How did you get here?

They probably started by importing wheel bearings from China.
Might even have bicycle-related origins, where steering stems were generally all-balls.

 

That could be but these days they hold a good rep for quality and value.

Pretty sure All Balls was a catch phrase for All Ball Bearings, makes sense to me anyway

 

I have heard mixed comments about the Kendas' wet performance. Many complaints, but also others who say they stick just fine in the wet. YMMV, I guess.

I have run Shinko 705s on my KLR and Himalayan. Nice tires on pavement, in rain, and on fire roads. Unfortunately they are not available to fit the Maxim's 16" rear wheel. The Shinko 705 is available in a 100/90-19, so if the Kenda front remains back-ordered (which it's been for a month or more) the Shinko is an option up front.

The damn 16" rear wheel is the problem. There are so few dual-purpose tires that fit a 16" wheel, and most of those are short-lived, expensive, and/or tube-type. I've done a lot of online searching, and the Kenda is so far about the best I've been able to find. Whether it's any good in practice remains to be seen.

 

Or, if you are really set on having more aggressive adventure style tires on your bike, find an 18 inch rear wheel and brake assembly from a Seca. It will fit right in on the Maxim in place of the 16 inch parts there without interference. Just remember to get the brake assembly too as it is different, smaller, than the Maxim's. You will have a bigger selection of tires.
Good job on the rehab of your bike, looks good.

 

Thanks. It's actually still pretty dirty, and there are a couple oil leaks on the engine that are messy but not terribly significant. They can be dealt with later.

One of the neat things is that the previous owner bought a milk crate full of shiny spares--like new fenders, turn signals, rear brake lever. These things are going on bit by bit. The old front turn signals went onto my RE Himalayan:



They are bigger, brighter and a lot better built than the cheesy plastic Indian units that came on the bike. The chrome on these old ones is a bit pitted--all the better for the flat black to stick when I paint 'em to match the ADV bike. I have a small turn-signal project in mind for the winter: I want to switch over to LEDs with white running lights and yellow turn signals. I have a set of these on my Road King, and I think the white running lights are brighter than the halogen spotlights that came on the bike. The 3-1/4" LED/lens "pancakes" are almost a drop-in into the Yamaha housings. Not quite, because they have a little flange at the front that's about 1/16" bigger than the Yammie blinkers, and they leave about a 1/4" gap that needs to be filled. On the Himalayan, I will probably just fill that gap with black tape or something. Depending on how this works, I will do the same thing or something similar on the Maxim's lights. Nice that the bulb socket itself can be removed from the housing by taking out two screws.

As for tires... I am a long way from trying to fit a different back wheel. They are hard to find and not cheap. I've been reading tire reviews, and with about three exceptions everybody hates the K761 on wet pavement. Damn. I don't hide from rain, so this could be a problem. The Kenda rear is already sitting at the shop, waiting for the matching front to come in. I figure I will try them, and if they really suck in the wet I will look at something else. The Duro HF-904 rear is fairly cheap (around $100 on Amazon, Revzilla and Dennis Kirk) and gets a lot of good reviews (particularly from Harley Sportster riders who want to play in the dirt), but it is a tube-type tire. An Amazon reviewer says they can be run tubeless (and shows one on what's clearly a Maxim rear wheel), while a staffer at DK says they lack the "liner" that makes tubeless tires airtight. I'm not totally opposed to schlepping a tube into the tires, depending on how hard they are to get on and off the rim (my Himalayan runs tubes and has a 17" rear wheel, and I do all my own tire changes on that bike), so the Duro is a possibility. Of course, the Duro is only available for the rear, but 100/90-19 is a fairly common front wheel size on ADV bikes, so there ought to be plenty of choices.

 

I had a Kenda rear on my GS - not a pleasant experience, as some doofus had decided that an across-the-way zig-zag groove would look cool.
That thing put the shyts up me when it aquaplaned.
Took it back, the supplier swapped it for a Michelin iirc.
A year or so later I noticed the replacement Kendas were sporting a different pattern, identical to the Arrowmax. Fitted one of them and had no trouble with it, even in the heaviest downpour or standing water.
There was nothing wrong with the original tyre's compound, it was just the stupid groove design.

 

Given that they're importing Chinese bearings of unknown origin...
Costs very little extra to buy genuinely good makes, like Koyo.

 

Was this the K761? Kenda makes a lot of different tires.

Duly noted for future reference. All Balls bearings are already installed and unless they fail, I will not be replacing them again. Based on a fair number of positive experiences reported on the site, I don't expect that. But if I ever need to replace the Maxim's steering head bearings again...

 

Bought my 82 XJ750
Maxim . It came with the Haynes manual. . Fixing up this XJ was therapeutic as heck. Gonna do another one. Found xj4ever after searching for parts. Joined the forum and the rest is history. No old lady to scold me for buying parts. The xj4ever supporting vendor is great for parts. I tried out an Amazon carb kit and I'm going back to the OEM parts. Other sources may provide marginal quality parts. The tech talk forum is a lifesaver. Everyone is helpful. Great community . My landlord has his 2023 Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10 parked where the dining room table goes! Reliving my youth.

 

Ended up here looking for answers as to why the speedo on my recently purchased 650 Maxim was wailing like a banshee.

It was embarassing. People around me probably thought a civil defense system air raid warning was going off when I rode by them.

 

Just got a 1982 XJ550 SECA from a friend of mine who wanted it out of his life. I've been working a bit to restore the bike to running order and came across this forum a few times over the last two weeks looking for useful advice. I decided to join up today to hopefully gain more knowledge from the forums and perhaps contribute useful information as I progress with restoring this motorcycle.

 

I was a Honda man who wanted to get back in the saddle again but wasn't having much luck finding anything nice in a 750 size, most of the Craigslist flakes blew me off and it was the seller of the SECA that called me back right away. I made a 150 mile trip to take a look at it and knew that was the one from 50 feet away, after unloading ten C-notes the bike was in the van for the trip home and I spent the next week working over the bike 12+ hours a day... should have seen the carbs. They went to church, the front calipers rebuilt and the electrical gremlins eradicated leaving me with a sweet running and very reliable bike. At some point I may ditch the Atari but as a child of the 70s & 80s I dig that quirky squareness. A big who knows.
What I do know is this one was meant to be so I'm going to make the best of it. Things happen for a reason and this is what keeps life interesting. The XJ forum has been the most influential and helpful, members like Chacal, Dave In Ireland and that zany Hogfiddles guy really know their stuff. I went back on ALL of the What Have You Done posts to soak in as much real life as I could plus the XJ4Ever technical pages.
As a long time moderator of the impalaforums I can honestly say this is a well oiled machine, the long timers are eager to help and contribute when they can, no bull or games. Someone got this one right.

 

I was googling for exhaust parts for an XJ1100 and landed here. Let me know if you have and exhaust your looking to unload....

 

I was looking for a "second" first bike. In my teens my dad picked up a 90s virago. Never rode it and it sat ripped apart. Now late 20s and fed up with automotive tinkering and always looking into riding but never having the money I'm on FB market place and find my 1981 xj650 midnight it's been repainted white on most accents and sitting in a garage dusty with a leaking carb. Knew immediately it would need that work at least. PO rode it last year with 30k on the clock, $800 and a rented trailer I was fawning over it the whole way home I've never mistrusted my strapping more than that day.
So I start looking into parts, gaskets, oil filter, order the manual and then stumbled upon THE CHURCH OF CLEAN. And here we are!

 

Just bought a 1982 XJ750 Seca - Bike was imported to the UK from the US in 1995. Bike had been sat for 3 years and parts started to be removed and have been misplaced so i'm slowly going through and checking off what i do and don't have. In amongst working on my other projects but the XJ has something about it that i really like and i can't quite work out what that is yet. Been scrolling through forum chats and how to's to start getting to grips with what i have got myself into.

 

Acquired a running '82 XJ550 several years ago, just like my first bike, fully intending to restore it to daily duty. Got a lot out of this forum just lurking and reading. But time marches on and the bike sat, so watch for a FS listing...

 

I bought an Xj550r seca and didn't realize I was in over my head and now several years later I'm back and she's running anddddddd here we are lol.