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I'm nearing the end of my Kawasaki project. She's turned in to quite the beauty queen, imho and is a hoot to ride! Mechanically, I have adjusted the valves, completely tore down, cleaned & rebuilt carbs, rebuilt front forks & moved the preload spacer to top of the damper rod (took ~1 3/8" travel out of the 6" of travel, lowering the front, giving it a sportier look, while keeping the preload the same), replaced the intake boots and manifolds, rebuilt the vacuum actuated petcock, added a bypass relay to the ignition, changed all fluids and replaced about a thousand o-rings in the process of doing the above. Pretty much all of the above was first time for me doing those jobs. Slow & steady, lots of utube videos, factory & haynes manual, etc. Still need to replace the brake lines and plan to use black braided lines for that. Have really been enjoying the doing and learning. Cosmetically, I blacked out the engine, fork lowers and rear shocks (all gold originally, but weathered). I miraculously came across a 40 year old, in the kawasaki box, brand new gas tank. Also found NOS tank emblems. The original side covers were faded badly & a bit beat up, so I painted them black to match the engine, but then came across a set of side covers on ebay, for a reasonable price that were in decent condition, clear coated them & they look great, applied a fresh coat of clear to the front fender also. The grab bar had a gold strip running through it, so pulled that out and painted it black. Also repainted the 'kawasaki' emblem on the mufflers, first black, then hand painted the lettering. Also repainted the gold kawasaki letter on the back of the seat. I want to eventually paint the wheels black too, but can live with them as they are for now. And there she sits with a mere 7,900 miles with all her pretty new lipstick and makeup!

A 1961 Sears-Allstate Compact scooter (aka Puch DS 60). A 60cc 2-stroke with a 3-speed gearbox. I picked it up about a month ago. Everything was seized up. The motor, the wheels, the chain was rusted solid and the cables were all seized. It was about a 5 hour wrestling match to get the wheels off, open up the drum brakes, clean everything out and get them to the point that it now rolls! Chain has been soaking & getting regular 'massages'. It now moves freely, but I may end up replacing it as not terribly expensive to do so. Soaked the cables with penetrating oil, they are all free now, clutch works, gearbox will move through the gears (fresh oil to replace the gunk that was in there). The last registration tag was from 1982, so I'm assuming its been sitting since then. The piston was seized solid into the cylinder, assuming someone ran it w/ regular gas until it seized, then parked it. After a couple hours of wrestling it, with the aid of a block of wood and mallet, was able to free the piston. It did not come with a carb, the original was a Bing 17mm. Rather than chasing the internet to the end to find one, I bought a repop chinese carb, which looks to be fairly good quality for the price, surprisingly. With the engine free, I had no spark, so opened up the flywheel/magneto. Heavily corroded points, cleaned those up and now have a strong spark! Tried to fire it up the other day and nothing....got fuel, got spark...did a compression test and of course it was not good, less than 50psi. Rings are shot, so managed to find some and they are on order. Amazingly enough, there are groups and companies out there dedicated to keeping these old puch scoots running. Many, many parts are available. I don't plan to do a restoration, just a preservation. Get it running, keep the patina and do some scooting on it! Wish me luck! (please)

As I remember, Cowpuc had 5 of these bikes that he wore out at 180k miles to over 200k miles, and as I remember, only one of them had second gear. The 6th one that he bought from another member had the second gear repair. He really proved how durable these bikes are.

And I do believe most of them had the second gear issue (which is why he got them so cheap) but he just rode skipping over 2nd gear going from 1 directly to 3.

Sounds like that bike is worth repairing, cosmetically in good condition, and with only 5k miles on it. If you can do the work yourself, I'd say get it running well and enjoy! The first thing I would do is a compression test on the engine just to make sure it's okay. The second gear issue shouldn't show up until about 30k miles or more. There is a ton of information on this site to read. One thing cowpuc always recommended on bikes that have been sitting is to put some oil on the valve train/cams before starting. And cowpuc who is no longer a member is famous for buying old cheap 83 and 84 Ventures and putting a couple hundred thousand miles on them.

My 07 RSV choke will stay where I put it. I suspect the carbs are a little dirty and I also recommend seafoam or a fuel injector cleaner added to the gasoline. I use Gumout for high mileage engines with PEA mostly but also like seafoam. It keeps the carbs clean on my motorcycles and yard tools.

mine would not stay out but would not go all the way in without help and I second the seafoam.

My advise, it is going to cost a bunch of money to get this ole girl up to a safe running order. It might be a great parts bike. If you proceed, I'd certainly start with getting it running, and there will be a good chance that second gear is out. many ride like that, just a heads up, 83s were a problem with 2nd gear.

The 'chock' cable is not really a choke, it's a fuel enricher and so I go with @Freebird that it may be some dirt in the enricher circuit.