of fairings.
One of the first models openly called
retro is very likely the Kawasaki W650
vertical twin, which looked very much like
a Bonneville copy. It looked and sounded
like a ‘Bonnie’. Kawasaki did build a 650
parallel twin as long ago as 1967, but as far
as I know it wasn’t referred to as a retro
model.
In August 1999 I was handed the keys
of a W650 four-stroke eight-valve SOHC
parallel twin for a road test. It had twin
carbs, and spoked wheels, with a Kawasaki
badge on the tank. It looked so much like
an original Bonneville, it even had the
rubber gaiters on the front forks. This was
a real retro model, and one of the first.
Three years later the reborn Triumph
Bonneville replica emerged from the
Triumph factory.
One of the interesting semantic
arguments here is, ‘when is a bike
a replica, a copy, or simply heavily
influenced by a previous design’? One
year after the ground breaking Honda
CB750 stunned the motorcycle world
in 1969, Yamaha released its 650XS-1, a
parallel twin which was openly called a
‘half English, half Japanese modern twin’.
It was Yamaha’s first four-stroke model.
Could it have been called retro, or was it
simply copying an existing format? First
study sketches of the proposed bike
showed clearly Bonneville characteristics.
The American market had called for a
‘modern slim variant on the Bonneville’,
and Yamaha provided it.
Today, with some from Moto Guzzi and
Ducati, the most prominent producer
of retro models is Triumph. The British
manufacturer has now made it a even
dozen different variants in its 2019
Bonneville line-up, with the unveiling
of a new addition. To mark the 80th
New age Bonneville 2002
Original Bonneville T120 1967
Bonnie engine 1969 T120
New Bonnie engine 2002
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