The Zxr400 Revival

Well after 3 years of being laid up and only being started for an MOT early this year i went to start the ZXR400 only to be greeted with nothing but a starter motor turning over the engine but not firing.
Oh dear i knew i was pushing my luck after 2 years with the fuel in it and that it may suffer some gumming of the jets but after starting on the button for her mot i thought i was in the clear...WWWRROOOONNGGG!!!!
So following a full strip down of the carbs, sure enough every orifice was blocked so i got busy with carb cleaner and wire and a high pressure air gun, once i was dubiously happy with the state of all the jets i began reassembly, checked the fuel pump was working...yup pulses of fuel all over the place lol, checked the fuel filter and yup that's free flowing ( may change it as a matter of course later) ...tank back on and hit the buttton ....nothing for a bit ..that was expected while the bowls filled ...then pfffuht ....phut phut ...full choke phutphutphut...a little throttle and she goes back to just turning over ....hmmm try again with full choke but wind the tick over up a few turns and phutphutphut ..duggaduggadugga...ok i have a v twin ...ang on its a straight 4 cylinder ...hmmm, ok leave it ticking over like that for a bit and add quite an overdose of injector cleaner to the tank ....rather noxious fumes building up.....temps rising ..thats good.....ease the choke off ...still got that v twin sound but she is holding at about 1.5k revs i try a touch of throttle and the revs rise...then fall and she cuts out ...bollox ..still fuel starvation....hit the starter and she fires and ticks over some more at 1.5k ....come on girl ( yes im begging a bike to run) i trickle in a bit more choke and the revs rise to 5k then drop so i back the choke off again....15 or 20 times of repeating this and i can actually leave the choke off and do the same with the throttle ....on a bit a ;et the revs rise and fall then back it off again ....5 minutes of this and suddenly theres a bit of a pop and i have an inline 4 again albeit a little slow to respond to sudden throttle movement ...i run her till the fan cuts in just gently easing the revs in and out until i can wind her up to 12k ....its not smooth yet but im hoping that with some new fuel and some additive and a good run she will be ready to howl once again.
well after sitting for a night i gave her another kick in the guts and ....she didn't wanna fire .....hmmm ok off to halfrauds....and a tin of stp carb cleaner ...a small can which you spray in via the air intakes a bit at a time ....set tick over to 2k and squirt...squirt ..the revs rise then fall to almost stall then settle again...keep doing this till the can is empty as per the instructions then leave ticking over for 1 minute , turn bike off re insert air filter and leave to cool. restarted once cooled and ....starts first time. the real test will be after leaving her for 24hrs.
Meanwhile i decided the old girl could do with sprucing up a little, now bear in mind this is a fairly old bike thats been dropped a few times im guessing and no paint job is ever going to make the fairing look new but a lick of paint wouldnt go amiss and so on a very very tight budget the fairings are in the process of being stripped back to bare and having got the best match i could made up they will soon receive a nice new coat of paint. gonna have a trawl of the net for new decals.
well following a bit of prep work on the plastics that required refreshing and some experimental paintwork on the wheels a week later i decided to give her another shot at starting...ahhh bollox ...still wont start cleanly and takes about half an hour faffing about to get her running anywhere near right so i reckon another strip down and a soak in something strong to clean all the fueling parts
After spending the best part of a Saturday stripping and rebuilding the carbs for the zxr 400 not once not twice but 4 frikin times before i solved an the overflow problem (turned out to be a split rubber seal around one of the float filter housings) she finally started and ran ...great. then it starts leaking around the fuel tap and i was not in the mood to look any further so walked away frustrated ( obviously turning the fuel off before hand ) Sunday and i go out , turn the fuel on and ...nothing ...zilch ..wont start again...FFS ..working on the moral of one should not work on a bike when in a foul mood i again walked away....and as much as i hate being beaten i was elated to find on ebay that night a full set of carbs removed from a breaker bike for £20. Defeatist i can hear y'all crying....noooo ...i shall wait til they arrive ..check em over and clean as required at my leisure then fit them to the bike ...the ones i take off shall be stripped to within an inch of their lives cleaned AGAIN ( WITH BITS LEFT TO SOAK THIS TIME) re assembled and all settings set to factory spec before i put them on ebay as untested . Fingers crossed i haven't just bought someone else's problems. Regarding the fuel tap leak ...im sure its a bad fuel line and may well just replace it along with the inline fuel filter the current one has been checked and does allow fuel past ( forgetting to connect the feed line to the carbs proved that ( fuel all over the place lol) but for the cost may as well do it for the piece of mind
so second hand carbs bought on e bay for £20 ...been sweating about em since the day i clicked "buy" ...so they turn up and ....oh shit they look different....so take off the airbox that came with em ...and strip out the ones from the bike ...oh yeah they look really different ....hang on ...there's something extra bolted to my original carbs ...does it come off ...ok it does ..will it fit the new carbs....OH YEAH THAT SHIT FITS....oooo ooo oooo now im excited cos they look like the originals now ...so fit em on then start the investigation into the leaky fuel tap...strip it out and dismantle ..hmm compression washer looks a little flat..a tweak here and a twist there and hey presto leaky tap fixed. so fit the tank back onto the bike hook all the pipes up and ...kick her in the guts.....hmmm not firing ...turning but not firing ...battery dies....fuck.

 

OK so battery charged and we have another go ( when i say we i mean ME...) and .....WAAAAHOOOOOO she fires up instantly on choke ...ok let her run ....fingers crossed i wind back the choke and......HOLY SHIT SHE TICKS OVER....albeit a little fast..so adjust the tickover and all seems good ....why can i smell petrol?...torch out ....shit fuel lines leaking now FFS ...turn her off and strip back again...poxy old fuel lines...cut back split and re assemble ..start her up and first time on the button she springs to life ....a blip on the throttle reveals she is a bit sluggish to return to tick-over with the revs dropping slowly and resting at 2k ..adjust tick-over again down to 1.6k another blip and slowly she drops to 2k FFS....start searching round praying ill find something thats going to avoid an immediate re-tune of the carbs ( wrong time of year to be paying out) ...wonder if that old cable tied pipe ( probably from some kind of pairs system that's been removed) is letting in air....whoops ..that old cable tied pipe literally fell off rofl, so find an appropriate bolt and screw that into the hole. start her up again on the button first time and she revs high...hmmm give her a few blips and whaddya know she settles to tick over at 1.6k ....BOOM!.....I AM THE DOGS DANGLIES, THE ELEPHANTS ELBOWS, A FRIKIN LEGEND IN MY OWN UNDERPANTS. FUCKIN WELL DONE ME!!!!
So then following on from the fueling saga and having sorted that all out i turned my attentions to the fairings which looked more than a tad tired, took to them with an orbital sander and took em right back to base ....then after finding the colour is like hens teeth i took a section into halfrauds for them to match as best they could and to be fair they didnt do bad. so back home and i give the fairings 2 coats of primer and then allow to dry ....1200 wet and dry that back to flat ( or as flat as you can get fairing that old lol) and start to spray the first coat of colour ...WTF....worst ever spray pattern ive ever seen, thick at top light mist in the middle and a thick line at the bottom , damn this is gonna be hard work...eventually get what looks like an even finish so leave them to dry.
2 days later i go out to check them and ....WTF...they have white streaks all over....a bit of research reveals this is not the best time of year to be spraying in a garage as the paint mist actually collects moisture between leaving the can and hitting the subject ....BOLLOX.
So once again i flatten it all off and prep it for re paint ...more paint from Halfrauds and this time i get spare nozzles. back home and out comes a tarpaulin and the upstairs office becomes my new spray booth ( everything covered with the tarp) i allow the parts to warm to room temp as well as the cans and i begin spraying , hmmm ok the pattern is improved but not what id call a good one but i manage to work with it and i can see a marked improvement with the way the paint is laying on. Once all done, i leave them to dry and await the wrath of SWMBO when she gets home to the stench of paint.
A few days later i bring them back in from the garage and check them over and im pretty happy they seem to have a shine now so back to the spray booth for the first layer of clear coat ...BING ....thats the trick now they gleam a bit .
After trawling the net i managed to find some vinyl stickers for the fairings and after spending what seemed an age applying them to one side i realised the other side was different and the lettering was going to clash with a cut out for the engine housing, shit shit and double shit...oh well with a bit of clever cutting ill sort it.

 

Attention was turned to the experimental paint job on the wheels which were a BIG eye sore as they were chipped and flaking all over the place and i cant afford powder coating at this time. my idea .....hammerite smooth...applied in fine layers ....did it work i hear you ask ...well for a 20 odd year old bike getting a budget make over ...they look a thousand times better than they did, certainly not acceptable for a bike worth thousands but for this little baby ...im pleased.
Now the brake calipers....man they look tired and the budget certainly wont stretch to a full strip down and the cost of replacing all the seals so cleaned and scrubbed with brake cleaner, de greaser and a stiff brush they get masked off where needed and sprayed with high temp caliper paint, left to dry and hmmm a marked improvement...sorted.
OK so i have silver caliper paint left and im in the mood whats else can i use it on to improve this lady's looks....exhaust hanger.....its steel painted black....oh no its not a rub down and a lick of silver paint and then clear coat and it now looks like a billet exhaust hanger ...cool whats next ....hmmm red tank ,black scabby filler cap with an aluminum surround, off comes the filler cap and a quick rub down, lick of paint then clear coat and it matches the surround....result.
next target will be tidying up the chipped and scratched frame.
now guys i know a few are going to be reading the above and thinking ewwww nasty but its finding a financial balance between what the bikes ever going to be worth and keeping her looking respectable for her age. add to that 2 weeks before Xmas and the wife's little corsa got broken into with a view to stealing it but resulting in a snapped steering column which required replacement and obviously money to do and the breakdown of the bmw x5 on the Monday night we had the storms with a spliut top rad hose needing replacing along with coolant and travel to obtain said hose coming in at near on £120 things have become tighter on the budget for the revival but once done she will look much better than the chipped, scratched and flaky looking bike she was.

 

Crikey. Good effort - I really enjoyed reading that. Probably not what you wanted to hear, as it was clearly a frustrating (series of) mountain(s) to climb. Folks who haven't wrestled with a recalcitrant piece of machinery won't understand what you just related, but I understand and empathise - believe me! Looking forward to seeing the beast.

 

Good work Pete. Want to come round and do mine?

 

Great write up pete, really puts me to shame as I haven't even cleaned mine!
Keep up the report and pictures would be great

 

not taken many pics yet but heres 2 i did take after doing the front calipers front wheel and the fuel cap

 

Those bits look good

 

oh well the plastics are about as good as im gonna get them

 

Also in addition I have given various frame parts a blow over with gloss black which alone have lifted the bikes appearance along with springs coiled around the brake lines, next step will be to tidy up the left side engine case ready for that cut transfer. Then some re assembly before some fluid changes.

 

Shouldn't you put some protective covers on so the furniture doesn't mark the body work.

 

Well the budget has reached its limit and i promised myself i wouldn't spend more, so after tittyfying a few other bits ( torque bar,side luggage rails,chipped swing arm ends) and giving her some fresh oil and oil filter ( i know the air filter is clean after all the carb work) im am now in the process of slowly re,assembling her, i would have liked to have splashed out on new fairing screws but it looks like itll have to do with what i have ( may remove them a few at a time and spruce them up with a quick blow over on the heads ) without shelling out thousands on custom paintwork, powder coating etc she will always be a 16 yr old bike but for a 16yr old bike she still gets a shift on and makes a superb first sports bike and is ideal for someone wanting to do their first track days without putting their pride and joy multi thousand pound machine at risk. now to decide if i keep her or sell her on for another to benefit from. decisions decisions.

 

No she won't! Next year she'll be 17

Good work Pete. Will we see her in the flesh again?

 

i am hoping to get out on her whatever i decide to do with her.

 

well her tyres hit the ground today and depending on a few factors she may be out for the lens tomorrow, what factors i hear you ask, well one is the weather, another is if the garage floor is dry as i decided to paint it this afternoon.
Ok...... i hear you asking how i managed to paint a garage floor that has 2 bikes stored in it .......its maaaaaggggiiiicccc!!!! ooooooohhhhhh!!!! Aaaaaaaaahhhhhh!
obviously is the other factor of she needs a bath and some make up having sat around motionless for a few weeks.
fingers crossed x