Pricey Z1 900!

[tommymck]

$50K

fast forward to 4:20

[GoldOxide_imp]

Sweet.

I wonder what the new owner's recreation room looks like where this little pretty thing will be parked.

[tommymck]

thats stupid. i actually know Rick Brett who owned the original NY steak bike a few years ago, the ONE press bike/prototype. If you don't know who RB is, look him up. And yes, he rode it around, restored it correctly and sold it maybe 10 yrs ago?.

This is what's wrong with the vintage market, over priced, over restored bikes that will never be ridden again bought and sold as commodities w people with more money than they know what to do with and nothing else. Very similar to the muscle car market in the late 90s early 2000s. Darn shame.

Part of me agrees completely with you... But on the other hand, I suppose that if all of these bikes are just ridden into the ground, in a few years, there won't be any left. Having a few of them restored and sold off (even for silly money) at least keeps them around. Unless a bike is hopeless though, my preference is to keep them stock and do just what is needed to keep it on the road. Fully "restored" is much less interesting to me. This particular bike is a blip I think and doesn't represent the true market. Even for restored examples on a good day, it's 5x the market value. Maybe a few guys at the auction had a few too many drinks at the tables in Vegas before the bidding.

[the Ferret]

Motorcycle Classics Magazine's motto "Ride em, don't hide em"

Although the ultra-rare ones, it would sure be a shame if some knuckle head went out and totaled one.

I'm always amazed at the amount of (example) 57 Chevies I see at car shows. They must have sold a boat load of them.

[Nachodaddy]

Beautiful bikes. The other guys got pretty good deals on the later models, too. I had a '75 Kawasaki 750 twin that looked just like the Z1, but with only two pipes. Great bike and only cost $900 NEW!

[the Ferret]

It's a lot of money to ordinary Joe's like us, but shoot Charlie Sheen would put that much up his nose in a weekend

[GoldOxide_imp]

Maybe Jay Leno bought the Z1 900.

[Nachodaddy]

Maybe Jay Leno bought the Z1 900.

Jay has a 1940 Indian he has to fix now. . . as soon as his broken bones heal. Now that NBC has cancelled "Jay Leno's Garage," I hope another network picks it up, because I enjoyed watching it.

[Nachodaddy]

That would be pocket change for Leno

[tommymck]

I see plenty of museum, or near museum quality bikes being used regularly in the groups i deal with. I don't buy that logic, you can keep a bike nice and use it without 'riding it into the ground' and turning it into a beater no matter the rarity or the age. Its like saying a stuffed elephant is a good alternative to them roaming free. its not, IMHO.

what good is a bike sitting on a shelf for 10 years in some guys man cave rotting away? I've seen that happen as well, and it takes its toll, usually worse than using them by far. i get that with a few specific ones, including the original Z1, the brittons, etc .

an example, local guy to me has one of these. one of the rarest bikes ever, a Saxon laverda. its 1 of 5. ever. this is the bike that resulted in a lawsuit, and bmw put them out of business over the telelever front suspension, so therefore it also has historic significance. I took these out at a local bike night, this guy has 5 or 6 laverdas, and he rides them all.






Or one of my old bikes, which I 'lost' in the divorce, and on its way back to me now, a US import 74 Moto-Morini Strada.. 1 of 174 ever brought in in this configuration. it was a basket case, i restored it and yes, i absolutely rode it quite a bit, and will again.



the idiot i got it from was trying to turn it into a chopper. this is the day i bought it.



I could continue examples, for pages, but I mean I deal with stuff like this on a regular basis. I jus thappen to like smaller bikes by preference. I've worked on a few z1's they really aren't my cup of tea (top heavy). And that's also why the F model CB came out in 75, which IMHO, is a better bike, certainly handling wise. .02

Naw... It's more like saying that keeping a few in the zoo maybe isn't so horrible if many of the remaining elephants are all getting turned into cafe racers or choppers or are rotting away in barns for another 30 years. I certainly wasn't advocating that they shouldn't be ridden, and personally couldn't imagine doing it any other way. I'm just not sure that somebody overpaying for an overly blingy restoration is all that terrible. And there isn't anything that says that this particular bike won't be ridden by whoever bought it. I doubt that the overall market for Z1s is going to be impacted by this particular sale.