1991 Kawasaki ZX11
Miles: 11,000
Clean Title
West Orange, NJ
$3,500 OBO
On ebay until Saturday, May 4
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SELLER
The Ninja-meister. The Ninja-smack-Daddy. The Ninja-see-me, Ninja-don’t.
This bike showed up on RSBFS last December when everyone was holiday shopping and nobody in New Jersey was riding. Now, we see it again for $3,500 with 214 views in the last 24 hours….
According to Cycle World in Aug 1991, “On a scale of 1 to 10, this one’s an 11”
This design factoid noted by Cycle World blew my mind – “But there’s a twist. Not only does the ZX-11’s bodywork aid its aerodynamics, it also plays a part in the motor’s power production. In the 1970s, Ram Air was a phrase coined by Suzuki to describe the shrouds that routed cooling air over its two-strokes’ cylinder heads. These days, Kawasaki uses the term to describe its air-induction system. Simply put, the system draws air through a scoop below the headlight and routes it through an elaborate snorkel to a huge airbox beneath the fuel tank. It is the airbox’s sole source of oxygen. The incoming stream pressurizes the airbox. forcing air into the bank of four 40mm Keihin semi-flat-slide carburetors, and the resultant fuel mixture then rushes through the hand-polished intake ports into the combustion chambers.”
“You could cruise a German autobahn in second gear and still keep up with most traffic. That is, until some wannabe Hans Stuck in an Audi turbo toyed with you, at which point you’d be obligated to up-shift and blow his doors into the stratosphere.”
I have a feeling this bike might be sold before Saturday.
Good luck to the buyer and seller!
This site contains affiliate links for which we may be compensated, hopefully.
Very cool example, low miles and love the paint scheme. A lot of bike for the money.
we used to call these the batmobile bikes…so cool but personally I personally I prefer the prior gen zx10 which looked meaner
This was the bike that set the hook that turned me into a motorcyclist. Specifically those articles in cycle and cycleword magazines did the trick. I was into sports cars before this bike came along. Cars didn’t matter after that. Forget your Nissan twin turbo, super HICAS rear wheel steer, 300 z.
I was 15 and no insurance company would even offer me a policy with no riding experience and the age i was. was lucky to not get outright rejected for a used 1989Honda VTR250. So those magazine articles were the closest I got to this 11. Seeing a real one in public, on the street was an event for me! Ah the wonder years…
A few years later I was disappointed to learn this milestone bike was a reliability disaster. Go look up the cycleworld long term report on the bike with owner feedback. Eek..not glowing.
Michael – good point about covering the original articles and then… the reviews. Loved reading your story!