CLASSICS
WORDS AND PHOTOS:
Rhys Jones
RETRO OR CLASSIC?
T
here is much speculation about the
current retro trend in motorcycling,
and opinions about where it came
from – and when – seem to be remarkably
different. Is it perhaps a marketing ploy
to help manufacturers develop another
class in order to sell more bikes? Are the
owners really interested in classic bikes,
or simply something that looks good
and turns heads? The Oxford dictionary
describes retro as “A thing imitating
or reviving something from the past, a
nostalgic or revivalist style”. Style is very
likely the important element with retro
bikes. Style is about appearance, and
not necessarily having something of
value because it was made in a different
era, and experiencing the engineering
qualities of thirty, forty or fifty years ago.
I know of riders who have, for example, a
1960s Triumph Bonneville in the garage
for special occasions and a post-2001
Hinckley built Bonneville for everyday use.
So, how do we categorise retro bikes? Go
back 30-years or more, and most bikes
did not have fairings. The trend towards
fairings began in earnest with the half, or
bikini, fairing on Suzuki’s 1981 Katana. It
wasn’t long after that anything without
a fairing was called a naked bike, which
suggested that in some way a designer
had overlooked the need to cover the
essential part of an otherwise complete
model. The part that disappeared on the
models with fairings was, of course, the
engine, which to many enthusiasts is the
heart and soul of the motorcycle and feel
should be on display. Fairings had been
used on race bikes for many years, but
they had a very different function. Today
it seems that models without fairings are
no longer called naked bikes, but retro
bikes, which is of course what almost all
bikes looked like before the introduction
English/Japanese style Kawasaki W1 1967
Kawasaki W650 café retro
New look Kawasaki W650 1999