New Member - rescued my F9 Bighorn
#1
05-24-2010, 08:18 AM
New Member - rescued my F9 Bighorn
Hi, I'm new to the forum and thought I'd share a bit about my bike.
When I was 15 years old I got a 73 F9 Bighorn 350. Paid $400 for it and a 3 bike trailer. It was in great shape, just needed a little carb tuning. For the next 5 or 6 years I rode every now and then, mostly off road or on remote back roads - (never registered or tagged). One day I parked it, got into tuning a car I had, and I'm ashamed to say, forgot about it.
So here I am 30 yrs old now, with my Lime Green beast sitting in my shop after nearly 10 years of being buried under a pile of junk in my dad's barn.
After draining what little gas was left in the tank and putting in some fresh premix (oil injection system is disconnected), I pulled the NGK and cleaned it and gave her a couple of squirts of starting fluid. A few kicks later she fired right up and idled great. 2 minutes later the wife is watching me zigzag across the front lawn with a huge grin on my face. I even got out on the road to "air her out" - I'd forgotten how hard that thing pulls! What a blast!
So other than a small issue with the clutch (I posted it in the tech forum -->
https://www.kawasakiforums.com/forum...ad.php?t=32604)
and a lot of cosmetic work, I'm back in the saddle again....
I'll post some pics later. Have plans to turn her into a full fledged street bike. I know some of you would say restore to original (especially with only 3500 original miles), but I'd rather do something semi-Heiwa syle with it...
When I was 15 years old I got a 73 F9 Bighorn 350. Paid $400 for it and a 3 bike trailer. It was in great shape, just needed a little carb tuning. For the next 5 or 6 years I rode every now and then, mostly off road or on remote back roads - (never registered or tagged). One day I parked it, got into tuning a car I had, and I'm ashamed to say, forgot about it.
So here I am 30 yrs old now, with my Lime Green beast sitting in my shop after nearly 10 years of being buried under a pile of junk in my dad's barn.
After draining what little gas was left in the tank and putting in some fresh premix (oil injection system is disconnected), I pulled the NGK and cleaned it and gave her a couple of squirts of starting fluid. A few kicks later she fired right up and idled great. 2 minutes later the wife is watching me zigzag across the front lawn with a huge grin on my face. I even got out on the road to "air her out" - I'd forgotten how hard that thing pulls! What a blast!
So other than a small issue with the clutch (I posted it in the tech forum -->
https://www.kawasakiforums.com/forum...ad.php?t=32604)
and a lot of cosmetic work, I'm back in the saddle again....
I'll post some pics later. Have plans to turn her into a full fledged street bike. I know some of you would say restore to original (especially with only 3500 original miles), but I'd rather do something semi-Heiwa syle with it...
Last edited by JackieTreehorn; 05-24-2010 at 08:22 AM.
#5
05-24-2010, 10:51 PM
Will do, but she's embarassingly dirty right now, bent rear fender, a tad bit of surface rust...but identical to the one in the pic above minus the rack and signals. Def not as shiny tho.
So, is it a sin to mod this bike since it does have only 3500 miles? I know I could probably get a good bit for it restored to original, but I don't have any plans to sell it ever. Kind of torn here...
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