Hey cool. TIL.
I didn’t know Honda made a V-twin with a north-south crankshaft, Guzzi-style. Reading up on the CX - sounds like a delightful bike.
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Re: Honca CX500
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annoying when the vertical video gets converted to horizontal and i try to view it vertically on my phone and it looks all tiny like this:
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It was very comfortable, very easy to service and was pretty reliable. And the shaft drive was great given that I was doing about 750 miles per week. And because of the engine layout it had quite a short wheelbase so it was maneuverable in traffic.
But the engine layout was a crazy mix of old and new. In 1976 liquid cooled motorcycles were very rare and it had 4 valves per head which was pretty hi-tech too. But the heads (and the rocker shafts) were twisted so the carburetors were inside the frame to allow room for the rider’s knees. This necessitated the use of pushrods and rockers rather than cam-chains and overhead cams, And weirdly, there was an engine block like a car, rather than a crankcase and cylinders like pretty much every other motorcycle in the world.
The thing still managed to redline at 11,500 rpm IIRC.
They were weird ugly but very lovable things. The engine had a lovely rhythm and on long distance runs, after hours and out of radio contact it was reassuring to know that it would always get you home.
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