Suzuki Produced A Rad Futuristic Motorbike With A Pop-Up Headlight

I’ve just lately experienced a sleepless night the place I burned the late evening oil looking at bikes to invest in. Right after getting rid of out on a Buell Ulysses with 80,000 miles and a Yamaha CS5, I got the sudden hankering for a thing offbeat. I have by now owned a scooter with a pop-up headlight, but what about a bike? As it turns out, Suzuki dabbled with pop-up headlights in the 1980s with a person of the raddest motorcycles you’ll at any time see. This is the Suzuki GSX750S Katana.

The Suzuki Katana’s story begins in the early 1980s. Back again then, as Bike Classics notes, Suzukis have been recognized for their speed, but their types felt stale to the buying community. To rectify this, Suzuki brought on German BMW motorcycle designer Hans Muth. His Bavarian Goal Layout organization, consisting of himself, Jan Fellstrom and Hans-Georg Kasten, would breathe clean air into Suzuki’s structure.

Or far more especially, Muth’s aim was to style and design one thing so out there that it would draw persons into showrooms.

In late 1980, Target’s do the job strike the highway as the GSX1100S Katana. And Suzuki did not just launch a bike with a distinct design. Suzuki claimed the Katana to be the fastest mass-generation motorbike. Even though it had the very same jogging gear as the GSX1100E, the Katana was observed to hit 147 mph to the GSX1100E’s 142 mph.

Suzuki’s futuristic Katana was a achievements, but it would not quit there. Showing in 1984 was the edition of the Katana that you are reading through this for.

Providing along with the significant liter Katana had been more compact 550cc, 650cc and 750cc versions for those who liked the seems but didn’t want the electricity. These would get updates above time and in 1984, purchasers would be addressed to one of the coolest wanting bikes of the 1980s.

The Suzuki GSX750S came with a GSX750E’s 16-valve 747cc inline four producing 84 HP. That is very good ability for an 1980s 750, but the star of the present is the bike’s style.

Suzuki redesigned the bike to be easy and uncluttered. Where by the older types had change indicators that trapped out and a large blocky headlight, this just one would be all flush. Yep, search intently and you will see the flip indicators built-in into the fairing. And yep, you get a excellent pop-up headlight.

The motorcycle also boasted a reduced seat top than prior styles and better bars for greater comfort and ease. Suzuki managed to shave 35 lbs . off of the issue, much too.

You may perhaps be asking yourself why you haven’t seen any of these in The us and the remedy is that we just didn’t get them. We did get the stylish Katana without the flush bits and the pop-up headlight. Bradley even wrote about a warm rod Katana in 2020.

In its place, if you want one of these you’ll have to locate 1 in a further state. Luckily, they do exhibit up in Japan, waiting for you to import a single.

As for the Katana in The usa, in the late 1980s the identify obtained used to the unrelated Suzuki GSX-F, the place it stuck all-around until finally 2006. The Katana returned after once more in 2019 with a design that phone calls back again to the unique.