The Kawasaki KZ200 was a street

motorcycle A motorcycle (motorbike, bike, or trike (if three-wheeled)) is a two or three-wheeled motor vehicle steered by a handlebar. Motorcycle design varies greatly to suit a range of different purposes: long-distance travel, commuting, cruising ...

produced between 1977 and 1984 by Kawasaki. With

single-cylinder engine A single-cylinder engine, sometimes called a thumper, is a piston engine with one cylinder. This engine is often used for motorcycles, motor scooters, go-karts, all-terrain vehicles, radio-controlled vehicles, portable tools and garden machinery ...

, it was considered one of the biggest engine capacities of mass-production motorcycle in Indonesia in the early 1980s.

Development history

The production began in 1977, starting with conventional points type

ignition system An ignition system generates a spark or heats an electrode to a high temperature to ignite a fuel-air mixture in spark ignition internal combustion engines, oil-fired and gas-fired boilers, rocket engines, etc. The widest application for spark i ...

. This configuration lasted until the latest production batch in 1982. By 1983, the motorcycle adopted the Capacitor Discharge Ignition ( CDI) system until the production stopped in 1984. The early production of this specification is called Merzy CDI, while the latter were launched with new model of

fuel tank A fuel tank (also called a petrol tank or gas tank) is a safe container for flammable fluids. Though any storage tank for fuel may be so called, the term is typically applied to part of an engine system in which the fuel is stored and propelle ...

and referred as Merzy Cobra. It was once planned that

Kawasaki Motorcycles Kawasaki motorcycles are manufactured by the Motorcycle & Engine division of Kawasaki Heavy Industries. History Kawasaki Aircraft initially manufactured motorcycles under the Meguro name, having bought an ailing motorcycle manufacturer, Megu ...

would launch a new model with improved engine capacity of 250 cc. However, due to the Indonesia's governmental regulation at that time, the plan was turned down. The regulation limited the engine capacity of maximum 200 cc for public motorcycles during the period.

Specifications

displacement Displacement may refer to: Physical sciences Mathematics and Physics * Displacement (geometry), is the difference between the final and initial position of a point trajectory (for instance, the center of mass of a moving object). The actual path ...

* 5-speed transmission * Front disc brake, rear drum brake

Additional information

* The early KZ200 had a cable-operated front disc brake, which was uncommon for a motorcycle sold in the US. * The later engines from the KZ250 and LTD250 will bolt right in for a small displacement increase with more power. * The KZ200 was only sold in the US for two years, 1978 and 1979.

References

* KZ200 {{motorcycle-stub

Development history

Specifications

See also

Additional information

References