TOPIC:

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Without the actual, born to the bike speedo I would not, could not believe the seller's claimed mileage.

Sounds like your valves are over due for an adjustment if it is dying and won't restart until cold. Iand I agree about checking the forks, personally I hate the look of those boots/gaitors.

I agree but with no way to get in touch with the previous owner kinda of hard pressed for getting the mileage info.

Would checking the valve clearances be a good place to start some maintenance?

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It would be, I believe you have to pull the carbs to do it. BUT, there are precautions to even removing the valve cover on the 550s. Member loudvhx had a link to kz550 info on his site. Would start there

Ok, it seems like a bit of a intimidating job especially since I don't want to cause any of the valves to bend. On a side note I took a look under the fork gators, no pitting or rust from what I could see...but they were a bit oily bad fork seals?

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I didn't know how rare the airboxes were. Are there specific ones that interchangeable between models. For example there is a Kz550 M airbox listed on eBay...Maybe I should take a second look at the parts diagram??

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Glad the forks are good, not rusty or pitted. The oil may be a sign of leaky fork seals but could also just be the PO oiled them up before installing the gators. Either way, you'll find out if the front end dives excessively when you brake. Maybe good for now to leave the gators on to keep road dirt & grit off until you learn more of the cause for them being oily. I'm not a fan of gaitors either but they do serve a purpose (on dirt bikes at least).
The valve lash adjustment isn't difficult (i did it my 1st time this past spring on my 550).
You don't need to remove the carbs but you do remove gas tank and coils for room to lift the valve cover up/forward & off.
The tools for basic inspection of valve gaps is just a feeler gauge set & 1/4" drive ratchet wrench with 10mm socket. Using a small 1/4" drive will help in preventing you from over tightening the cover bolts later. No more than hand tight on a small wrench.
The issue for the 550 (as you can read in loudhvx's articles) is the cam chain tensioner. The 550 uses an integrated cam chain guide (i think it's nylon) which is bolted into the valve cover. Thus it tensions the cam chain as you re-install the cover and so if you do not back-off the auto-tensioner below the carbs, it will tighten up on chain when cover comes off and thus, reinstall of cover can over-tension the chain & stretch it beyond use.
Bottom line, if i can do it then you can.
To simply check is easy but then if you discover your valve gaps are too tight, you'll want to have replacement shims of thinner guage. Also you'll want to have a new valve cover gasket in case the existing gasket tears or is worn out.
If you do discover the valves need adjusting, then you either have to figure out which shims to buy OR buy a shim kit that comes with a selection and use them.
The 550 uses the 13mm shims which were not readily available at my local motorsports shop, hence why i bought the shim set/kit in advance from an eBay seller.
The shims are located under lifters below the cam lobes. These lifters have to be removed from head to change the small shims. To easily remove the lifters, i used a cheap magnet tool i got from HFTools.
Some of my experiences on this are documented in my 550 sig below.

Thanks for the input and the advice. I'm in the stages of getting the work area together.More than likely will be doing this project over a couple of weeks. Will also print out a few different reference documents I see in the KZ database. I've been also looking at the service manual and noticed the process is scattered through different chapters of the book. While i was preparing, I was reading that some of the torque settings in the manual is incorrect is that right?
I will be using some auto shop towels to stuff around the cam lobes areas, don't want anything to fall down the engine case.
I noticed the shim kit on ebay is about 200 dollars, a bit expensive.. I"d rather have them on hand so I can close it back up . I started reading a few of your topics, pretty solid work with the case polishing on the kz550. Hopefully I can do the same sometime down the line.

I recently restored a 1980 KZ550A that had 14,000 km and had sat under a tarp since 1988. I ended up replacing all the shims although 4 were only marginal the other 4 exceeded the specified clearance. Since I had to take the camshafts off I replaced all shims to ensure I had adequate clearance that would last for a while. Just follow the manual make sure you get the timing chain correct on the camshafts and don't install the chain tensioner and push rod stop until after the camshaft cover is installed. I ordered the shims from Z1 and they were delivered in a week. loudhvx has some excellent posts that explain everything check his site which are linked under his signature.

By Mcren: I didn't know how rare the airboxes were. Are there specific ones that interchangeable between models. For example there is a Kz550 M airbox listed on eBay...Maybe I should take a second look at the parts diagram??

From the diagrams at Partzilla the 550A, 550C Ltd & 550D Gpz have the same airbox. The 550F/M shaft drive & 550H Gpz airboxes are different. Edit: see following reply by loudhvx.

Valves. The replies by TomasDouglas & wrenchmonkey have some good advice for checking the valves. Doing the check is fairly straight forward. changing shims is more involved buy doable. Be sure to note the comments about the tensioner. If you need to change shims, most guys order them as needed. Also, you might be able to swap some of them around to attain the proper clearance on some of the valves.

I was pretty sure (edit: but I was wrong ) the Kz550C1-C4 (chain drive Ltd) does not use the same airbox as the Kz550A1-A3 (first 3 years of the "standard") and the Kz550D1 (81 gpz). The frame is very different on the C model ( edit: but the frame difference appears to still allow for the same airbox on the C models as the A1-A3 and D1 ) . (All other models use bigger carbs, so they are different.)

EDIT see later reply for airbox numbers and model used on.

His bike, being an 83 Kz550A4 is sort of an oddball (in the USA). It has no matching airbox from other models because that year had the larger carbs like later models, but has the frame of the earlier "standard" models. I think he will need an exact 83 Kz550A4 airbox, unless he can hack an earlier airbox to make the holes bigger and use bigger boots. But I can't be sure the internals are the same, and if the carbs are longer, intake to outlet, the fit could be tighter.

Incidentally, it's not just his carbs that are different. He may want to know that the motor itself is slightly different. It uses the more angular covers and, of course, has bigger intake ports for the bigger carbs. The bigger ports required the screw spacing to be further apart on the intake manifolds, so it is not a direct swap to install the earlier carbs. IT can be done, but requires some mods.

And while his motor and carbs resemble those found on the 82-83 Kz550H1-H2 (gpz) and the 84-85 Zx550A1-A2 (gpz), those bikes used very different frames (being monoshocks etc.), so their airboxes are different from his. The rest of the 550 line using the bigger carbs are shaft drive Ltd style frames, so their boxes are different too.