If you own one of these, then I hope it's nothing like mine was...

[The Lone Rider]

Haha, theres a guy at work who just got one of those!

[HenryDorsetCase]

And there are people selling bikes like these now saying they are classics n wanting big money for em. My theory is 'if it was crap when it was new, it's still crap (just older crap)

concur!

there was a cbx750 as well, an unfortunate pile of poo in all respects.

IIRC the handling woes were attributed to the fact that they just stapled that fairing onto it, and there was an unfortunate resonance that happened which made them very bad. Kind of like that police bike (cant remember which one but there is one in MOTAT). Fine as a civilian bike, but get all the chips kit on them and take them over 80kph and the shake like a belly dancer on acid.

I had a GPz750 (ZX750A3) at the time. That was a lovely stable good handling thing.

[roadracingoldfart]

ok I'll bite (well not really). We'll start by saying I'm not a big Honda fan.

Thought it was a great bike & handled really well. But it didn't take much to turn it into a pig. Tyres were king. You had to have the correct sizes in a matched pair that suited the bike. I think I was running Bridgestones of some sort. Also the rear wheel axle position markers on the swingarm were miles out. I stringlined it & made some new marks. It would weave on the std positions.

The steering head bearings replace for tapered with the superseded mod rubber ring that went under them. The shock needed to be pumped out for oil & replaced & the forks reoiled also.

My test for bikes back then was an off road test track that looked almost exactly like the Nauranga Gorge being a long steep down hill off cambered curving road that goes on forever. Many old bikes wobbled down there at 100 kph (as was the speed limit back then). If a bike went down there composed at 100mph it was a goodun. When sorted the CBX passed with flying colours.

On this off road test track of course, this never happened on the road.

I put about 80,000 clicks on it & had to reoil the shock a few times & re do the linkage & fork bushes to get it back to fine, but strangely these parts were cheap, the fork bushes replaced for about $48 total I seem to remember.

Ohh so you dont like Honda's but you know what we did to them at Honda Dealers in those days lol.
Your head bearings comments are so spot on and it was what made the diff to the bike.
I raced one many times and they were a great bike. The only thing we didnt do was the Castrol 6 hour because of the front brakes but folks like Allan DeLatour and Paul Pav did and got good results, I think Dave Martin raced one to a national Junior Proddie title. The CBX 550 was a very sweet engine but had a wicked nasty frame and suspention. At 572 cc's it was a sure thing in a head to head with the GSX550 ESE and the like.
PS; we accidently fitted a set of 400 carbs to a 550 once and shit , did that puppy haul ass and Blue Wing didnt know why either lol.

Id love one to have a Post Classic Play thing .
Cheers Paul.

[F5 Dave]

Well I was just trying to impress that I wasn't biased towards Hondas. I like bikes that are worthy more than brands. OK maybe I'm Yam & GasGas biased.

I was lucky I'd been pointed towards a great mechanic at the time who had CBX experience, you probably remember Craig (erm struggles with last name) who owned Ace up in Paraparaumu. I used to largely do my own work but started to make trips up there to get work done as he was worth the very reasonable amount of money he charged for his knowledge & to watch how he worked.

Think he became a cop or somesuch when the business fell over.

[edit] Craig Eddie I think (sp)