The Bike that Time Forgot...

Hey there! We hope you are having a wonderful springtime! To our Northern friends - hopefully it won't be much longer before you are back on your bikes and enjoying the beautiful landscape that us "flatlanders" don't get to see as much!

We know it's been a tough winter...and we feel your pain!

Well, sort of...Well, not really actually! 
Wipe your tears (and the winter riding blues) and let Yankee Dave tell you a story of a fellow rider who's winter lasted wayyyy to long!

This is Dan - and his sweet ride:
​A Kawasaki Ninja ZX600

Nice looking ride isn't it? Well, it wasn't too long ago that this beauty was hiding under a tarp, not running and a completely different color! 
Dan originally called me looking for a quote to rebuild the carburetor and possibly re-assemble the bike for him. 

I scheduled a time to come look at it, plugged his address into my GPS and headed out right away. I pulled up next to a pretty good looking Ninja that was parked next to what seemed to be another bike, covered with a brown tarp...I'm thinking to myself, he said he had a ZX600 and the bike I'm looking at here is a 250.
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So I begin to peek under the tarp and as I'm snooping (yep - ZX600 in there!) Dan comes out and we pull the tarp all the way off - it was the great unveiling! I'm not gonna lie here - the bike was in dire need of more than just a carb rebuild and as Dan is telling me his story....from 3 years ago to now. His not willing to give up on it and his determination to get her back on the road...After hauling it 1500 miles, from yankee-ville (just made that up...it means new England!) to his new home in FL, I decided to help him bring his dream to fruition and made arrangements to come back with a trailer and get started!

(Below are some before pictures from Dan - to help you get a better understanding of my starting point)

As I said before, this bike needed wayyy more than just a carb rebuild. So I got the bike to the shop and put her up on the lift to get a closer look...21 point inspection time!

What I discovered was:

• The bike had been put together (by someone other than Dan btw), with a mish mash of odd parts - coming from various different models.
• The Carbs did in fact require rebuilding of....
• Many critical parts were also missing.
• There were some wiring problems (no directionals/tail light)
• The brake fluid looked more like mud than brake fluid. 
• It needed a new chain and sprockets.

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But the bare bones were there and

I was excited to get started!

It took some time to completely get through the bike and we did quite a bit of "on the fly" repairs, dealing with each challenge as it presented itself.

Vrooom...Vrooom...Vrooom!

Finally came the day where I was able to get the bike running! I knew that Dan hadn't heard the bike run (nicely) since he purchased it and even though I was still waiting on some integral parts - I thought it would be apropriate to give him a small teaser for what was to come really soon! 

Here is the video footage of the test start up!

I have to say...Dan has a smile on his face for the rest of the day

It wasn't too long after that, when his bike was fully put together and on the road!

Happy riding Dan! It sure was an adventure...