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Six for the Road
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Honda CBX
Michael Schulte
04/01/2007
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Photography by Cordero Studios/corderostudios.com
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The mid-1970s was a cruel era for Honda streetbike
enthusiasts. A lack of captivating suspects in the showroom lineup had admirers
of the engineering giant wistfully twisting the throttles of past glories. The
powerhouse Honda CB750 Four had broken ground on a number of design fronts, but
the original superbike was an aging child of the sixties. By late 1976, the once
mighty roar of Honda’s innovative motorcycle engineering department had been
reduced to a muffled gust—at least that was the view from the street. While
Honda buffs had good reason to wax elegiac over the absence of thunder, there
was a nascent rumble in the lab. Shoichiro Irimajiri, the man behind Honda’s
world championship-winning six-cylinder engines (made famous by the legendary
Mike Hailwood) was at work applying the technological imprint of his
six-cylinder racers to a street-legal, mass-production watershed—the
imposing Honda CBX. Irimajiri’s audacious feat would shock the industry and
effectively signal the end of Honda’s ’70s stagnation.
Then, as now, the
hulking CBX makes a potent first impression, unique among beasts of the road.
From the steroidal powerplant bulging out of the frame like a cleanup hitter’s
biceps, to the zaftig tank and foreboding six-pipe exhaust system that literally
spills out over the road, the CBX inspired visions of tattered pavement when it
was first introduced in 1978. The heart of the allure of the CBX is the
theatrical 1047cc transverse in-line six engine. Resembling a burly Wurlitzer
pipe organ mounted upside down and backwards, it seems impossibly wide,
although, in reality, it’s only two inches broader than the aforementioned
four-piston Honda CB750. The six dishes out 105 horsepower at 9,000 rpm, more
than delivering on the motor’s visual power pledge. Raw muscle isn’t the only
remarkable feature of the big six; riders marvel at the glassy ride produced by
the high-revving machine at 100-plus mph. The smooth, precise glide, combined
with euphoric acceleration and a rumbling baritone exhaust generate an
experience that has kept CBX addicts in the saddle for over 25 years.
The
road to innovation is often littered with hurdles and curses, and so it was with
the development of the CBX. Initially, the short stroke engine revved so fast
that alternator shafts were snapping like uncooked spaghetti. To resolve the
issue, Honda clutched the alternator, resulting in the emblematic “electric
cricket” sound a CBX makes on warm up. Also, early CBX exhaust prototypes
produced an unnerving howl eerily similar to that of an F-15 tactical fighter
jet. Honda redesigned the exhaust baffling to produce a less threatening (and
perhaps less tempting) tone. An oil cooler nullified initial overheating
problems.
Despite these obstacles, development on the CBX was completed
swiftly, requiring only a year-and-a-half. When the paint dried and the first
CBXs hit the streets in late 1978, consumers had access to a road-ripper that
topped out at 140 mph and clocked at 11.55 seconds in the quarter-mile, making
the new superbike the world’s fastest production motorcycle to date. Despite the
CBX’s uniqueness and its share of glowing press, very few of the bikes got more
than a quarter-mile from the dealerships. Sales were flat. Why?
While the
motor was a nearly flawless execution of inspired design, the chassis was not as
fortunate, to say the least. Flimsy 35mm front forks were scarcely adequate for
a bike that weighed in at nearly 600 lbs, wet; ditto for the rear shocks. The
scrawny front end was notoriously prone to a nasty high speed wobble. Sloppy
riding would be generously rewarded with shoulder-dislocating tankslappers.
Handling issues would later be dispatched with aftermarket upgrades, but back in
the ’80s they required more creative means, such as the infamous watermelon
remedy, discovered by Mike Brown Barone, National Director of the 1,100-strong
International CBX Owners Association (ICOA) and publisher of the organization’s
magazine, The CBX Press.
Barone had first experienced the unpredictable
wobble while running his new 1980 CBX wide open. One day, at a roadside stand,
while securing a just-purchased watermelon to the tank for the trip home, a
Kawasaki Z1R shot by, scattering leaves. Barone hopped his melon-laden CBX and
gave chase. As he closed to within ten feet of the Z1R, the Kawasaki opened up
on a long straight. Barone dove in behind. When both bikes hit an undulation in
the road, Barone was shocked to see that the Z1R was fully engaged in a
high-speed rattle, while the X glided through the wave like a torpedo. Barone
watched the Z1R exit in his rear view and realized that a 25-pound watermelon
strapped to his tank had offset the flex in the 35mm’s and provided a lo-tech
handling solution. No doubt, the vanquished Kawasaki rider had other creative
ideas regarding melon placement.
Considerations other than fruit-assisted
suspension curbed interest in the CBX as well. At over $4,000 retail (over $11k
in today’s dollars), it was not exactly a Sunday afternoon impulse purchase. The
engine was seen by many as formidably complex. Six carbs to sync and 24 valves
to shim scared off the less mechanically adventurous. Others avoided the bike
because it was just too big, too heavy, and too wide. Mike Barone initially fell
into the latter category. “I thought it was a despicable motorcycle from the get
go,” Barone said of his first impression of the bike. In 1979, Barone was riding
a Yamaha SR500 that he had tricked to roam the tight Pennsylvania backroads near
his home.
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