Kawasaki Mach III... very scary indeed!!!

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Tripper

Older and more rusted every day!
Joined
May 10, 2007
Messages
14,153
Location
Central Tejas
My buddy worked for AJ Foyt Kawasaki back when these came out & I got to ride the very 1st one that came into Houston! I raced bikes & rode a Harley panhead chopper for fun but nothing prepared me for this wicked machine! I did several 1/4 mile blasts & to take off you had to literally lean over the handlebars to keep it from flipping back over. Each gear lasted far less than a second & you were basically hanging on for dear life! At that time it was the fastest bike ever 0-60 & very scary indeed! Oh the stupid things we did as kids! Fastest bike I ever rode... period! Lots of people died riding these widow makers... my buddy crashed his several times but luckily walked away every time!

BoB
 

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A friend had one and I can attest, that was a really scary bike and he traded it in short order. I think his dad rode it and said it had to go! :eek:

Toad
 
Then there's the Honda CBX. ��

My fav bike of all time... just wish I had bought one back when they were giving them away! When they 1st came out I was going down I-10 in Houston about 70MPH & a guy riding one did a wheelie right next to me for about a 1/4 mile. His girlfriend was on back & you should have seen her face... pure fright!!! Never drove one but always wanted to! [dr

BoB
 
Dumped my bike on I-90 near Spokane 40 years ago this summer. Lived to tell about it. The bike has sat in the garage since.
 
Eman, a fast bike might put you in a nursing home instead of keeping you out of one!


I rode when I was in my 20’s and 30’s, not anymore though. Looked at a cruiser a friend was selling, I couldn’t hold it up, got to thinking, what if I laid it down or dropped it? Figure if I ever do get another it will be a trike. No more two wheelers for this old man!
 
Dumped my bike on I-90 near Spokane 40 years ago this summer. Lived to tell about it. The bike has sat in the garage since.

Burgerman, what kind and age of bike, might be worth a trip north. [S
I haven't learned, at 73 I'm still riding almost everyday.[cl

Tripper, I had the Z-1 four stroke version in 75. Not a quick but more top end :eek:
 
Been riding since I was twelve and at fifty five I don't want to stop yet. Started with a Chapparal 80 and now have a 110 cu Harley. Had quite a few in between
 
Burgerman, what kind and age of bike, might be worth a trip north. [S
I haven't learned, at 73 I'm still riding almost everyday.[cl

Tripper, I had the Z-1 four stroke version in 75. Not a quick but more top end :eek:

impressive Soltz. It's a 72 Moto Guzzi 850, full dress, still has the 8 track. it's gonna stay. Been think'n about fire'n it up for a while now. :cool:
 
Like most of you I rode too. Never put one down though.
I look at these rockets they make now and just shake my head.
I was talking to a kid with one a few year ago and he told me that he had hit a turkey at about 135MPH.:eek:
He survived but swore he wouldn't ride again until.......He met the beautiful young women had had with him. He said that she thought bikes were cool.[ddd
I eyeball a trike every now and then myself Bama but I doubt that my back could take it.
As an aside. My wife's uncle used to own a Crocker. She remembers sitting on it in her Grandmothers garage were he had it stored in the 60's.
Torchie
 
Like most of you I rode too. Never put one down though.
I look at these rockets they make now and just shake my head.
I was talking to a kid with one a few year ago and he told me that he had hit a turkey at about 135MPH.:eek:
He survived but swore he wouldn't ride again until.......He met the beautiful young women had had with him. He said that she thought bikes were cool.[ddd
I eyeball a trike every now and then myself Bama but I doubt that my back could take it.
As an aside. My wife's uncle used to own a Crocker. She remembers sitting on it in her Grandmothers garage were he had it stored in the 60's.
Torchie
Would love to have that Crocker now.
 
impressive Soltz. It's a 72 Moto Guzzi 850, full dress, still has the 8 track. it's gonna stay. Been think'n about fire'n it up for a while now. :cool:

Thanks Burgerman, firing it up might get the juices flowing [S

Not sure about a dress, but the 8 track had to be cool :eek:
 
At about 19 I was into Yamaha Twins, R5 & RD 350's. A friend of mine's younger brother had just scored a Kawi 500 for 500 bucks. He asked me to take it around the block to see what I thought. Going about 70 on a sweeping right hand bend in the road I hit a patch of gravel and shot off the road hitting a tree in someones front yard. I hit the ground hard while watching the bike flip through the air above me. It landed on its right side tail pipes taking chunks of the cylinders with them as they broke off. As I hurried to pick the bike up off the sidewalk I watched my left arm stretch an additional six inches because my collar bone was broken. It reminded me of Gumby. About that time my friend pulled up with another friend and loaded me and the bike into his El Camino and took me to the emergency room. Later that day my friend thanked me, saying that if I had not hit that tree his little brother surely would have killed himself on that bike. I was happy I hit it too. Had I missed the tree, there was a sweet 66 Chevy II 2 Door Hardtop parked in the driveway and I surely would've hit it instead. Trippers picture and this thread brought this memory back. On a lighter note, I saw a 750 Suzuki Water Buffalo on CL the other day. Does anyone remember those?
 
impressive Soltz. It's a 72 Moto Guzzi 850, full dress, still has the 8 track. it's gonna stay. Been think'n about fire'n it up for a while now. :cool:

MG 850 Eldorado? Man,I wanted one of those really bad in '74 or so.

I bought a '72 Kawasaki Mach III H1B 500 cc disk brake model in early 1973. I rode it for almost a year before the Z1's came out.

We were leaving on a seven-month cruise to the Mediterranean, and I took the Mach III back to the dealer for an upgrade. I told the service manager, a pro motocross racer, that I didn't want to get beat stoplight to stoplight, to do what needed done. He installed a tuned exhaust, reed valves, shaved the heads, bigger carbs, did a few other tricks, including a new crank. As there was no cam, the crank was the only way to get more power. He found a guy in Connecticut who was making cranks for flat-track racing the two-stroke 500's, and put one in my engine. He balanced everything,shoved a 750 Mach IV clutch assembly in the hole he took mine out of. It fit, barely. But the pull was so stiff I pulled a muscle in my right forearm the first day I rode it.

When we got back, I settled up with the dealership for the amount beyond the substantial down payment I'd made, went out to see how it ran. I asked Ray, the pro MXer, what he thought. He said he wouldn't ride it. It was too nuts. Nobody else had ridden it either. As I left the parking lot, everyone working there was in the window, watching. No pressure.

I pointed the bike toward the Beach (I was halfway between VA Beach and Norfolk, VA) and pulled on the throttle. There was a short lag, as usual with a two stroke, then all heck broke loose when it hit the powerband. It went from around four grand to over 10,000 rpm's in what seemed like an eyeblink. The front wheel went skyward, and I was afraid to let up so I shifted, and shifted again. The front wheel came down somewhere in third year, and I flew through a very yellow light and another block or so before my brain kicked in. I took the thing out to a back road on the airbase and learned how to ride it.

I got thrown off the back a few times trying to learn how to launch it. I finally put a step-up seat and a short sissy bar on it to help keep me on it. Drag bars, metalflake paint, the biggest tires I could get under it on both ends. I am guilty of passing cars on the tollway between the Beach and Norfolk on the back wheel at over eighty mph. I went through toll booths in the middle of the night on the back wheel, scaring the daylights out of the attendants. I raced everyone I could find, and never lost stoplight to stoplight. I loved that bike, but woke up one day and knew it was time to get off it before I died on it. I traded it in at the same dealership for a year-old Honda 750 demo unit.

This was on a Thursday. I took it to a friends, painted it black with metalflake flames, installed a different seat, a short sissybar, highway pegs,
pullback drag bars, and a custom rear fender and taillight. When I went in for my 500 mile checkup on Tuesday, the bike had over 600 miles on it The tech asked me if it was a different bike. :D

As I was waiting, the sales manager asked me if I'd talk to a kid who wanted to buy my 500 Mach III. He wanted me to talk him out of it. The kid was 19, had never been on anything bigger or faster than a 250 dirt bike. I talked real hard to him,but could see the gleam in his eye. It was a lost cause. He'd seen me being a total fool on the bike, and wanted it, period. They sold it to him, and he got ready to leave. Once again, everyone was watching. He left the driveway okay, but pulled on the throttle too hard when he hit the street. When the powerband kicked in, the front wheel went up and the bike went across the street and hit the far curb, throwing the bike and rider into the front of a car parts store. He was okay, and insisted on pushing the bike back across the street himself.He left it there to be repaired, vowing to learn to ride it. I took my Honda 750 and left Virginia three days later for Key West. I never heard any more about the 500 or the new owner. I hope he tamed the beast and never got beat stoplight to stoplight. :D
 
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Great story Larry [cl
I had the gravel in a curve also, I went to dirt shoulder that tunded into a small hill, did a barrel roll landed on the white line head first and The Z-1 on top. Also a broken collar bone. :p

Cool does have it's price.:rolleyes: New Mexico H.P. wrote me waning [cl I was 100 of the max speed limit. :eek:
 

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I rode one when they first came out and knew I'd kill myself of that thing, I walked away and bought a Honda CB 750 instead! It weighed more than the Kawi and I loved the smoothness of the 4 cylinder! Loved that bike and wish I still had it! :D

Zipper
 

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