Just picked up an 85 vf500 lend me your thoughts

I picked up an 85 vf500f interceptor a couple weeks ago from a tow yard for $250. Hasn't been registered since 2000.

Bad things:
wouldn't idle
rear shock needs some love
front brake master and lever missing
rear brakes hammered
tow yard busted ignition switch and fuel cap with screw driver as they had no key
all lights not working
exhaust hacked up from 4-2 to 4-1 with lots of nasty welds

What I've done so far:
took the carbs apart idle jets were clogged and carbs were rather dirty. I picked up another set in great shape and threw them in
replaced spark plugs and wires
replaced front brake system
replaced rear rotor and pads
got all the lights working
got a full vance and hines dual exhaust for the bike and threw that on

So now the bike starts and idles but only runs on 3 cylinders. It has spark and fuel on the cylinder its not running on so I'm guessing the valves need to be adjusted. Does this sound right? any other ideas? how often should the valves be adjusted on this bike?

Also the rear shock has definatly had better days I called the dealer and the seal is NLA so I was just going to add some oil to it but don't know how much to add as I don't know how much is left in it. Was thinking of adding 25cc at a time and test is this a bad idea?

I've also herd that these bikes have issues with the cam chain tensioner is there anything I should replace for that right away? How do I avoid these problems.

Any other info on what to look out for and how to get this bike running top notch would be great. Thanks

 

That sounds like an OK deal for $250 considering it was in somewhat of a running condition.
I have 2 vf500's and I have had similar problems with one cylinder not firing and on my bike it was a compression issue. I have also replaced the cam chain tensioners in one motor but could not hear a difference in the noise between the two. I adjust the valves on mine at the start of every season and that seems to be adequate.

The rear shock is an air shock so look around where the coolant tank is and you will see a little valve that looks like a tire stem and you can pump a little air into it with a bicycle pump. The rear shock on these are crap and I have heard of people replacing them with other honda shocks but I am not sure what will fit. It might take some rigging.

 

Honestly, I'd tell you not to bother. Those stock shocks are really prone to failure and once they go bad there is no way to bring them back. Take a look at my site, I show some stuff in the How To section that might interest you. The modified rear shock page shows the details on what I've come up with. So far I've not found anything better to solve the problem of failed rear shocks.