Thursday, July 31, 2008

Suzuki's Big Naked Bikes

Ever since Suzuki introduced the GS1000 the company has been a great source for big bore machines. The GS1000 and 1100 established themselves as the performance benchmark of the day, besting even the Honda CB and Kawasaki Z1. The tradition continued with the GSX series and the radically styled Katana. But the introduction of Suzuki's own plastic wrapped GSX-R series sparked a trend of "non-naked" bikes. In the 1990's Suzuki brought back their naked standard with the Bandit series. The Bandits began with air/oil cooled inline fours from the early GSX-R's, and they continue on today with their own unique liquid cooled engines. Besides these bikes there are a few odd-balls in Suzuki's history. Such as the Japanese market only GS1200SS. Suzuki's V-twin sports bikes, the TL1000S and SV1000S. Each of which offered some some stripped down big bore excitement as well. Finally there's the B-King, the wild Hayabusa based naked motorcycle.

1979 GS1000S

1981 GSX1100 Katana
2002 GS1200SS


2001 GSF1200

2007 GSF1250S
2008 B King

TL1000S/SV1000S

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