What’s that saying? “If you complain enough, you’ll eventually get what you want”? Well, that may not be the way the saying actually goes but that’s exactly how the Honda CB900F came to be.
From 1981 to 1983, Honda manufactured and sold the Honda CB900F, a bike that introduced Honda as a contender into the “naked bike” field that made motorcycles show off actual machine parts. As you’ll learn, the introduction of the Honda CB900F represented a bike that had already been tested on European and Australian roads, so the bike itself become known for its longevity, comfort, and performance - but it only got the United States because we complained enough about not being able to get one.
If you wanted to go off-road with a motorcycle in the 1960s, your options were fairly limited to larger, slower bikes that were pushrod-driven and not all that much fun to drive.
Honda entered the market with the Honda CL77 in an effort to contrast the lackluster efforts of other manufacturers by adding a more modern up to date design with a smaller, but more rev-happy engine. The result? Between 1965 and 1968, Honda sold an incredible number of the Honda CL77s as a fun, lightweight road bike that could handle off-road trips too. It was just what America was asking for.
To those that grew up in the 1970s,and loved motorcycles, this meant amazing creations from the legends at Honda like the Z50 mini bike and its bigger brother the Trail 70. See, Honda knew they had a hit on their hands when the “monkey bike” that first debuted as a children’s ride in Tama Tech park was a hit with not only the kiddies, but the adults as well. Within a few years of this concept, the Z50 was a hit in not only the home market of Japan but in markets all over the world.
When Suzuki dropped the Katana on the world in 1979, everything changed. The 1970s saw the rise of the universal Japanese motorcycle (UJM), however, by the end of the decade, manufacturers and consumers were growing tired of this conservative design language. Suzuki, the creator of the fantastic GSX series of motorcycles and superbikes, decided to try a design experiment that would take the creation of their new motorcycle to an outside design firm.
For a company to make a splash in the motorcycle world, they either have to make a big claim or have a revolutionary new design.
Taking a place in the Honda lineup from 1978 to 1983, the Honda CX500 did a little of each. Rocking the nearly hyperbolic headline “First into the future”, they were actually pretty serious about having a new vision for what motorcycles should look like.
This article examines the history of the Honda CX500 from its development and initial reactions to its reception by motorcycle driving audiences.
