Forum

[John R]

Anyone ever owned/ridden/known about these? They are a Suzuki engined 650 single and I know where I can get an old one cheap. Could be the sort of thing we like!

[Mark M]

John, a friend of mine (who is also a wheelbuilder, Northampton/Milton Keynes area if anyone's interested!) has one and raves about it. I haven't ridden it but it looks like a quality piece of kit. I think they could be an under appreciated gem. How much?
REgards, Mark

[Wayne]

Was that the one with Egli frame ? sounds fab to me ...

[STU]

Very nice, high quality peice of kit that was completely side-stepped by the sportsbike BHP craze, and therefore did not sell many at the time.
Compared to an Enfield they are faster, better handling, better equiped and better made - I guess that it may just lack that bit of 'charactor' us Enfield people seem to like.
There is also an 800 V-Twin (Suzuki engine again) version - I really like these too.
These two Sachs bikes are the ones I would look out for if I ever sold my Electra XS.
Very rare in the UK - but all the better for it I'd say!

[John R]

£550 asking price. Not a minter, but not bad for its age. Clamed to be a good runner.
Probably led a fairly gentle life here in the sunny Channel Islands.

[Les H]

I can recall seeing quite a few of these overseas on the Continent and spent some time checking them out. Three Cross Motorcycle imported them and they were priced at £3999. The high pillion seat and rear mudguard and odd front part of the petrol tank spoils the look for me. The Honda CBR500 was an earlier, now classic status 500 single. The MuZ Scorpian also used the 650 Suzuki single and these are well made too. Ultimately most modern large capacity modern single cylinder bikes fail to provide the same emotional pleasure for some reason.

[Les H]

CORRECTION....HONDA XBR 500 OR GB500.......NOT CBR.

[STU]

Les, unless I am mistaken the MuZ Skorpian used a Yamaha XT660 engine?!

How about a Buell Blast anybody? Rotax 500 single?

Cheers, Stu.

[Les H]

Hi STU...just checked and you are right about the Scorpian having the Yamaha engine, all I knew was that it was Japanese. I was keen on getting one when they first came out back in about 1993ish? Several bikes had the Rotax engine fitted...Matchless (Devon) MuZ, Jawa, Armstong military, a maybe some others. They were quite pokey when revved, and I nearly bought a low mileage Jawa R500, but unlike a British 500 single it had to be always in a lowish gear and would snatch very badly if you tried to accelerate at all from lowish revs, due I assume from the engine having a very light flywheel. As far as I know they can be very highly tuned. Regards...Les

[Denwyn]

Had Suzuki VX 800 a long time back the motor was excellent,the rest of the bike very poor,don't think you can go wrong with the 650 engine bike,but spares for anything but the engine may be a problem