¿Quantos Pistones? (The Triples)

By Joe Berk

I suppose I could wax eloquent about all the magnificent three-cylinder motorcycles out there in the world, but in keeping with the theme of this series, I’m sticking (at least for now) with motorcycles I’ve owned or ridden.  In those of the triple flavor, there have been three:  A 1969 Kawasaki two-stroke H1 Mach III, a 2006 Triumph Tiger, and a 2007 Speed Triple.  The first one (the Kawi 500 triple) didn’t impress me at all; the Triumph triples impressed me mightily.

Keith Hediger’s 500cc Kawasaki

Way back when I was in college, I had a 1971 Honda 750 (I’ll you about that bike when I do the ¿Quantos Pistones? blog on the fours).  One of my ROTC buddies, Keith Hediger, had a 1969 Kawasaki Mach III.  It was a real oddball:  A 500cc, two-stroke triple that could stay with a Honda Four in a drag race (which was kind of amazing, considering the Honda’s 50% displacement advantage). Keith and I had this great idea that it would be a real adventure to ride from New Jersey to Quebec, Canada, and we set off to do just that.

New Jersey to Canada on two naked street bikes with no plan, no luggage, and no rain gear was not a great idea.  That point was driven home when it started to rain somewhere in Vermont.  It kept raining all the way up into Canada, and when we hit Montreal, we decided we had experienced enough adventure riding for one trip.  But it was my first international motorcycle ride, and I had a chance to ride Keith’s Mach III when we switched bikes for a while.

My short ride on the Mach III convinced me of three things:

• • • The Honda CB750 Four was downright luxurious compared to the Mach III.
    • The Mach III had a seat like a 2×4.  It was uncomfortable as hell.
    • The Mach III was indeed every bit as powerful as the CB750 Four.

I didn’t ride the Mach III long enough or on the right kind of roads to assess its rumored widow-making handling, but the bike felt twitchy and unstable compared to my Honda.  And that was it for me and triples for the next 2o or 30 years.

My decades-earlier short ride on the Mach II notwithstanding, I changed my mind about triples.  I wanted a Triumph.  It started at a Cycle World event (or maybe was it Cycle; I always get the two pubs mixed up) in Los Angeles.  I was there on my ’92 Softail when it happened:  I heard a Trimph Speed Triple enter the parking lot.  It was a magnificent thing, kind of a pearlescent candy pink (which sounds weird as I type this), but wow, it hit all the buttons for me.  The color (I would call it bubble gum pearl) just flat worked for me, and that exhaust note…it was just wonderful. It was kind of a mix between a small block Chevy with a big cam and a jungle cat’s snarl.  Fierce, yet refined.  Loud, but not obnoxious.  Big power, but controlled.  I knew that someday soon I would own a Triumph triple.

2006 Triumph Tiger

That someday soon arrived when I stopped at Doug Douglas Motorcycles in San Bernardino.  In those days some 20 years ago now, Doug Douglas was an old school motorcycle shop.   San Bernardino is regarded by many in southern California as the armpit of the state, and I guess I was of that opinion, too.  At least until one of my riding buddies corrected me:  “It’s more like the crotch,” he said.  I think he was right.

Anyway, I was riding through San Bernardino on my Harley when I stopped at Doug Douglas Motorcycles.  Doug was an old guy even then, and he was famous, I guess, as a former motorcycle racer.  He was a crusty, cagey old guy who picked up on my reaction when I saw the candy blue, tiger-striped Tiger you see above.  He knew I was a goner before he ever said a word.  Doug told me what it would be, out the door, and my fate was sealed.  Folks, I’ve never paid the asking price for anything, and folks who know me, know I’m as tight was a turtle’s butthole (and that’s watertight).  I looked at the Tiger and then Doug and I simply said, “Okay.”

I don’t remember exactly, but I think the Tiger was about $9,000.   Sue hit the roof when I came home and told her what I had just done.  Then I told her I needed a ride back to Doug Douglas so I could bring the bike home.    She fumed for about half the trip until she finally asked me where the money was coming from.  I told her I had some money left from selling my Suzuki TL1000S.  “What did you do with the rest of that money?” she asked.

“That mother of pearl and black onyx bracelet I bought for your birthday,” I said.  I hadn’t known it when I said it, but it turned out that was the perfect answer.  Sue was sweet as a kitten for the rest of the ride.   When we reached Doug Douglas’s place, I introduced her to Doug.

“You must be the world’s greatest motorcycle salesman,” Sue said.  “My husband told me he said yes to your first offer, and that never happens.”

Old Doug scratched his chin and told her, “It’s true I’m a good motorcycle salesman, but I’m really much better at selling new living room and bedroom furniture.”  Sue and I were perplexed at that one, until Doug added, “lots of guys who come home with new motorcycles end up buying new furniture within a few days of their buying a motorcycle from me…”

The Tiger was a wonderful motorcycle and I covered a lot of miles with it. The Tiger was Triumph’s “me, too” ADV machine, but it was god-awful off road.  I was terrified on it every time I turned onto a dirt road in Baja, which was exactly twice.  In soft sand it would scare the bejesus out of a former paratrooper (something I can speak to with authority).   The Tiger was essentially a high-performance street bike with ADV styling.  It excelled on mountain roads.  It was tall and top heavy, but it was fast, it sounded wonderful, and I loved it.

2007 Triumph Speed Triple

The Tiger scratched a lot of my itches, but I still remembered that candy bubble gum Speed Triple, I fancied myself a hooligan, and I still had the urge to own a Speed Triple.

About a year after I bought the Tiger from Doug Douglas, I was in his dealership again and I saw the Speed Triple you see above.  I didn’t buy it on that visit, but I thought about it a lot in the days that followed.   I drove out there on a lunch break (I was still working then), made an offer, and it was mine.

I opted for a few doodads, including gold-anodized bits and pieces, the little flyscreen, and a set of Jardine carbon fiber mufflers.  The result was what was unquestionably the most beautiful motorcycle I’ve ever owned.  I remember I was getting a haircut one time downtown and a cop came into the barbershop.  He asked if the Speed Triple was mine.  I got an adrenaline rush thinking I had done something wrong, but nope, he just wanted to tell me it was a beautiful motorcycle.

The Speed Triple was beautiful and it photographed well, but it was buzzie and uncomfortable, and with its short wheelbase it was a little bit twitchy.  I owned four or five motorcycles in those days, and the S3 was the one I rode the least.  I sure liked looking at it, though.

One morning, I was headed to the University early in the morning for an 8:00 class.  That was November 9, 2009.  I exited the freeway and turned left, and I remember seeing a guy at a stop sign in a Camaro.  We established eye contact.  The next thing I knew I was being loaded into a helicopter, in great pain, with the blades’ downwash sweeping over me, thinking either I was having a really bad dream or I was being medevaced in Vietnam (which is kind of interesting, as I’ve never been in Vietnam).

It wasn’t the Camaro guy at the stop sign, and it wasn’t even at that intersection.  My S3/automobile altercation had occurred a block further west, which I learned 6 weeks later while I was still in the hospital.  I have no memory of the crash (event amnesia, the doctor called it), but as crashes go, it was a relatively bad one.  I had a concussion, two crushed vertebra, and two big fractures of my left femur.  The femur was the big deal.  One surgery while I was still in the hospital put a big metal plate down there to hold everything together while the fractures healed, and when that broke a year later, I had revision surgery to remove the now-broken plate and install a femoral rod so that the lower fracture (which had not healed) could do so.   (Trust me on this:  The words “revision” and “surgery” should never be used together.)  I went on to ride other motorcycles throughout the western US, Mexico, Colombia, and China, so I guess the accident didn’t screw me over too badly.  But it made an impression, and I’ll never use a motorcycle to commute to work again.  The streets have a different personality during commuting hours, one best suited for a big car, or maybe an armored vehicle.

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So that’s my story on the triples.  Although the idea of a three-cylinder motorcycle may feel weird (and from an engineering perspective, maybe a little unbalanced or asymmetric), I believe a three-cylinder motorcycle makes a lot of sense.  I think a triple has it all:  Power, balance, handling, and (at least for Triumphs) the right ExhaustNotes.

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Missed our stories on the Singles and the Twins?  Hey, no problemo!  Here they are:

¿Quantos Pistones? (The Twins)
¿Quantos Pistones? (The Singles)

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