Test: cult bike Honda CBX 1000

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Test: cult bike Honda CBX 1000
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Test: Honda CBX 1000

The cult bike Honda CBX 1000

It is your fault that it became unspeakable "100 HP self-restraint by manufacturers and importers" came. Honda’s flagship in 1978 only meant well.

VMaybe the presentation should have been done elsewhere. But it had to be the Suzuka race track in December 1977. The tank lettering was probably not a good idea either: “Super-Sport” was written there. Okay, soichiro Irimajiri was an engineer responsible for the CBX construction, who had also worked on the legendary 250cc Grand Prix machine with which Mike Hailwood outclassed the competition in 1966.

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Test: cult bike Honda CBX 1000

Test: Honda CBX 1000
The cult bike Honda CBX 1000

CBX 1000 Honda had the most technically complex and strongest production motorcycle of its time, but whether it was very wise to introduce an undisguised 274 kilo humus as a super athlete with completely undersized suspension elements and brakes remains to be seen. In other words: it wasn’t! Because at the end of the 1970s, the potential customers did not consist of experienced and well-informed over 40s. And the testers also belonged to the “young and wild” category at the time. Correspondingly, the original CBX (model code CB1), which was available from Honda dealers from spring 1978, was used. The verdict was as clear as it was devastating: great engine, completely overwhelmed chassis.

Of course, forks with thin 35-millimeter standpipes, measly rockers in vulnerable plastic bushings and underdamped disposable struts were the state of (large-scale) technology at the end of the 1970s and also found in the four-cylinder competition, but the CBX played after all in a completely different performance league. A further complication was that tire development had not really kept pace with engine development (Kawasaki was in the starting blocks with the 120 hp Z 1300). So it was foreseeable that the legislature would put a stop to the performance race.


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The original CBX (CB1) was introduced as a super sports car and simply had to fail in terms of chassis.

In order to forestall this, the industry imposed the aforementioned self-restraint, which drove a whole generation of motorcyclists into illegal registration. Despite official assurances to the contrary, the CBX always stayed with its 105 HP, which is very well fed. Anyone who understood the true character of the CBX upgraded to accessories (box swingarm, cones, etc.) and / or took it a little easier. It is not top speed that makes the CBX appeal, the nonchalance with which the stable engine rages through the entire speed range, and above all the sound experience that only a straight-six can offer, ensure the CBX kick that cannot be compared. And that is worth a consumption of over ten liters.

Honda got the chassis weaknesses under control bit by bit. As early as 1979 and before the production change to the USA, improved versions were made in Japan, recognizable by the black Comstar wheels. 1981 followed with the SC06, better known as “CBX Pro-Link”, a new model. Stronger fork, massive aluminum swingarm with central spring strut, more stable brakes, wider wheels, revised clutch, new seat and side cover and, above all, full fairing – the Pro-Link could do everything better than the original CBX. Almost everything, because she also weighed 26 kilos more, and the time of the six-cylinder hype was over. Sales were slow and the last CBX was built in October 1982.

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