Undesirable but reasonable motorcycles

[KungFooBob]

What's needed is the engine taking out and put into some sort of trellis frame with assorted bits from the Yamaha parts bin. I'd go for that.

That's the fuel injected 900, not the 850 as fitted to the TRX.

I reckon a TRX with that engine would go well. If only we knew someone with a TRX and a history of swapping engines into stuff they shouldn't go in?

[Skub]

I feel required to admit I really liked the 850 Tedium. I rebuilt a crashed one many years ago. That oil tank for the dry sump was a bugger to replace.

[Nobby]

What's needed is the engine taking out and put into some sort of trellis frame with assorted bits from the Yamaha parts bin. I'd go for that.

That's the fuel injected 900, not the 850 as fitted to the TRX.

I reckon a TRX with that engine would go well. If only we knew someone with a TRX and a history of swapping engines into stuff they shouldn't go in?

Yeah , if only.

[demographic]

Tigerstripe blade.
Perfectly competent bike for its age thats gaining in value but I hated the stripes.
Oh and the NR 750, an engineering masterpiece designed to get round racing rules, those rules never existed for the roadbike so its just a bike that was a massive folly.

[Yorick]

Tigerstripe blade.
Perfectly competent bike for its age thats gaining in value but I hated the stripes.
Oh and the NR 750, an engineering masterpiece designed to get round racing rules, those rules never existed for the roadbike so its just a bike that was a massive folly.

The NR750 was just Honda showing off. Let's build something better than ever and sod the cost.

[KungFooBob]

The NR750 was just Honda showing off. Let's build something better than ever and sod the cost.
Top

They did that with the VFR750 too. It was a loss leader for many many years. Cost more to develop than they ever made on them.

[demographic]

The NR750 was just Honda showing off. Let's build something better than ever and sod the cost.

Aye, we have so much money we can afford to dick about making an evolutionary dead end.
Well done Honda, the Honda Appendix.

For me the racer was built for well defined good reasons, but the roadbike? Naah.

[Mr. Dazzle]

In fairness to Honda, they would have learned a lot about all kinds of (pretty boring) things in making the NR.

8 valves cylinders and oval shaped pistons is what everyone remembers. A new way of heat treating the metal they make piston rings from, or a funky mathematical model for developing machining code for making them weird combustion chambers or whatever is a touch less marketable!
Manufacturers do all this technology demonstration stuff all the time, its simply the case that 99% of it is never seen by the public.

[demographic]

In fairness to Honda, they would have learned a lot about all kinds of (pretty boring) things in making the NR.

8 valves cylinders and oval shaped pistons is what everyone remembers. A new way of heat treating the metal they make piston rings from, or a funky mathematical model for developing machining code for making them weird combustion chambers or whatever is a touch less marketable!
Manufacturers do all this technology demonstration stuff all the time, its simply the case that 99% of it is never seen by the public.

Did they learn it from the racebike or the roadbike though?
I liked the racebike, but the roadbike? Not so much.


Plus it's always good to chuck into these threads.

[Mr. Dazzle]

Mostly from the race bike yeah.

But if you can, why not? Builds the brand and you can charge for it. I just disagree that it's a dead end.

[Horse]

In fairness to Honda, they would have learned a lot about all kinds of (pretty boring) things in making the NR.

Wasn't there an iridium coated windscreen?

Edit: According to the only price list we can find, the screen is currently unavailable but would cost €1,572 if there were any still in stock. 2017

[Trogladyte]

For me it's the Suzuki Bandit, both the 600 and the 1200, they're way better than they ought to be.

Don't agree. Well not in my experience anyway. The 1200 is, I agree, way better than it ought to be. Fun to ride, and reasonably practical. But the 600 bandits i have ridden were less good. A lot less good. I thought the 600 Bandit was one of the worst bikes I have ever ridden. It's completely gutless, and it runs out of breath at the top end, so the whole point of the thing seems to have been lost in the compromises that were made in designing and tuning the engine. The handling and suspension also felt awful. Granted, the one I rode was a hack at FWR and so may just have been knackered, but was imprecise in its steering, and wallowed round the bends. And it's brakes were awful.

[Trogladyte]

[KungFooBob]

Honda are usually engineering masters, but inboard brakes.

[KungFooBob]

Honda are usually engineering masters, but inboard brakes.

Was there not some issue with them like build up of brake dust making them more inefficient over time?

That and a lack of cooling.

[Bigyin]

At least twice in the past 6-7 month the black cab of the bike world has came up local cheap and i keep going back to the advert an thinking should i? Then i remember when i bought the GS550 Katana a few years ago. Lusted for one in the 80's but now it was a heap o sluggish shit. Anyway, The black cab of the bike world

As a bike courier in 1988 in Glasgow i was always on the look out for a decent CX500 but ended up with BMW R65,R80 and R100 .....bloke called Simon i worked with had a high mileage (90000 plus miles) CX500 that was immaculate and still shiny despite his work rate right up till, ironically, a black cab did a U turn as he was passing

[The Spin Doctor]

No, no, NO!

Horrid bike.

Like many couriers, I thought about one of these but compared with the CX (I could do a full service in 30 minutes), they offered very little extra and were harder and costlier to service - four plugs for example. The electrics were a bit iffy too - alternator / ignition problems.

I bought an XBR500 instead. That should be in the list

[The Spin Doctor]

Just undesirable

Ack. I'd forgotten the Philippe Stark Aprilia Moto 6.5. Should have stuck to kettles.

[Whysub]

No, no, NO!

Horrid bike.

Like many couriers, I thought about one of these but compared with the CX (I could do a full service in 30 minutes), they offered very little extra and were harder and costlier to service - four plugs for example. The electrics were a bit iffy too - alternator / ignition problems.

I bought an XBR500 instead. That should be in the list

I think it were these (or maybe the 400?) that Ron Haslam had at his race school at Cadwell circa 1989. Total and utter shite. The bike wasn't much better either.

[Whysub]

Just undesirable

And fetching really strong money now. Most are bought by arty types with no interest in the bike itself, just stuck on a display plinth in their vegan avocado coffee bar or in their warehouse apartment for eternity.

Some design exercises don't fail as a design, but don't cut it for their intended purpose.