Five Awesome Bikes for Under £5,000
August 19, 2019
It’s high time we get some features about motorbikes here on Car & Classic. We would have done it sooner, but our Editor can’t ride a bike and as such, he knows very little about them. Worry not though, as we have drafted in Chris Vardon, a seasoned rider who knows the good from bad. And for his first piece, we tasked him with finding five great bikes from the listings on Car & Classic – the only catch being a firm five grand budget. Chris, over to you…
You’ve got £5k to throw about and you want to relive your younger years by picking up a classic sports bike (though quite possibly dodging the admirable, albeit also lamentable, madness that was the ‘80s trend of bolting turbochargers onto mid to higher displacement bikes with skinny tyres). Ok, so add on another 5K and I’d have the GPZ 750 Turbo that’s currently listed quicker than you could say ‘Oh god why did people think this was a good idea, this is wildly unpredictable!’.
For me that idea brings up a lot of love for the mid ‘80s to mid ‘90s bikes that I grew up around, but a few other things sneak in that I think I’d have to strongly consider.
Triumph Tiger T100
Anybody who has read ‘Jupiter’s Travels’ by Ted Simon will understand why the T100 fits on the list despite my claim above that most of this list would be ‘80s/’90s machinery. From 1963 to 1967, Simon travelled through 45 countries on a T100, hilariously overloaded at every possible point.
Sure, if I were actually embarking upon a round the world trip now I’d be on a Tiger 1200, but there’s a large part of me that would love to make a trip like that on a T100 to know what it was like for Simon, and that makes more sense too with my standover-height challenged stature. That and I’d feel somewhat more legendary making an around the world trip on something without ABS and TC.
Kawasaki GPZ900R
Possibly the height of the Katana-esque ‘80s machines, certainly in terms of looks if you ask me. This one is very much a personal one, as my older brother’s GPZ750 Turbo was one of the bikes that really stuck in my memory. The 900R – with a somewhat more predictable power curve than the mad turbocharged 750 – was shorter, lighter, thinner and sharper than pretty well anything it was competing with. It was better to ride in general than the competition; it was the bike to choose then and I think is still not a bad choice now.
This one needs some minor work like a service, and also the final bit of paperwork given it’s fresh off the boat, but I think a GPZ900R in the garage is a solid move, as long as the suspension is all shifting and wiggling as it should, as it tended to seize if sat for a while. Also check the side-stand switch, which was used as an earth and can cause poor or non-running if faulty.
BMW K1
Looking like it could’ve been a large part of the inspiration for Dredd’s Lawmaster bike, it’s as eye-catching now as it was back in ’88, as well as being redder and rarer than I like my steak, which is going some. The K1 is an intriguing machine, sitting as a perfect long distance/touring machine after the wind tunnel time that went into the fairing designs; creating a remarkably aerodynamic shape.
That shape does unfortunately have a habit of trapping heat possibly too much, though being a year-round rider I’m unconvinced that’d be a horrible thing a lot of the time in the UK – especially coupled with the factory heated grips. Not really a bike to get remarkably spirited on, but superb if you like doing miles upon miles.
Kawasaki ZXR750
Pitted against the achingly beautiful Ducati 888 and the phenomenal RC30 VFR750, the ZXR750 shouldn’t have succeeded, either on track or on the road, yet it did with Scott Russell astride it, winning the 1993 WSB. Unlike the 888 and RC30, you can pick up a ZXR750 H1/H2 (H2 possibly as the preferable choice, as they did some tweaking with the rear suspension and made it slightly less bone-fragmenting) for less than £5,000, instead of the £15,000 the 888s command, or the frankly berserk £40,000+ the RC30s are fetching.
It’s not as beautiful as either, though in my opinion it’s a damn good-looking bike and those ludicrous, completely redundant, yet totally cool hoover pipes into the tank just add to the cool factor on top of the twin headlights and sleek fairings. The ZXR750 really is a bike to get spirited on, begging you to just try to outdo it at every opportunity. Thoroughly thrilling, rewarding and fully worth buying.
Ducati 900 SS
Speaking of Ducatis, you cannot pick up an 888 for less than £5k. You can have something nearly as achingly beautiful though, namely the 900 Supersport. This example has the rare white frame option picking the beautiful tubular frame out against the smooth, slab-sided sweeping single-piece fairings, with the white wheels setting it off beautifully. Maybe it’s not aged as well as some bikes, but dressed up like this, it’s still got it somehow.
Don’t expect to spend just the £5k on it. If you do plunge into the cheaper end of Ducati ownership with a 1st gen 900 SS, as they don’t completely shirk Ducati’s reputation for problems, with snapped head studs and bent chain guides reportedly being a not uncommon concern. Terrifying. Still would.
