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Hello there and I have a couple questions you may be able to answer for me. I have a 77 KZ750 Twin and want to add some more lights. I enjoy riding at night and the regular headlight was a little less than sufficient. I upgraded it last season and helped greatly. I am still looking for a little more light. The so called pot holes around here will eat a motorcycle if you are not careful. I was thinking of adding a set of fog or driving lights. Will the stock electrical system and charging system handle the extra draw. I am running the stock points and charging system. I figured you guys would know and I am sure some are doing it. Please let me know what you think or if you know what will work. Thank You

My 77 650 4 cylinder (which had a separate rectifier, regulator and generator) had an extremely weak beam from the headlight. I think that it ended up being the rectifier since the rectifier caught fire shortly after I added a stronger headlight. Perhaps the age and or extra power draw was too much for it.

I built a rectifier for less than 30 bucks from parts from radio shack. I would be happy to get you the plans for it. And I bought a new regulator from a guy in Oregon. This helped my system keep a much more consistent level of power. The old regulator would have such extreme voltage swings. The new one keeps the voltage consistently around 14.5 volts, with no swings. I just recently took the volt-meter off of my bike for confidence in its soundness. I could get you that info too. (about 60 bucks) Now I have power to spare.

I might add that I have also upgraded the ignition to the Dyna-S. I am not sure if that has much to do with the equation concerning lamp power, but there it is.

P.M. me if you would like to get any of the info I mentioned so you can research it a little more.

Qdude wrote:

I might add that I have also upgraded the ignition to the Dyna-S. I am not sure if that has much to do with the equation concerning lamp power, but there it is.

You're right. The Dyna S uses just under twice as much average power than the stock points for a KZ650.

The rectifier upgrade you mentioned might be this:
www.geocities.com/loudgpz/GPZdiy3phaseRectifier.html

mikemac01 wrote:

Hello there and I have a couple questions you may be able to answer for me. I have a 77 KZ750 Twin and want to add some more lights. I enjoy riding at night and the regular headlight was a little less than sufficient. I upgraded it last season and helped greatly. I am still looking for a little more light.

I have the '79 KZ750 twin. When I was night riding a lot, I did the following:

1) Install a 7" round halogen sealed headlightr unit in place of the stock headlight. It has the usual 35W/55W power but is much brighter.

2) I also added a second light I mounted on top of the front fender which was a 55W halogen driving light.

I used to drive with both hi-beams on and never cooked anything, so I guess the alternator could handle it. The second 55W light had it's own 8A fuse and power feed.

Yes, that was the rectifier!!