Kawasaki W650 Road Test And Review

In the summer of 1965, I felt pretty smug making the Sunset Boulevard run on my Honda 305cc Super Hawk. The hot Japanese two-strokes hadn't arrived in force yet, and you could shrug off Harley-Davidson's iron as overpriced, underpowered, overweight and unreliable. The big strong 750 Brit bikes--Enfields, Matchlesses and Nortons--were pretty rare on the West Coast, and they, like BSA's 650s, seemed as likely to shake themselves apart as to embarrass the Japanese middleweights. The Triumph Bonneville was another matter. We Honda riders could claim technical superiority, but the Triumph twins had better handling, were faster and much prettier.

When I heard that Kawasaki was introducing a new 650 parallel twin, I assumed the company was resurrecting its original W-series bikes (which in America were called the W1 and W2 Commanders), lightly massaged versions of a BSA pushrod twin. Those bikes, which came to the U.S. in the late 1960s, were the first "big" bikes imported in noticeable numbers from Japan. Even though the Ws were not much better than the Beezers they copied, the line had a surprisingly long production life, lasting through the 1970s in some markets.

Riding Retro

However, when the new W bike actually materialized, I was surprised to see that the machine it mimicked was a mid-1960s Triumph, not a BSA or Kawasaki 650 twin. I was also surprised at how effective an imitation it was. Kawasaki has certainly tapped into the public's interest in retro vehicles. The Drifters address our nostalgia for one era, and the W650 rediscovers an era that is probably closer to the hearts of today's motorcyclists. Though the new Triumph is reportedly recreating the Bonneville, Kawasaki has beaten it to the punch and set the standard for what the Triumph will have to achieve to compete successfully.

I was prepared to let the W650 pass without comment in this magazine because I didn't feel it fit the cruiser category. However, readers, who apparently see anything retro as having a cruiseresque appeal, didn't agree, and we received many queries about when we planned to test one. Eventually, I decided I really would rather switch than fight, and we asked Kawasaki for a W650 to sample.

Without actually copying a single piece exactly, the W650 so successfully mimics the T120R that our testers were frequently approached by people who had been fooled. One soul was so convinced that our W650 was an older bike he would not accept our answer that it was a 2000 model. On the other side of the coin, some of those who recognized it as a replica thought it was smaller than the Triumphs of a quarter-century ago. Not so. At 57.1 inches, the W650's wheelbase is actually 1.6 inches longer than the old Bonneville's and its claimed dry weight is almost 50 pounds higher (though the 1969 Bonneville we compared it to didn't have the W650s electric starter, larger battery, turn signals or many other features). Motorcycles have become steadily bigger, although we tend to assume that the bikes we remember as big and impressive were as big as the ones we ride today. It is often a surprise to sit on one and discover how small they actually were.

Kawasaki has done an impressive job of packaging modern technology in a classic manner. From the left, the air-cooled 676cc engine looks much like the Triumph 649cc twin. The shapes of the cases and the proportion of the cylinders are similar. But when you walk around to the bike's right side, the shaft that runs up to drive the single overhead camshaft via bevel gears tells you you're not in England anymore and that this is not a pushrod bike. Each cylinder has four valves, and the engine makes less mechanical noise than the original Triumphs, which reduces the engine's mechanical presence.

Sounds Right

Thanks to a 360-degree crankshaft design (where the pistons move up and down together, alternating power strokes), the W has much the same smooth, muscular-sounding exhaust cadence as the T120. However, a counterbalancer snuffs out the vertical twin's considerable vibration. Unlike the original Triumph, you can't tell if this bike is idling by just looking at the front end to see if it is shaking. There are other modern touches too, starting with mainstays such as wet-sump lubrication and working up to late-breaking news like a digital capacitor-discharge ignition system with a throttle sensor and a clean-air system that reduces exhaust emissions. Instead of the dreaded Amal carbs on the Bonneville--each with its own air cleaner--the 34mm CV carbs on the W650 share a common large airbox, which improves power and reduces intake noise.

With this kind of technology, it should come as no surprise that the W650 makes great power. Indeed, it has one of the nicest powerbands in memory. The bike will pull smoothly from below 1500 rpm, and you can ride around all day short-shifting and keeping the engine under 3000 rpm and still be impressed with its power and acceleration. But there is plenty more available when you decide to rev the engine harder. More rpm amplifies power almost all the way to the 7700-rpm redline with no surges or flat spots.

The engine is a little cold-blooded, however, and we wished it had the Triumph's pretty polished choke control on the handlebar instead of a plunger on the left side of the carbs. The clutch engages progressively with a light pull, and the five-speed gearbox shifts lightly and smoothly.