The Honda Motra
Some will say it’s no Motocompo, but you gotta admit the Honda Motra has style. Hardcore military style, that is. Welcome to a new episode of “cool gadget things from the past”. This is a bike I just spotted the other day in front of the Shibuya Underpass Cafe.
The Motra is a 49cc bike that was built in the 80’s (started in 1982), weighs 76kg, and comes in two colors: dark yellow and military green. The total length is 1665mm, width is 740mm, and total height 975mm. I’m not sure if it was ever used in actual army operations, I doubt it has, but owners of these little squary machines are free to believe and pretend what they want. What makes this 3 gears bike special, apart from the embossed “Honda” logo on the side, is that it can climb a hill up to 23 degrees. If you feel you need a SUV to commute to work, you probably need one of those to get your groceries from the convenient store too. In case you find one on eBay, remember the original price was 165,000 yen (1650 US$).
For more info and great photos, more cool links are available here (really cool photos at the bottom of the page), here (Motra Owner’s Club, in Japanese), and here (great pics, parts, remodeling manual etc). Anyway, get one now, before I found yet another gem from the past and I post it here…
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