My mates told me I was a mad moron to buy a three year old GPz305 at top price. They had a bit of a rep for falling apart once past 25000 miles, something my still shiny machine was a mere 400 miles off achieving. But the brief test ride had revealed a light machine that shot up to 90mph as I played silly buggers on the six speed gearbox and the throttle. The engine was a lot quieter and smoother than the rattly AR125 I'd just flogged off, so I couldn't resist the deal.
The first week of commuting, evening scratching and weekend hooliganism was all it took to break through the 25000 mile barrier. I was enjoying myself so much I could hardly bear to get off the machine at the end of a day's riding. The joys of a new motorcycle and all that. My only complaints during that first week were that the riding position was too cramped to be comfortable for more than 75 miles in a sitting and that the headlamp led to severe eye strain on unlit country lanes at night.
It wasn't until it rained that I became really uncomfortable. The tyres, Avons with about 2mm of tread, liked to wander all over the wet tarmac and the front brake became all grabby, which sent the tyre into some wild slides. Only the light mass allowed me to survive. The suspension was stiffened up from stock, giving a nice taut feel with lots of feedback from the road, which also helped with the ease of control. Mass is only 330lbs, the GPz feeling even lighter on the road.
I splashed out on a set of Metz's and attacked the calipers with blowtorch and large hammer. The resulting pile of alloy scrap was useful for throwing at next door's dog but not much else. A new set of calipers off a one year old crashed GPz went straight on, had lots of meat on the pads. When everything was reassembled the road holding felt way better but the brake was as mushy as a school dinner.
The rubber hose was dribbling like a drunk seventy year old, the rubber must've gone hard and cracked up when I left the calipers hanging off it. Goodridge hose cost a bundle but I assured myself that it had maximum pose value. That got the brakes working but they were still a bit nasty in the wet, dead easy to lock up the front wheel with hardly any effort.
In the dry I used to impress the city centre louts no end, howling the tyre to a dead stop with the back wheel a few feet in the air, which belied the rather sedate lines and boring paint job. With only 35 horses on hand, doing wild wheelies required 10000 revs, dropping the clutch dead and jerking viciously onthe bars. The clutch made such disgusting noises that I soon stopped this practice.
The reluctance towards doing wheelies was probably down to the neutral weight distribution, which made riding the Kawasaki as natural as leaping up and down on the girlfriend. She was, by the way, quite impressed with the pillion accommodation, but then her earlier experiences had been on the minimally padded AR whose tingles did absolutely nothing for her. My perch was a couple of inches lower but she was a lot smaller that me, so wasn't affected by wind buffeting.
I thought that the belt drive was rather neat, making the OHC vertical twin seem smoother than it really was and undoubtedly helping the gearchange action, which was still precise. I was less impressed when the damn thing broke at 26200 miles. At least the belt material refrained from wrecking the alloy engine. After a muscle building push I found out, whilst poking around at the back end, that the swinging arm and Uni-trak bushes had developed a bit of slop.
Big hammer time. My mates found the expense of the renovation hilarious, over a 150 smackers. As well as a new belt and bushes, the spindles were well pitted, due to an absence of grease that would get a health freak high. The swinging arm needed some cleaning and painting whilst the drum's lining's looked on their way out. I made a note never to use the back brake other than in dire emergencies.
The thing was, after a week off the road I was suffering terrible withdrawal symptoms. The only way I could get my highway kicks was to go pillion on the back of so-called friends’ bikes, an experience I hated almost as much as I loved motorcycling. It was an education in humility, as it made me realise I wasn't really the mad nutter I thought I was - or perhaps they rode like that only with a pillion on board. The only way I survived was by using the dubious logic that they surely didn't really want to kill themselves.
I was really full of myself once the 305 was back on the road. Roared along 200 miles of near deserted country lanes, taking the little beast to 11000rpm, where the engine seemed to stutter and threaten to go dead, but I booted up a gear before it had a chance to develop into anything terminal. There aren't any balancers in the engine, but with the pistons going up and down alternatively I found it acceptably smooth at 40 to 90mph in top gear.
Top speed seemed to be dead on the ton, there's very little that can be done to make it go any faster, not that the wimpy handlebar fairing encourages more than 80mph cruising, something the engine will do for hours on end. Fuel proved surprisingly good, better than the old AR, with about 70mpg possible under quite reasonable speeding. Lurid throttle work would get it down to about 60mpg, but that still gave a range of around 200 miles, which was really more than I'd want to do in one sitting. My mates wouldn't believe I could have so much fun for So little cost!
Anyone who's owned a GPz305 for a while will probably be smirking to himself at this point, full of stories of engine. blow-ups. My mates were absolutely convinced that it wouldn't last past 30000 miles, especially as I was riding it hard to keep up with their much bigger middleweights. I figured that they were just pissed that such an old fashioned motorcycle was able to keep up with them, thanks to too many speed cops and the nimbleness of the chassis on any road with a few curves.
I was heeling the GPz over so far I was taking chunks out of the silencers, the stands having already being cut away. Rust had broken out where the protective black paint was scraped off, quickly spreading the whole length of the silencers. On one corner the scraping sounds gave way to grating, explosive exhaust noise then drowning out everything. I'd knocked off a whole silencer. There wasn't enough metal left to try to hammer the silencer back on, so the ride home was ear and window shattering. As well as that I had to contend with screaming kids throwing bricks (I blame TV) and snarling dogs trying to take chunks out of my ankles (I blame their owners).
The other side was about to fall off as well, so I was quite happy to hand the breaker twenty notes for a used 2-1 (Motad, I think). This seemed to add a bit of mid-range and allowed all of 105mph on the clock without blowing my eardrums. The only problem I had was with the mounting screws stripping in the engine when I tried to get the old exhaust off. The Helicoil horrors followed.
That was at 31300 miles. did a service every 1000 miles, including an oil and filter change. The oil came out black and murky but without any metal fillings. The engine was still quite rattle free at that mileage. My mates sullenly reckoned that it must've been rebuilt just before I'd bought it. The engine failed at 33500 miles, when the ignition module went dead. I'd assumed it was just the spark plugs, but no hope of such an easy solution. Thirty notes to a breaker 300 miles away secured a working unit and the advice to add enough rubber to keep Malaysian peasants in happy employment.
Then at 35000 miles the belt drive snapped again. The Kawasaki dealer reckoned that 20000 miles was about right but accused me of misaligning the back wheel when I went back to complain. If I wanted to pay fifty quid extra for his well trained mechanics to fit the next one and bring the bike in for regular check-ups he might consider guaranteeing it for a reasonable mileage. I told him where to get off, bought a replacement from a breaker for £15. Anyone who's ever tried to buy a straight piece of wood will know what a waste of time that is, so I went by the markings on the adjusters.
I was becoming pretty pissed by then as the engine was beginning to make the handlebars vibrate. My mate in the building trade came around and emptied a tube of silicone sealant inside the bars, which helped damp down the vibes above 7000 revs. Sounds weird, but the rubber-like material changed the frequency at which the bars vibrated in sympathy with the engine.
The clever thing to do would have been to sell it then whilst it was still running well, but even if I got a reasonable price I wouldn't have been able to buy anything better. It took until we ran through the 40000 mile barrier for the rattles to become so loud and the power so poor that I had to pull the motor out. As well as shot camchain, valves, rings and bores, the big-ends were loose enough to slip a nail through. So that was the end of that 1990 engine but the beginning of a new life for the chassis as I'd put in a 2000 mile old 1994 unit.
Didn't tell my mates, told them I'd just put in a new tensioner. I'd bet their jaws will sag when I put 60000 miles on the clock. They can't believe how well she goes now.
So that's life with Kawasaki's GPz305. They're great fun to ride without destroying consumables at a rapid rate. Just capable of touring on the motorway, they are also something of a giant killer on the back roads. A really nice one will cost less than £1500 but something that still runs can be had for less than £500.
Brian Griffiths