and the competition….
you first saw richard’s goldwing work on bM at the beginning of the year with his 1976 gl1000, the condor.
he’s since gone very slightly raw with this gl1000 bobber, “ol’ sparky,” finished this last november:
the goldwing was introduced in 1975, the liquid-cooled flat four honda gl1000 was an amazing technical achievement. at the time, it was the world’s biggest, heaviest and second-fastest mass-produced motorcycle; second only to the mighty kawasaki z1 900cc, shown here as a modern streetfighter:
the standard z1 looked more like this (thanks mfotd) and made a whopping 80 ponies. i guess we were more innocent in the ’70’s.
the first honda goldwings were 1,000cc’s and featured belt-driven overhead cams, shaft drive, triple disk brakes, a fuel tank under the seat, counter-rotating alternator, two oil pumps, floating piston pins, detachable backup kick-start arm, and more. there was also major collaboration between honda’s motorcycle and automotive engineering teams on the first beast.
in 1979 the motor grew 1,000cc’s and by 1984 the gl was a 1,200.
richard’s bobber took approximately six months to build from the time he purchased the machine until it turned into this finished piece.
to read more about the build process and see a great gob of informative photos, visit his page at the ngw goldwing forum.
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