I was expecting something wild and wacky. Instead, the stroker triple gave every impression of being civilized. My first taste of a real motorcycle after the CG125 learner, I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to ride. Burbled along below 5000 revs, then went a bit harder but didn't come close to lightening the front end.
Handling was good, especially after the worn out CG that had suffered no less than eight learner owners (and had gone on to another one when I sold it)! I could even slam the throttle shut without the back end going berserk - something for which Kawasaki triples were once infamous.
It was one of last KH models, therefore had scads of development. Only made 28 horses, not tuned to extremes like the original H1. The only area where the reality of its stroker nature appeared was the economy. Or lack thereof - 25-35mpg! I was always filling the tank up with oil, as well, so there was quite a lot of expense involved. Not brilliant as I was off to college. Whatever's said about student grants and their poverty, an awful lot of people were able to run cages but I could barely eat and run the KH at the same time. Rich daddies, I suppose, some real spoilt bastards that I took a delight in burning off on the Kawasaki.
I haven't come across a cage that could stay with it up to 70mph. On the motorway run down to London (from Leeds), any number of cars left me for dead. The KH indicated 90mph, was beginning to rumble in discontent - I was always surprised by the level of vibes when it was strung out. The cars streamed past at the ton, ton-ten, some blaring away when I was a bit slow to move over. The mirrors blurred into uselessness at those kind of speeds.
The riding position was good for 75-80mph, beyond that some pain appeared in my shoulders, neck and bum. I could hold out until the bike went on to reserve after about 90 miles but definitely needed a stretch and walk. For running around town, the bike was fine for a couple of hours.
The clutch overheated a little after too much town work, becoming vicious in action and sometimes dragging. The five speed gearbox was smooth and slick, a reflection of the 18,500 miles on the clock, but clanged away if I tried to operate it without the clutch. Despite the relative smoothness of the three cylinder power pulses, the drive chain needed plenty of attention to keep the gearbox slick. The chain was so stringy that it could've been the one that came with the bike. I ended up taking links out of the chain but it never actually failed.
One item that always appeared on the verge of failure was the front disc. You could tell its age from the lack of holes and the way the caliper was mounted in front of the forks rather than behind. The single disc made the wheel shimmy on the days when it worked with power but most of the time it had the same kind of fade as the CG's front drum! Unlike the Honda's safe reaction to wet roads with mild but steady braking, the KH's disc gave up the ghost when it rained even a little.
Wet weather lag was an extended experience that had my heart in my mouth until it suddenly slammed on when the contents of my stomach ended up in my underwear! A rather unpleasant smell added to the ever present sniff of burnt off oil. Did nothing for the gal's, who complained of ruined clothes and went all anal on me.
I did manage to extract the pads, which looked warped and were down to the metal. A pair of used EBC pads were persuaded in with a bit of file work (I'm not sure what they were off but the breaker assured me they would fit) but as might be expected they weren't brilliant. Better in the dry but vicious in the wet. The calipers didn't want to come apart so new brake fluid and half a can of WD40 sufficed. At least it stopped squeaking like starving mice trapped in an antic.
The overall finish was still in reasonable shape, from a few yards away it didn't look that old. Up close, there was a smattering of rust on the frame and the old alloy rot had got to a couple of the engine casings. Not bad for something that was 15 years old. Some wear did turn up in the headstock, five months down the line. The bars started to twitch in my hands every time I went beyond 60mph - the headstock bearings were a funny shape and colour! A lack of grease, I think, or maybe just plain old age as they could well have been the originals.
Another sign of age, the way the charging circuit started to malfunction at 22000 miles. The battery discharged overnight and the motor would often stutter when the lights were switched on. The latter were wholly inadequate for country road riding at night and the horn was a silly beep that was rightly ignored by the cagers. Despite the lack of load on the system it still couldn't cope. The problem turned out to be a nonstandard rectifier/regulator that stopped working when it became too hot. This was difficult to diagnose but one fellow student had a similar problem on his Suzuki GS550 and gave me the nod. A used replacement sorted that out but obviously did nothing to help the lights or horn.
I was pondering upgrading them when a series of starting and running problems confounded my feeling of well being. This was the switches falling apart, shorting out. More used replacements. A hint that engine wear was setting in came at 24000 miles when the bike no longer wanted to push through 80mph and took five minutes to start. It had always smoked a little, now became a bit like the MZ 250's that were popular with the working class students. Piston rings, those in the know suggested.
I decided to decoke the cylinder heads and the silencers. Loads of black gunge to be burnt off. The engine responded with a new sharpness and relative lack of smoke. 95mph came up on the speedo, maybe more possible but I backed off as the chassis felt like it was going to become all hinged in the middle. The wheel bearings were just beginning to go and by 26000 miles needed replacing. It wasn't the kind of bike on which you could happily ignore chassis wear, making demands on my pocket money all the time. Hard times, sob!
I kept the bike for another 3500 miles when I had the chance to sell it at a profit and buy a neat Z550 as a replacement. You don't see many Kawasaki triples on the road, most seem to have been revved into oblivion. Mine was beginning to become a bit tired - I expected major engine work at any moment, was happy to move on to something with a more robust nature. The bigger four's also much cheaper to run. On the other hand, the KH was cheap to buy and fun to ride.
Adrian Foster
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My KH250 was built up from three different bikes, all bought as dogs in boxes. Ended up with one good bike in lime green with the loudest spannies in the world. Carburation was so extreme that from cold the only way it'd scream into life was with a bump start. The one guy who'd tried to steal it was found slumped over the bars from kickstart exhaustion. He had trouble both walking and breathing after I'd finished with him, having found my ignition lock ruined by a screwdriver.
The KH weighs only 350lbs, was quite easy to push down the road and bounce on to the saddle. After a night in the pub it was an entirely different matter. Many were the times I ended up wrestling on the tarmac with the triple rather than roaring up the road on one wheel. I reckon if I was sober enough to accomplish a bump start then I wasn't drunk enough to crash! The engine had modded ports, oversized carbs and high compression pistons. That added up to sod all power below 5000 revs then all hell breaking loose as the three combustion chambers finally began to work. When that happened in first gear there was no need to yank on the bars, the bike went vertical so fast that it was dead easy to tip right over.
If the exhaust was noisy it didn't deaden the characteristic engine rattles and knocks, which at the 2000rpm tickover convinced all but the most deaf spectator that the motor was but moments off seizing up. I'd learnt to ignore it as the noises were there right after a crank rebuild and rebore.
On one occasion some mean looking dude on a Harley chop tried to cut the tank in half with a chain whilst we waited at the lights. His face looked really pained from the noise and he was about three times my size. I should've protested about the large dent in my tank but the lights changed and I went for the throttle before he could gather his strength for a second attempt. I left him for dead with the front wheel at head height for a few hundred yards.
I didn't even slow down for the bend once back on to two wheels, taking a wide, wide line with both ends of the bike squirming all over the place and the frame turning plastic. That was pretty much what you'd expect above 70mph. The suspension was tightened up but that just transferred all the road shocks even more efficiently straight into the frame. Having owned an infamous H1, which was really vile, I was never really worried by the KH, it was just a matter of sitting tight and ignoring all the bouncing, grinding and howling.
Had I wanted to lose speed rapidly the single front disc would've been useful had not the braking forces threatened to tear the forks out of their yokes. The uneven forces fed into the fork by the single sided disc displayed distressing effects when banked over. It was like playing Russian Roulette in so far that I had little idea which direction the bike was going to leap off towards and the compressed suspension encouraged the exhaust to dig into the ground. When that happened you fell off!
Engine bars were necessary as the triple cylinder engine was as wide as a middleweight four and it was dead easy to rip off the ends of the crankshaft if the bike hit the tarmac. The couple of scrapes I'd experienced were, mercifully, minor with little damage to either myself or the bike. Despite the apparent frailty of the chassis the KH proved to be relatively robust.
Ridden within the speed limits (when forced into such silliness by a following cop car) the chassis was almost good. It only seemed stressed when using the power hard in bends and when the top speed of 105mph (on the optimistic clock) was approached on the straights. Minor bumps, though, could send the chassis into a suicidal frenzy.
The common Kawasaki triple trait of increasing that frenzy when backing off the throttle was largely but not totally eradicated on the smallest triple. Worn tyres or chassis bearings would bring back such H1 traits with a vengeance. I felt it safest to replace the rubber every 6000 miles although there was over 3mm of tread left. The handling was so weird that no particular make of tyre stood out as worthy of note; I just bought the cheapest set that was available (don't, whatever you do, mix makes!).
The other thing for which these triples are famous is wallet emptying fuel consumption. I know one guy with a low mileage, summer only KH250 in stock nick who reckons that he gets nearly 50mpg. I've never bettered 35mpg so I very much suspect that nearly means 41mpg! Gonzo riding (as in drunken madness, the only time I did drugs I spewed my guts up for the following week) turned in 20mpg, maybe 22mpg! 25mpg was relatively easy to attain and some constant 80mph cruising would turn in 30mpg.
Oil was just as bad. With rings wearing out in less than 7500 miles it was always mind warping to watch the oil consumption increase from 80mpp to 40mpp! Any long run needed a five litre can strapped on the seat, the angle of which tended to spit it off after a few miles. One time the can was splattered by a following biker, which caused someone else to fall off on the oil slick. He was all for kicking the shit out of me as I, foolishly, hadn't done a runner. His GPX600 was a write-off but his full (pink!) leathers had saved him from serious damage. In the end he decided claiming on the insurance would suffice; the engine was on its last legs!
On these kind of runs, fuel and oil aside, I was happy enough to scream along A-roads at 90mph or so. Secondary vibes were a bit intense, amplified by my firm, almost desperate, grip on the bars; a necessity to keep the KH on course.
Natch, if it rained I wouldn't have gone anywhere near that fast. Even with better HT leads and caps the engine would still cut in and out to a rhyme of its own making that I was never able to predict. The faster we went the worse it became, the spark breaking down at higher revs and huge plumes of water being fed off the shorty, sporty front mudguard. Luckily, it was relatively well behaved below 60mph, which was about all the chassis was good for on damp roads. There was no way I could hope to control the wild slides on wet roads.
The sit up and pray riding position also amplified the effects of any rain. I found the most effective clothing for long tours was a tight fitting waxed cotton Barbour under the leather with another bulky Barbour on top. This gave me a most impressive physique and even in the worst English weather the water never got through the inner jacket. It did make any quick movements awkward and I always started the Kwack before putting on the final layers of clothing!
Comfort was quite reasonable as the seat, bars and pegs weren't standard and complemented each other well. I could do 500 miles in a day with the vibes the largest comfort problem. Reliability between frequent rebuilds was good; I always knew when the main bearings were on the way out by the way the increased vibration cracked the downpipes.
Despite all the problems - a large stash of spares meant that rebuilds rarely cost more than a hundred notes (once a year) - the KH250 was always a Good Times machine that urged me on to greater madness and always thrilled with the wail from the silencers when the power snarled in. Never a day went by when I didn't get a buzz out of riding the little triple, it turned the five mile commute into work into a glorious test of my reflexes and the plod's tolerance of local hoodlums (good, it seems, they haven't booked me yet).
Most of the KH250s still on the road are in nice if modified nick. Most of the hacks being bought up for spares. A nice one can be had for five hundred notes, which given the almost complete lack of practical value seems about right as they are still great fun. I've had mine for the past five years and it's probably gone around the clock by now. Apart from the frame and crankcases, though, few of the bits are original.
Larry Kline