To the average sportbike addict, the 2008 Ducati Desmosedici RR stands alone among race replica bikes as the one that nailed all the details and defined the genre in a taught, carbon fiber-clad package. Honda saddled its RC213-VS with electronic nannies, a restrictive exhaust and a collectors-only asking price. Ducati engaged in no such silliness.…
Prices of the RC30 have gone through the roof, and enthusiasts who want a taste of Honda’s homologation specials have been forced to go elsewhere. Luckily, the less-desirable, less cubically-endowed, and equally exotic VFR400R NC30 manages to provide many of the qualities of its larger sibling at a greatly reduced cost. At a glance, it’s…
The Yamaha RZ500 promised GP-bike glory for the every man when it hit the scene in ’84, with a quartet of exhaust pipes poking out at odd angles producing a biblical scream. By ’85, Suzuki had rained on the parade a little with the RG500, which was lighter, more powerful and a few notches crazier,…
This 1992 Honda VFR400R is claimed to be road-ready, with a clean New Jersey street title, a recent carb clean and fluid refresh, refinished wheels and a fork rebuild. The seller says it is not in immaculate condition, but it’s hard to tell from the pictures how bad or good the cosmetics are. It does…
12.13.2017: Bob has decided to upgrade to a Featured Listing after we first posted this bike on November 30th. Links updated to latest auction. Good luck to buyers and seller! -dc When Yamaha and Suzuki dropped their 500cc two-stroke race replicas in the middle of the 1980s, the bikes effectively stopped the oil-burning horsepower wars…
Update 12.19.2017: eBay shows this bike has sold for $5k. Congratulations to buyer and seller! -dc Built to celebrate Honda’s AMA F1 and Daytona 200 successes in the early to mid-’80s, the Honda VF1000R was bedecked with everything Honda’s skunk works had bolted together for its racebikes, and made the kind of power that the…
Update 11.27.2017: SOLD! Congratulations to buyer and seller! -dc Our buddy Greg at Deftone Cycles has a near-constant stream of gorgeous grey-market bikes come through his doors every year, from fairly standard JDM imports in excellent condition to some real unobtanium pieces that you have to be fast to catch. It’s no surprise, then, that…
Back in the early ’90s, Honda was still known for pushing boundaries with build quality, poise and panache unrivaled among its competitors. Throughout the decade, Big Red claimed some truly great accomplishments that dragged motorcycling further toward the coming millennium. But in ’92, Honda spat out one of its craziest street creations on record, the…