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- These are some bikes I have owned over the years.
Bikes I’ve owned 0-60
1 1967 Honda CA160 ~13.5
2 1969 Honda CB160 13.3
3 1969 Honda CL350 6.6
4 1972 Honda CB350 6.6
5 1968 Kawasaki 650W2 ~5.6
6 1953 Harley Hummer 125 n/a
7 1984 Honda CB450 5.6
8 1981 Honda CM400C 5.5
9 1983 Yamaha XS650 5.8
10 2001 Yamaha Virago 250 10.2 (stock is 10.8)
11 1999 HD 883XL 6.3-6.6
12 2009 Suzuki Blvd C50 trike 6.75
13 1986 Honda VT500C 5.3
14 2017 Honda Rebel 500 5.9
15 1974 Kawasaki 650 W3 5.6
16. 2017 Honda Rebel 300. 7.8
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My first motorcycle
This bike above was originally a 90 cc single cylinder – Bruce put in the twin cylinder 160 cc motor, I rewired it, and spray painted it ruby red with the assistance of my neighbor Ricky Whipple.
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A week after I turned 16, I bought this bike. My older sister’s boyfriends had Honda motorcycles, and Benny Wallingford (drove a Honda 90) especially was always talking about the CB-160, so by the time I hit 16, I had one bike on my mind. I went to the Honda dealer in Ft Pierce, FL. The Honda 175 was out by then, and the sales guy told me that, but I wanted a CB-160, and that is what I got. When new, the top speed was 85 mph. As the engine wore, it would do about 82 mph. I actually would cruise as fast as 70 mph (8200 rpm) even with a passenger. In those days, bikes had very little rubber mounting, if any, so things like the footpeg mount were always loosening up. I used lock washers and loctite and that helped a lot. 55 mph (6500 rpm) would have been a better cruising speed for less vibration.
On a CB-160, top speed for a good-running one was 85 mph which was 10,000 rpm. In my hometown, Johnny S. had one (completely stock) that would do 102 mph which was 12,000 rpm. At 14,000 miles it blew up, and after Johnny rebuilt it, it had the same top speed as any other CB-160 (82 to 85 mph).
This is how it sounds (with open mufflers).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ7d4R4cJkY
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hit link and then hit “play” to hear me driving the CL-350 in 1972
http://soundcloud.com/lstrick115/les-on-cl350-1972-okeechobee
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I made two short mufflers for the CL-350. I bought asbestos from Bennies Auto in Okeechobee to seal the exhaust joints. It was white, like thick cardboard but soft and easy to crumble if you weren’t careful; I would touch it with my hands – no one knew the dangers of asbestos in those days. This was the second year of the Honda 350, so it still had the 10,500 rpm redline.
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This was a really nice bike. I got pulled over in West Palm Beach one night because the bike was so quiet, the policeman was investigating a loud motorcycle complaint and he thought I had just coasted by him with the engine off. I cranked it up to show him, and he saw that it was not me. I never ran this bike at top speed, but one day coming back from West Palm Beach I was curious about how fast the train near the highway was running so I had the bike 95 mph.
The 350’s were pretty high rpm bikes for that time period. Redline on the early models was 10,500 rpm. Honda reduced it later to 9200 rpm – they found that the cable-driven tachs were slow-responding and a quick run up to 10,500 rpm indicated on the tach could actually be higher than that. The throttle cable failed on my CB-350 and (while I was fumbling for the kill switch) the tach went past the red zone and into the black – 12,000 rpm.
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When I went into the auto parts store, I thought that I was buying ruby red paint. But the paint was in a dark corner, so what I actually bought was lavender. And when people asked why I painted it purple, that is what I told them.
It vibrated a lot, was loud, and was fast; I had a lot of fun with this bike. I had this bike when I went to college for one semester in Marianna, FL, and I did a lot of the stupid things that 18 year olds do – riding through cornfields, on the highway at 70 mph with passenger (my buddy Jack) facing backwards, wheelies by the school. The speedometer was inaccurate – I used to take people down the hill near the hospital at 120 mph indicated, and I would lean over while pointing to the speedometer and say “look”. Their eyes would get real big – the bike was so loud and vibrating that they fully believed we were going 120 mph – at 120 indicated, the actual speed was 95 mph.
I am still looking for a realistic sound of the 650, but it sounded something like this:
http://www.vintagebike.co.uk/galleries/soundfiles/Norton-73-2.WAV
http://www.sounddogs.com/sound-effects/21/mp3/578647_SOUNDDOGS__mo.mp3
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1953 Harley 125 Hummer – I was not really into it then, but was I a fool to sell it ?
I sold it to the local motorcycle shop guy Marvin Brantley. After I moved from Okeechobee, David W. told me he saw Marvin on this bike in a parade.
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This bike was pretty quick. It had a 6 speed transmission, and it had an indicator light that came on when you were in 6th gear.
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Bike #11 1999 HD 883XL (sold)
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Bike #12 2009 Suzuki Blvd C50 trike (sold)
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Bike #13 1986 Honda VT500C (sold)
Bike #14 2017 Honda Rebel 500
I got this bike from the junk pile at Marvin Brantley’s motorcycle shop in Okeechobee, FL, in 1971 and restored it for a friend. It had holes in the pistons, ten dents in the gas tank, torn seat, rusty exhaust, rusty fenders, etc.
- Honda CL160 belonging to John Hornung Okeechobee FL
Rebel500 