On Saturday I stopped by Honda’s campus in Torrance, California for a meeting – I’ve got a fun-but-secret project coming up that I can’t wait to share with you guys! The timing was great as Honda was hosting their “Cars, Bikes & Coffee” event that they put on every two months. Here’s some of my personal highlights from the event:
The event is definitely dominated by cars, so let’s start with one before we move on to the two-wheelers. Meet the “Huge Bug,” a custom creation that is basically a 1959 VW Beetle that’s been enlarged by 40%!
It’s built on a Dodge truck chassis and it utilizes a Dodge 5.7L V8 engine.
You can get some more details here, or check out this video:
Alright, let’s get to the bikes!
One of my favorite bikes in the parking lot was this Kawasaki Z900RS owned by our client Larry K – that’s right, a Z900RS! When I first rode by it in the parking lot, I assumed it was a custom GPz. I’m a big fan of the Z900RS (here’s my review from when it first came out)
Larry also sold a Yamaha R3 with a GG Retrofitz kit on Iconic’s auction site, it ended up going to a lady in the Bay Area and I randomly saw her with it at a track day at Laguna, it was great to see it being enjoyed! I asked him if he’d talk a little bit about his bike and fire it up if you’re interested:
After he told me about Doremi, I had to look up the other kits they make for the Z900RS and they’re pretty sweet! There’s also one for the Z1000 Mk. II, Z1, and my favorite, which is inspired by the ELR.
Photo from Doremi.
Heck, they even make a GPz-inspired set for the little Z125 so you can make a “Mininja”:
Photo from Doremi
One of Honda’s newest releases is the NT1100. I haven’t ridden it yet but it features the motor from the Africa Twin and the US only gets the DCT version.
There was also one in police spec, which I thought was cool.
Speaking of DCTs, there was a Honda NM4 that showed up. I rode one years ago as one of my first reviews for Bike-urious.
Gotta love pop-up headlights, like the one on this Honda Elite 150 Deluxe.
Here’s a different Elite – the two-stroke SR. I don’t know enough about scooters but I believe this is the livery from a ’94 model, and I don’t think they were sold in the US that year.
More two-stroke scooter action: the Dio SR was introduced in 1990 and it used a 49cc air-cooled two-stroke engine.
Who needs a marketing department when you can just advertise the upgrades right on the bike?
My friend Monique had her cool Honda Shadow Aero sidecar out – she’s taken her two kids across the country twice and explored Western Canada with them. Note the two hitch for when they’re on long trips and the “I will never drive a minivan.” sticker.
This beautiful black RC51 is one of the many machines that has passed through Iconic’s auctions. It’s VIN 0001 for 2005 and when we sold it last year it only had 1,683 miles on it – the new owner is making a point of riding it regularly.
A different black twin-cylinder bike:
A rare Suzuki GAG50 sighting in one of the four factory liveries:
Honda Hawk GT
I didn’t get a chance to meet the owner of this bike but I was impressed to see a CB1100R out in the wild!
Our client Vince (bought a NSF100 from us) works for Honda and he was rocking the perfect shoes for the day. There’s HRC branding on the tongue and the heel.
DROWsports was out with a bunch of showcase bikes. The yellow monkey caught my eye due to the wide front wheel and crazy engine. I’ve modified Vy’s Monkey a bit with Ohlins suspension and a Yoshimura exhaust but I think I’m pretty much done there.
With that said, I do have a Motocompacto that I use as a pit bike for racing, but I don’t think I’ve ever shown a photo of it here before:
Well, my friends over at Steady Garage (I met them at the Monkey press launch) were at the event and one of the products they were showcasing was a crazy “Fatty Rear Tire” kit built by Chimera Engineering for the Motocompacto. Adam thought it was wild and that my pit bike should have some more style so he bought it on the spot. He’s a good influence…
Holding my newest modification with Kevin Dunn, co-founder of Steady Garage.
Steady Garage also had this wild Honda Grom custom on display – the bodywork is a pre-painted kit from Tyga which looked great in person.
Brian Murray of SoCal Supermoto was representing as well – I’m a big fan of his program and highly recommend it if you’ve never been.
Kevin Erion was at the show as well, he brought out two bikes from his personal collection: a Hawk GT and a CBR929RR in the Erion Racing livery that Honda gifted to him!
It was great to see Kevin and my buddy Colin Miller from Honda. I’ve mentioned Colin several times on Bike-urious – among other things, he put on the “Grom Prix” that I participated in.
Speaking of which, it’s been about a year since said Grom prix happened. I’ve been bugging Colin to see if I could buy one of the race bikes and it looks like it’s finally happening so I’ll have something for mini tracks, which means I can practice for cheaper!
That about wraps things up. As usual, I rode my Tesi out (up to almost 19k miles on it now) and I still get a kick of people staring at the hub-center front end.
