Vintage Japanese Motos Head North

Not as measured by the compass, mind you, but as measured in dollars.  A 1980 Honda CBX recently sold at auction in Las Vegas for a whopping $49,500.  Wow.

The CBX originally debuted in 1979, and production continued through 1982.  The first two years featured naked bikes (no windshield, no fairing, and no bags); the last two years were equipped with bags, fairings, and a little bit of detuning to make them a bit more reliable.  The bikes were (and are) impressive, with wide engines (the engine was a straight six mounted across the frame), six carbs, six headers, and 24 valves.  I think those CBX Hondas were and still are beautiful.

When the CBX first came out in 1979, I was living in Fort Worth.  I rode my Triumph over to the local Honda dealer, and the guy let me take a silver one out (by myself) for a test ride.  I immediately headed to Loop 820.  It’s where I used to open up my ’78 Bonneville, which would touch an indicated 109 miles per hour.  Naturally, being a wise-beyond-my-years 28, I did a top end run with the brand new CBX.  I don’t remember what its speedo went up to, but I do remember running out of resolve at something north of 135 miles per hour (the bike still had more left).   The CBX was an impressive motorcycle.

I turned it around and headed back to the dealer, and when I arrived, I leaned the bike over on its side stand and left the engine running.   It was leaking oil from the left valve cover, and it was kind of pulsing out like I had nicked an artery.  The sales guy came up, eager to close a deal, and asked what I thought of it.  “Not for me,” I said, pointing to the oil leak.  “It’s already leaking oil.”

But the CBX bug had bitten.  About a dozen years later, I had moved to southern California and I rode a ’92 Harley Softail (didn’t everyone back then?), and I saw a pristine ’82 CBX at Bert’s MegaMall in Azusa.   It was $4500, and I had to have it.  I bought that bike and rode it for another 10 years, and I did some serious touring on it.  That’s me you see in the photo at the top of this blog somewhere in Arizona with good buddy Lou and his Goldwing.

The CBX was an amazing machine, and I felt that way the entire time I owned it.  I sold it when Honda stopped stocking parts for the CBX because I was worried that if something complicated broke, I’d have a $4500 paperweight.  I put it in the CycleTrader and it sold the next day.  I thought I had done well because I sold it for what I had paid for it 10 years earlier.  If I only knew what they’d be going for today.

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