How could a 1991 bike look so far gone? The mean green paint was worn through on the side-panels and the back of the tank. The alloy was mottled with corrosion, the fairing was missing a mounting bolt and the engine ran half-heartedly below 2500rpm. The owner reckoned that it was because he had degutted the silencer, which judging by the racket was marginal when it came out of the accessory store. 32,000 miles and wired in bolts suggested it'd had a severe year and half of abuse.
Normally, I would have walked away from the heap, happy enough to have had a brief test ride for free and with tales of malaise and poor build quality with which to regale my mates as we drowned our sorrows in the night. What stopped this sensible course of action was lust for a race replica, almost any model would've done, and the desperation with which the owner was trying to off-load the ZXR. Insurance rate hikes had made 750s very hard to sell.
After listing a large number of bits that would have to be replaced, worries over the state of the engine and that with the recession money was hard to come by, etc, etc, £1850 changed hands. Put me in such a good mood that I tried to pull a wheelie as I left his house. The whole bike lurched, first jumped out of gear and the tacho needle went through the red so fast I thought the clocks were going to leap out with the vibes.
I crunched up to second, left there as fast as I could. I was soon in the midst of heavy traffic, trying to get some speed up to take the weight off my wrists from the wretchedly low clip-ons. I'm not particularly tall, the stretch over the tank left my bum up in the air and my groin taking a battering from the tank every time I hit the twin front discs. Very powerful they were, too, but they only gave any feedback when used from above 60mph.
It might be a bit strange to buy a race replica to ride upon eight miles a day to work, but I loved their racer looks and had visions of emulating my race track heroes. It only took a couple of days for me to realise my mistake, at least in the case of the ZXR.....its riding position was absolutely horrible for anything other than fast riding. Even the large fairing didn't help in the rain, the water came streaming off the screen and landed in my lap.
I was so pissed that after the first couple of weeks I put an advert in MCN, but no-one phoned up, so I was stuck with the ZXR. The noise the exhaust made was the kind of demented howl that sent normally respectable citizens into a rage, although I thought it a good safety factor in town as even if they claimed not to see me there was no way they wouldn't hear the howl.
For really slow riding it was better to leap off the bike and push it. The lurching transmission, misfiring engine and painful riding position made any attempt at sustaining speeds up to 20mph a complete waste of time and energy. It used to get me so mad that I'd hit the horn, ride like a lunatic through gaps that were barely wide enough for the handlebars. I had to squeal the front tyres several times to avoid whacking some cager.
I soon decided that I'd better put the Kawasaki to some proper use. A motorway blast up to Brum would clear out some of the aggression that was building up in my body. It was a nice enough day, a bit blustery but the sun was shining and there weren't any reports of traffic jams on the radio.
The ZXR knocks out over 100hp, has a pretty aerodynamic fairing (as long as you get down on the tank) but is a bit on the porky side. I wasn't that surprised by acceleration that was only on a par with one of the 600s but a bit disappointed when it refused to do more than 135mph. In its favour, stability was excellent and tucking down behind the fairing there was hardly any wind buffeting.
The bike was happy cruising at 90 to 100mph, although on the long, fast curves there was an unnerving tendency to run a bit wide. Hanging off the ZXR helped. It was probably just the tyres being more worn than new. Streaming past the bigger lorries I was a bit disconcerted by the way the front end shook around when it hit the slipstream. Putting as much of my weight as possible over the front forks helped.
Even at insane motorway speeds my wrists still hurt like hell, although the seat was relatively comfortable, perhaps because most of my weight was thrown forward.
When I rolled up in Birmingham I got lost on the ring roads, then had to lose a cop car as I sped past them at 75mph. For once I didn't notice the pain of the riding position. That only came back in the traffic jams. I was so tired by then that I tried to wrench the ZXR through a tiny gap. The steering lock was so minimal that we tottered over on to a conveniently placed Volvo. The owner had a head so like a wolf that I thought I was hallucinating. I pulled the bike back upright and took off along the pavement like there was a wild beast on my tail.
I decided to head back to London down some more minor roads. I'd already annoyed one set of plod so thought it better not to repeat the experience by using the motorway.
The ZXR's suspension had always been a bit rigid but I'd expected that in town on a race replica and it wasn't much of a problem on the motorway. The rear shock was so hard that on bumpy roads the back wheel felt like it was going to leap into the nearest hedgerow. The further I banked over the more dangerous it felt. It was better going into corners slowly and accelerating hard out, save that the bars would shake once or twice in my hands. This was worrying at first but it never developed into a speed wobble, so I soon learnt to ignore it. I've owned much worse.
The wraparound frame was undoubtedly strong, and once I became used to all the rattling I was able to push on at a reasonable pace. So enjoyable did I find the riding, that it was only when I tried to climb off the bike that I realised my spine had been battered by the bumps to the extent that I could not stand upright for a while. I feared that extended exposure to long distance travel would leave me hunch-backed, deaf and bald. The latter from the worry about whether the tired engine was going to last and the cost of consumables.
It had only taken 1500 miles to finish off the tyres. The chain was so slack it was taking chunks out of the chainguard and the rear disc had been gummed up for a long time. The engine's need to misfire was extending up the midrange, threatening at any moment to make the motor impossible to use below 6000 revs. Balancing the carbs and giving the dealer a bit of dosh for nearly new Jap tyres and a worn chain, sorted most of the immediate problems.
After about a month my wrists had adapted to the pressure on them, would resist 10 miles of commuting before the pain returned. The next long journey was down to a camping site in St Ives. A piece of cake, I told my mates.
The only problem was that I nearly rode into the front a camper van. I was overtaking a long line of caravans, only to find that the fuel had run out. The ZXR has the fuel tap so awkwardly hidden between the side-panel and frame that the only way to safely hit reserve was to pull off the road! With a stuttering engine and a fast approaching van this wasn't a viable option. Only by some desperate grovelling around did I get the fuel back on in time to throw the ZXR in front of a car on my side of the road. The riding position after a few hundred miles of hustling was so bad that once I'd got to my destination I didn't touch the bike for two days.
The return journey was even more fun. Wild crosswinds played havoc with the stability, the fairing seemed to shake on its mountings and the steering head appeared to turn to jelly. I was down to 60mph for most of the time, though I was tempted by the thought that 120mph might've improved things. The gearbox also started slipping out of gear as I neared London, the temperature gauge was in the red and some vibes were rumbling through the chassis. By the time I got home the engine felt like it was running on three cylinders.
I had a day free before work, spent it tearing off the plastic and tank. With the cylinder head cover off I discovered the reason for the poor running - two of the exhaust cams had large chunks missing. With the engine out I found that one of the selectors was bent. It took two weeks to track down good used items. The engine rebuild was relatively straightforward. Putting it all back together, the plastic cracked in several places, one side-panel and the left fairing were able to flap around. I riveted on some alloy sheet to add some stiffening.
It didn't add to the bike's appearance, which was rapidly becoming as ratty as some twenty year old hack. Corrosion appeared on the alloy so fast that I soon gave up trying to keep it clean and the paint was in desperate need of a respray.
I was more than relieved when some local hoodlum decided it was just what he needed. He would only give me £1750 for it, but I could live with that easier than I could continue to battle the ZXR. Mine was undoubtedly a hard used, well thrashed example. If you can take the riding position and harsh suspension then a low mileage one might just be a good buy.
Harry Johnson
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Nearly 50,000 miles on a late '89 Kawasaki ZXR750. It all started in '91 with a nice bike that had only done 5000 miles. The owner had to sell because he could no longer afford insurance. At that time Kawasaki had introduced a new model that was a lot slower, so there was a great demand for this one and I was lucky to buy it at a reasonable price.
The most immediate problem with the ZXR is its riding position. Now, that's pretty obvious to anyone who casts a quick glance at the bike so I shouldn't be complaining, should I? I don't believe that the seat needed to be quite so hard nor the bars so low. The early months were pretty nasty, to be honest, and I often thought about selling the bike.
Not even the tremendous acceleration could distract me from the discomfort. My neck was in agony, my wrists swelled and my backside went numb. My back began to go, as well, quite horrendous pains shooting up my spine. The ever helpful doctor told me to sell the motorcycle. This poor impression of the bike wasn't helped by the fact that I was using it for the commuting duties, not having time to get out of town for the first two months.
The human body is a wonderful instrument and after six months of suffering, various muscles had toughened up and the pains went away. Either that or my body had rearranged itself into a more resilient posture. One thing to assiduously avoid was bumpy country roads because the combination of sparse seat and taut rear shock gave my back a real battering. The ZXR series was infamous for crap rear suspension but on reasonable roads it's tolerable.
With lots of midrange grunt and another surge of power where, on any sane account, you'd expect it to start diminishing, a taut chassis is necessary to stop it wobbling all over the road. With the low, narrow bars it's not the kind of bike that will flick from side to side on the slightest whim, but it can be banked right over, apparently destroying the laws of physics, and the front end is much more assured than the back, despite lacking the later bike's upside-down forks.
The forks proved less entertaining with about 15000 miles on the clock when the seals blew. Talk about acting up like a recalcitrant carthorse! I couldn't cope with the steering above 80mph and any bumps threw the ZXR around more like a rat moped than 460lbs of advanced motorcycle. The dealer reckoned the seals were a weak point and was quite happy to sell me a set of gaiters. I don't know if he was taking the piss or not but I didn't have any more problems from the forks.
The handling could also be upset by the tyres. Wear wasn't as ferocious as I'd expected, the original Japlops lasted for 12000 miles! By the time they were down to 1mm, the bike became incredibly sensitive to road imperfections and lacked directional accuracy. It was a wide old bugger to begin with and leaving an extra few inches to spare through gaps meant town work could turn incredibly slow.
A set of Michelin Hi-Sports were fitted. They had a little more grip than the Dunlops but only lasted for about 8000 miles. I went back to the OE tyres as they lasted longer and were available cheaply. They did discourage me from riding above 130mph when they allowed a weave that the Michelins had removed, but to my mind that was a jolly good thing because it saved my licence!
The engine wasn't entirely smooth at such excessive speeds, even at 70mph there was quite of lot of mild secondary buzzing. The fairing took the brunt of it, rattling around like there were a couple of mounting bolts missing. With 20,000 miles done the plastic began to crack up around the mounting holes. This happened halfway through my holiday and there was no easy way to fix it.
Approaching home one of the brackets broke, the fairing threatening to blow off in the 100mph gale! I lost speed fast and did a temporary repair to the fairing with bungee cords. I reached home in one piece but almost had a coronary when the dealer told me how much a new fairing would cost. GRP was used to repair the plastic but it needed continuous patching up for the rest of the time I owned the ZXR!
The fairing was not the only thing affected by the vibration. It didn't really bother me but caused the exhaust system to crack up. Part of that was down to rust, which started to eat into the exhaust after about two and a half years. I managed to buy a race pipe for fifty quid, which gave a marvellous bellow but left the mill choked above 8000 revs. One ZXR owner reckoned I'd burn out the valves if I didn't upgrade the carbs. I approached a dealer who reckoned eighty quid would fix it. £150 later I had the bike back with bigger jets and a degutted airfilter box.
The midrange was as good as before, the top end stronger. Top speed was 160mph instead of 150mph but I tended to use it in the lower gears for fantastic acceleration instead of excessive speeds. The noise the 4-1 exhaust made was exquisite, even the odd pedestrian gave me the thumbs up!
That wasn't the only time I was ripped off by a dealer. Another reckoned he'd do a full service for £175 but wouldn't let me have the bike back unless I gave him £250, muttering about new spark plugs and shims. Worse still, he'd cracked the fairing around one of the mounting holes! There is a lot of junk to removed before the valves are accessed, although carb balancing is reasonably easy. I've left the sixteen valves for 20,000 miles without any hassles!
I wasn't so happy with the gearbox and final drive. Transmission slop, especially at low revs, seems endemic to watercooled Kawasakis. A poor design of cush-drive does not help matters. I've replaced the rubbers twice! Once slop got into the transmission the gearchange became quite malign even under hard acceleration.
With 40,000 miles on the clock it started leaping out of second and third gears, making fast acceleration difficult. Secondhand selectors solved that. Chains lasted for a minimum of 5000 miles, twice that if it was expensive and I could take the venomous gearbox for the final few thousand miles. At the current mileage the gearchange is bad enough to annoy friends who borrow the bike for the first time, but I'm pretty used to it.
The brakes were always good. Powerful twin discs up front and a rear disc that was quite sensitive. The best thing about them was that they could take winter weather without seizing up the calipers. A gentle hand on the throttle was needed to stop wild slides, though. The brakes were as surprising as the rear linkages that similarly required no attention! The rear shock was so stiff to begin with that age and mileage only had a minimal affect on tautness. It's possible to fit a Ohlins shock and different linkage set-up but that is an expense I couldn't justify.
As race replicas go, the ZXR wasn't that expensive to run. A reasonable right wrist could turn in 50mpg, as much as 55mpg, but it was also possible to go down to a stroker-like 30mpg if all the acceleration was used. Tyres and chains are no worse than some 250s. Servicing is expensive if you go to a dealer but valves can be ignored for most of the time.
Insurance is the real downer if you're under 65 (few OAP's will be able to take the riding position). Build quality is variable - brilliant engine and brakes, crap plastic and dubious electrics (my fuse holder corroded through). Overall, though, it's fast and fun, still looks flash now I've resprayed it and has even retained its value.
K.M.