Using the Kawasaki Parts Diagram function
Riders of the older Kawasaki motorcycles often wish they had a diagram of the assembly they need to work with. Some of the manuals available have poor pictures, or don’t provide enough data to allow a rider to fix his own bike. This is more important to an owner of a vintage machine as many dealers have stopped working on motorcycles older than 10 years old.
The Kawasaki website
Welcome to Kawasaki.com does provide diagrams for the motorcycles they manufactured, and also lists all the parts by name, part number, and quantity used. In many cases they are very good, clear diagrams. As they say, “A picture is worth a thousand words.”
Here is how to access those diagrams
1. Find the words “Owners Info” on the Kawasaki main page, mouse over them and click the link.
2. Find the words “Parts Diagrams” and mouse over it and click the link.
3. On this page select “Motorcycle” in the dropdown box and click “Continue”
4. On this page you can select all the items you know of to identify your bike. If you know the bike model only then choose that. As you choose and click data you will narrow the choices down, eventually arriving at the model you are looking for.
5. When you select your model a new window will open and it has an index of the parts. Choose the area you need and click it. Now a new window opens with frames: the diagram, a parts index for that diagram; and a master index. These all interact with each other; if you click a part number in one area it highlights the part in the other area. If you want a new diagram go to the master index and click what you need.
6. On some parts you will notice a black arrow pointing left, right, or both. By clicking the left arrow it will show you the part with an older part number; and the right arrow shows you what your part has been upgraded to.
7. There is the ability to add the part to a “Pick List” and print it out. It comes in handy having all the parts on a page for reference in ordering dealer parts or for Ebay searches.
8. The diagrams are easily printed out to your printer. I have found the parts index below the diagram will need to be left-clicked and held with your mouse to highlight everything and then Copied (or right-clicked and “Select All”); then save it to Notepad, WordPad, Word, or other text editor. You can then modify the text to look nice and readable. Once it looks nice save it to your hard drive in a new Folder just for this model bike.
How to make a Kawasaki Parts Diagram Manual
I wanted to be able to save the parts diagrams to my hard drive, but the Kawasaki website does not provide that ability. It does let you “Print” and that was the key. I found a free downloadable program called “Cute PDF”
CutePDF - Create PDF for free, Free PDF Utilities, Save PDF Forms, Edit PDF easily. Cute PDF creates a new printer that just makes .pdf documents, and all you need to do is send any type of document to this printer and it happens automatically.
After you download and run the program a new printer will show up in your main “Printers” folder. This printer is just an outlet for the program to create the .pdf document. Now you can print the parts diagram to this printer and file them with the text file you created above in the new Folder just for your bike. All the Kawasaki’s I own have a folder with a .pdf diagram and text file of the parts for each sub-assembly. I back it up to a CD, and then print out the diagrams and text list. With these I’m able to make a manual in a loose leaf 3 ring binder, or something fancier in a spiral bound fashion. When pages get dirty just print them out again. I'm sure there are other programs that can arrange the pages into any order you want. You could even take the CD to Kinko's and have them make your manual too.
By the way, this is just for your own personal use; I'm sure it’s illegal to make manuals from this and sell them on EBay, it’s all copyrighted and owned by Kawasaki.