Minimoto and Moto Minarelli thingy!

[dangerousdave]

Haha went for this stuff in the end

Apico Fast Finish Universal Acrylic Paint - KX Green

As far as I can see there are at least two official shades of KX green. It became more flouro in the late '90s I think.

Not sure what it's going to be like, have a mixture of painted and bare plastic on the bike at the moment.

I did consider getting something mixed up, but had some done at Halfords for another bike, the match was terrible.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[WJE]

Shit, may be a bit late on this< dont know if you saw my Facebook status about rsbikepaints.com .

You enter your bike, and they have the paint.
Just got some footpeg silver off them to do my swingarm and silver bits. If they dont have the right colour under the model, try a diff year


Very VERY helpful firm, and based just down the road from me

[steady eddie]

More!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Fz50>Ts185>Rd125Lc>Cb250n Superdream "Deluxe" (!)>Kmx200>Tdr250>Yzf600 Thundercat>
Current bikes: 1997 Fireblade RRV & 1989 KMX200

[dangerousdave]

recieved a master cylinder rebuild kit so hoping to get the front brake set up on weekend soon.

the tank needs to be resprayed before that can go back on. then can fasten everything up and do some testing of the suspension.

the rear shock has had it so this could put a dampner on things (lol)

have a couple of old kmx shocks kicking about but doubt these are much better, so some work to be done there.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[dangerousdave]

so, won a KXF250 Renthal unbreakable clutch lever and perch on eBay. Kind of unneccesary purchase but have difficulty resisting these blingy bits lol.

project been stalled over winter but should get going now its warming up outside.

what is annoying that there's a bit of a leak from the left hand USD. didn't seem to reappear when i wiped it away. The forks has a bit of stiction to them, not too bad, but not great either. Figure at some point soon they'll want a strip, clean, new oil and new seals.

As far as the rear sus goes, nearly bought a Hagon rear shock for it which was going cheap, but it was for the KMX125. When I spoke to Hagon themselves, they said the KMX200 shock has a different end on it. So for the time being will try the spare 200 gas shock i have here.

To correct the geometry of the bike after adding the longer forks, I need to find a pair of shorter "dog bones" or suspension links, to raise the back by roughly 2". I saw somebody made their own on here recently, which was pretty impressive. I've been looking at other bikes for linkages of the same size etc. If all else fails il make up something roughly and get a local engineering company to machine something up properly.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[dangerousdave]

Been away for a while a while excuses excuses !

Worked on the tank yesterday. Got it looking pretty reasonable after filled in a large dent behind the filler cap. Think somebody must have ruined their wedding tackle on it at some point.

Now the front master cylinder is doing my suede in. Have had it in bits, used a rebuild kit, bled it to death, lever zip tied to the bar all night, and I still can't get a solid feel at the lever.

Its a '99 KX 125 master cylinder, not the best year for KX brakes apparently but I shouldn't be able to pull the lever back to the bar. Brake hose is a brand new Goodridge braided hose. Its mated to the standard KX Nissin 2-pot calliper.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[dangerousdave]

Bit more on this today.

Earlier on in the thread i looked at ways of raising back of the bike to correct the geometry after adding the longer fork. I've raised it by 1.5 inches by using an alternative tie-rod in the rear suspension linkage.

Also a while ago a member sent me another rear suspension unit, for FREE !! Andy K - Kudos !! I've given this a clean up so I can see if it is an improvement on the pogo stick which somebody had disguised as a shock absorber.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[dangerousdave]

So I fitted the alternative rear shock today to test the condition. Worked a treat, damping adjuster working etc so massive win and good improvement for now.

When I ride the bike I'll be able to test out the suspension and make any adjustments needed. I'm not expecting to combine suspension from two different bikes and expect it to work perfectly straight away.

The current back wheel has seen better days, the usual rot around the spokes getting to it now. I picked up a better wheel a while back with knackered bearings so set about getting these out and replaced with new ones. All was fine until I lost the a circlip and spent half hour sifting through all the scrapings on the floor of the garage for it. My world was good again when it was found and returned to its rightful place in the hub.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[dangerousdave]

Called it a day with the spongey KX125 master cylinder, and went for a DRZ400 one instead, which has a larger capacity. Used the braided hose & matched up to the KX brake caliper.

After bleeding out, this brake setup worked fantastically so looking forward to testing that properly. Of course now the back brake feels weak !!

Finished spraying the tank, including 4 coats of lacquer followed by 2 coats of petrol resistant lacquer. Overall it seems a good finish, although the colour match wasn't the best.

Also managed to find another KMX 200 exhaust with a lot less weld and rust in it than my current one, which cleaned up pretty well, so have bolted that on.
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[dangerousdave]

MOT booked for 10.30am tomorrow

The bike is coming back together well, with a few problems.

With the increased height of the bike with the taller suspension, it leans over further on the side stand, meaning the carb continuously leaks fuel. No quick fix for this, may have to modify the side stand.

Simple solution would be to turn off the fuel, apart from ....... the fuel tap has now given up, and doesn't fully turn off , my Dad resorting to trying to make up a rubber insert for it before the MOT.

Also, bought a chain guard for, but being off a 125, doesn't fit, as the swingarm is different
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1988 Kawasaki KMX 200

Previous: Yamaha YZF1000, ZZR600, KMX200, DT50, KX80, CG125, PF50

[zbraff]

Any news Dave?

[dangerousdave]