Comeback kings

BLUE HAZE: KAWASAKI TWO-STROKES
to Stoplight racer’ – specially built for urban hooliganism.
The H1 was Kawasaki’s first triple. It was launched with one
single-minded aim: to cement the big-K’s reputation in riders’
minds as a no-compromise performance brand, with the fastestaccelerating
bike that the world had ever seen.
Kawasaki called this secret endeavour Project N100. Make no
mistake, they knew exactly what they were doing. And they did it.
Mission accomplished (shock-horror headlines
and a 12.8-second standing quarter were
promptly achieved). The Japanese makers then
began steadily civilising the bike over ensuing
years by adding mid-range at the expense of
top-end, handling at the cost of weight, and
emissions-legality at the cost of free breathing.
But not by very much. Any H1 is a hardrattlin’,
smokin’ hoot. This B model offers a
good compromise between most evil and least
entertaining. Well, it’s got the newly-introduced front disc brake,
anyway – even if it doesn’t have the wheelie-damping lengthened
chassis of the following year’s model.
TWIST YOUR WRIST AND HOLD YOUR BREATH
Whichever model you ride, don’t expect anything in the way of
mid-range power. Getting the H1B smartly off the line involves
thrashy high revving, yowling intake noise and a glut of blue
smoke. Shrinking violets need not apply. Once you’ve wound it up
to the magic 6000rpm mark, all the bike’s claimed 60 horses kick
in. That’s not much by the standards of today, but it still feels like
‘THE H2 IS MORE
STRAIGHT-LINE
POWER, AND
THAT’S IT’
armageddon – thanks, not least, to the slump in power that
preceded it. Yes, it’s a two-stroke, only worse. And better.
The H2 is a complete contrast. When it first emerged in 1972,
riders expected it to be more of the same. It is indeed that – more
straight-line power, and that’s it. Rather like a narwhal’s tooth, the
H2 is one single characteristic, taken to the extreme of extreme.
But the manner in which it delivers its claimed 74bhp is
completely different to the H1. The first clue to
their relative power characteristics is revealed
by their tachometers. The H1 redlines just
short of 9000rpm, while the H2 hits the redzone
earlier, at 7250rpm.
As a Dutch H2 owner once told me, in his
impeccable English: “This bike is like riding a
wall of torque”. Indeed, the huge mid-range
power feels far more like a four-stroke than a
peaky, pipey two-cycle motor.
Jump on either of the bikes and your first task is to get
accustomed to Kawasaki’s strange old habit of putting neutral at
the bottom of the gearbox. There’s nothing quite as embarrassing
as giving it a handful in front of a crowd, dropping the clutch, and
moving forward not an inch. It’s a problem that can prove
seriously dangerous at junctions.
With the H2, first impressions also include the bike’s
considerable vibration. Some of these 750s’ cranks are so poorly
balanced that it’s like holding on to a jackhammer. This one is
comparatively civil. Open the taps and you are rewarded with a
deep, guttural roar. The power delivery is so gloopily thick that it’s
Q Two unsuspecting
passers-by are subjected
to the ‘all-seductive aura
of candy-flake lethality’
on Brighton prom
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