Newbie Advise Needed

[mpalm]

I'm a newbie and purchased Two late 80's PW50 that didn't run for $100. One was together and the other one looked to be a part bike with almost all the parts. After a couple hours of work on the one, it was running great. I'm 280 lbs. and it had no problem running me around. Now for the part bike, which is in pieces. It seems the kickstarter doesn't catch until it's about 2/3 of the way down. Is this a common problem? Is there a fix? Or should a just leave alone. Any advise would help. As for the bent forks, the one was a bear to get apart. I didn't have to drill anything and nothing looked to be broken inside. No oil inside? just a lot of black powder in that one? The other had grease inside. I have new seals coming and I'm taking the tubes to a machine shop to be straighten. I'll grease them up and put back together in the next week or so. All in all it looks to be a pretty good little bike. I'll have to do a compression test on both to see how good they really are. If I'm missing something please chime on. Thanks, Matt

[turbomart]

At the beginning of the kick starter stroke, a gear slides on the main axle to grip to the transmission. This movement must take some of the kick starter travel, but 2/3 sounds way to much. Should be more like 1/4 tops.
Make sure the gear moves smoothly on the axle. You have to remove the clutch to get to it. Also make sure that the clip-spring-thingy on the starter gear (perhaps you need a parts-list/exploded view to understand that... ) doesn't snag onto something.

And btw, the service manual states a warning: "WEIGHT OF THE RIDER SHOULD NOT EXCEED 25kg (55lb)" ;D