Suzuki Katana Feature Bike

In January of 1988 at the ripe old age of 22 I decided that I'd had enough of looning around on LC's and should really grow up a bit. Anyway, now that I was working I could afford the insurance premium on a bigger bike. There was only ever one bike that I'd chop my LC in for and that was the amazing Suzuki Katana. Having previously owned a shed full of LC's and a handful of Suzy four strokes it sort of fitted with the general trend.

Now East Yorkshire isn't exactly heaving at the seems with Katanas and January is a particularly bad time of year to buy any bike. But sure enough just when I though my luck was out 2 turned up at the same time. As both were about the same price I decided to go for the one which had been a little tarted up and reputed to have previously won the UK Marlboro production championship (who knows if it really did). Anyway, Ł1900 was laid out and we arranged to collect the bike the following Saturday. Now with this being January the weather decided that it was time to start doing January type things so my first ride on a bike bigger than 550cc was inevitably in the snow and what had looked like tread on the front tyre was just the vaguest remnants of the ME33 tread pattern which was picked out in the dust from the garage floor.

However, the ride home was actually pretty uneventful although the motor was a little rough everything seemed OK. That was until a few days later when the motor wouldn't turn over - yes you guessed it the old Suzuki Regulator/Rectifier gremlin had struck. Unfortunately having just laid out all my money on the bike and insurance I couldn't afford the replacement so I decided to just charge the battery up and run a total loss system. I don't know who's idea it was to put the battery under the air box but sure as hell it didn't help. As this situation lasted for some time I eventually got the job down to around 30 seconds.

That summer I decided that it would be cool to get the bike to a drag strip. Never having even seen a drag strip before I was a little apprehensive and particularly concerned about the life of the rear tyre. But my apprehensions were soon allayed as I managed to post a respectable 11.11 @ 125mph which given the motor was almost standard isn't at all bad for a beginner.

British bikes seem to have an undeserved reputation for being unreliable and leaky. Well at least that's what I thought until I parked up next to a Norton in the centre of Norwich one day. When I came back to the bike I found it completely covered in oil, now I don't just mean a fine haze, I talking enough oil to fire a small power station for a year. It was literally running down the side of the Kat and had seemed to get just about everywhere. God only knows what had happened but I think it safe to say it was both expensive and terminal.

Now all the time I'd had the Kat I hadn't actually gotten rid of the LC, in fact it had turned into two LC's and a Power Valve. As I also had a GT185 I was starting to wonder what I was doing with all these bikes. I needed a deposit for an apartment and the Kat was the highest value machine which was probably the least used because of it's cost so it was time for us to say our farewells.

The Kat subsequently turned up in issue 17 of Streetfighters and was almost unrecognisable - in fact the only reason I knew it was mine was the fact I'd seen the registration number on an earlier picture. It was now sporting full GSX-R running gear and a very smart Harris Magnum II tail unit and a gorgeous new paint set. I'm glad it went to a good home.