What the fuck is this? Craigslist bike

OneArmWillie

OneArmWillie

Active Member
http://columbia.craigslist.org/mcy/3227831409.html

Its a Suzuki but I have never seen anything like this... Its in Columbia SC

Not interested in buying it but its strange.
 
Actually a very rare bike - because it was kind of a crappy scoot back in it's day I guess.

Here's all the Suzuki models in one convenient spot:
http://www.suzukicycles.org/All-Suzuki/all_suzuki_models.html
 
Nice there is powers at work that we dont understand every time that bike starts.
 
yep, thats a rare one, an RE5 wankel rotary powered "superbike" from the 70s, massively overcomplicated, hugely unreliable, slow as feck, unbelievvably heavy maintenance nightmares and no spares left anywhere (cos they sold bugger all of 'em in the first place)

they had 3 seperate oiling systems, liquid cooling that (from memory) involved the water pump crapping itself into the rest of the motor, 'orrible 70s suzuki electrics and so the list goes on........until it reaches the styling which included the instruments being placed into a 'barrel-like' binnacle with a tinted cover that spun back round the outside to reveal the instrument faces behind it. the tail-light was in a similar shaped thing so it was at least as ugly at the back as at the front.....

i'm sure that they have their devotees........i just hope never to meet one
 
All that aside, the rotory engine is simple. It couldn't be "fixed"?


I see fantastic potential for a custom only due to the fact that there aren't any spares. You are forced to outside the norm.


Turbocharged !
 
The 'simplicity' of a rotary is only theoretical. In practice, some of the difficulties can only be resolved by expensive and/or complicated means.

For example - corner seals!

Crazy
 
The fact is that rotary engines do not belong in a motorcycle. And the re5 is a perfect example of why. It was just an exercise in "look what we can do". Just like Honda's CBX. Overly complicated, unnecessary, and unreasonable for the average rider/wrencher. At least the CBX was actually pretty fast.
 
to be fair, 'norton', such as they were at the time did a reasonable job with their rotary Interpol models, most of which ended up in the hands of the filth, oops sorry, i mean the totally uncorrupt and unbiased english police forces. they also knocked out some pretty damn good race bikes back in the 80s, was it steve parrish used to campaign them in the euro road race series?
but the suzuki was unpleasant, undeveloped and unloved.
 
A couple of years ago a friend of mine in Australia came over here with the intent of buying RE5s. As I remember he found about six of them and took them back to Australia.
 
Motorcycle Classics magazine actually ran a couple of pages on this bike not that long ago - I want to say less than three or four thousand total were ever imported to the US over the course of a couple of model years. They're definitely a unique bike, but even the owner of the one they featured didn't have a lot of good things to say about it other than it being "different."
 
Shit!
It was a deal before but now its a steal and a half at $750
Properly interesting bike that is rare.

These bring large money in good shape.
 
Yeah, but the CL bike has a big stupid fairing on it and doesn't have the cylinder gauge pack. I bet that gauge package in decent shape brings a few hundred on its own.
 
IIRC not all had that super cool gauge pod

Money comes from interest and rarity for sure.

Performance is not always the driving force in price.....just look at what people pay/buy/sell CB350s for....
 
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/RE5-Suzuki-Estate-find-one-owner-Very-nice-original-condition-/200814752021?forcev4exp=true#ht_500wt_1072


As always its hard to compare different used bikes.
The CL one needs a lot of work, and is missing some big ticket parts, but when you are dealing with a bike that brings good money you are by default going to make the junky bikes worth more do to need for parts.

A sandcast CB750 is a $10k bike even if its stored in a lake these days.
Im all for having fun and building this that or the other thing. But it is important to be able to appreciate stock bikes for their stories and interest.
 
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