It was 4 cylinder 4 stroke and did have kick and electric start.
It was the mini version of the classic Z900
I used to own this Kawasaki 650 two cylinder. I can't remember exactly what year it was, maybe a '76? I saw it for sale in a small local news paper. Didn't give it much thought at first because I thought it was some junk bike. But I went to take a look at it anyway. It was at one of the small shore communities near Atlantic City. The guy was asking $350. for it. That's why I thought it must have been trash since if it was any good, at that time, he would wouldn't consider anything less that a thousand. When I went to the house, to see it, the owner explained to me as we were walking to the garage to see it, that he had removed the ends of the exhaust pipes to buy better ones and had never replaced them and couldn't find the original ones he had taken off. It also needed a battery. I was thinking:"O God, a basket case, its all in pieces. That's why he's asking so little." When he opened the garage door and turned the light on, I thought he must have been joking. The bike was missing the ends of the exhaust pipes as he said, but the rest of the bike looked brand new. In almost perfect condition. It just sparkled in the light. I looked at the odometer and it showed 2100 miles!!!! I asked him why he hadn't ridden it much and he told me that he had wanted louder pipes soon after he bought it, took off the old ones, misplaced them and never got the new ones. I don't think he had ridden a bike that big before and he gave me the impression he was actually afraid of it. He had quickly lost interest and let it sit for a few years. As you might remember, bikes of that era hadn't quite made the complete transition to electric start only, and still had a kick start. I had twenty dollars on me and gave it to him right away and told him I was going around the corner to the bank machine to get the rest of the money. I did this as fast as I possibly could because I knew anyone else coming to see the bike would give him a thousand in a heartbeat. I can't remember exactly what year this was, maybe 81 or '82 but it was November. I got the bike home, which was at that time a ground floor apartment in Brigantine. The bike was so clean, I just put a few pieces of newspaper on the living room carpet and wheeled the bike into the corner of my living room. All winter long, I kept looking at it, hardly able to believe what perfect condition it was in. Before the spring, I got new pipes and a new battery. On the first good spring day, I wheeled it outside and started it up. In the back of my mind, I kept thinking that something just had to be wrong with this bike, I can't be this lucky to pay so little for a bike in such new condition. But no, everything was just perfect. The electric start worked well, and so did the kick start. Driving it down the street, I felt as if I had just pulled out of the motorcycle showroom.
There were two things I needed to get used to. Being only 2 cylinders, there was a lot of compression. The first time the kick start
'kicked back" it almost flipped me over the bike. But the second thing was far more dangerous. All the bikes I had up to that point locked up the front forks when you turned the key in the ignition to the "lock" position. This bike had a different lock on the lower part of the front fork. The first day I had taken it to work, when I got out of work, I just stuck the key into the ignition, turned it to "on" and started it up and began to drive away. One second later I was on the ground as it was impossible to straighten up the front wheel, it being still locked. I did this again about a week later at the post office in Atlantic City. I was parked on the street on the left side, it was a one way street. As I got to the bike, I noticed that the traffic light at the end of the street was turning green. The lights in AC are the longest lights I've ever seen. So I jumped on the bike, started it up and roared away. The wheel in the locked position was facing in the right position to pull out of the parking spot but when I went to straighten out, of course, I couldn't. Then, over the handlebars into the street again!!! OTHER THAN THAT, I loved the bike and drove it for several years. Frankie
