![]() ![]() Straight out of the crate it was capable of 140 mph, previously the preserve of very few bikes: the Jota had managed it, but not much else. Of course, this only worked at high speed, but high speed was what the Katana was all about. The riding position and the droopy nose fairing were intended to make the airflow pass smoothly over the rider. It’s just that the speedo needle starts from the four o’clock position and the rev counter needle from ten o’clock, so they appear to counter-rotate as they sweep round.Īerodynamics played their part. People say the needles contra-rotate, but they don’t: they both go clockwise, as normal. There were the amazing clocks: a single instrument binnacle which contained twin needles for speedo and rev counter, plus a bank of five warning lights underneath them. (Oh, a katana is a Japanese samurai sword, if you didn’t know.) and the little badge of a katana bisecting a Japanese character. There were little touches like the dummy switches set into the side panels, which gave it a sort of techno appearance. There were splashes of colour, like the red tank stickers which echoed the orange of the indicators. It had the overall effect of slimming the lines. The front half of the mudguard was silver, and the rear half black. So the rider’s portion of the seat was dark grey/black to match the black bodywork bits like the headlight surround and the black chrome exhausts, and the rest of it silver, to match the overall colour. Executed by Hans Muth of Target Design in Germany (the styling house responsible for the BMW R100RS, among other gems), it married a poised droop-snoot frame-mounted fairing with an arrowhead-shaped petrol tank, and detailing achieved by very clever colour co-ordination. Everyone does it that way now.īut the actual styling was the master-stroke. ![]() Suzuki, with the Katana’s chassis, reasoned that the arse end of the bike could be built lower as it wasn’t holding the tall engine, and that would mean a nice low seat height (all of 30” or about the same as a dinky Moto Guzzi Monza), lower centre of gravity, and so on. Many big bikes of the day had a seat that was on much the same level as the top of the fuel tank. It remains one of the truly innovative styling jobs to come from Japan, and its influence can be seen even in today’s machines.įor a start, it had a low, low seat. The Katana had people gasping in admiration. Remember the Starck-styled Aprilia? The Moto Morini Dart? Well, Suzuki didn’t fall into that trap. Insectoid, low, hunched, futuristic, space-age: many manufacturers have tried to provide truly avant-garde styling and most have embarrassed themselves in the process. It was also quite heavy.īut it looked like nothing else. In keeping with the technology of the day, it was long - the only way the Japanese knew then to stop their bikes from wobbling like hell was to give them a long wheelbase. The Katana was little more than that excellent 16-valve engine dropped into a café racer chassis. Big, bulky in weight and looks, but it handled coherently and it was about the fastest Japanese bike of the day. The GSX1100 had been around for a few years. Mechanically, the Katana was nothing new. Almost everyone opted for the extra cubes and the lighter throttle. The 1000 got a set of flat-slide Mikunis which make it, allegedly, a bit quicker. The only thing that distinguishes a 1000 from the 1100 is the carb set. Well, two Katanas were: the GSX1100S and the GSX1000S, which looked identical but the smaller one, being just under 1000cc, made it eligible for production racing of the era. A year later the Katana was on the roads. Yes, it was stunning, but the Japanese would never produce a bike like that really. When the Suzuki Katana was first shown at the Cologne exhibition in 1980, it was generally dismissed as a styling exercise. ![]()
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