Honda CX500 Specs - Honda CX500 Review

The Honda CX500 has to be arguably one of the most far sighted creations of a motorcycle to be released over the last 30 years. Unique in concept, progressive in engineering, and incredibly long lived, in fact it was a milestone in motorcycle design. Just have a look at the spec; water cooling and shaft drive, a low maintenance 4 valve per cylinder engine and of course tubeless tyres. The first motorcycle to have them fitted as standard. think of the effect when it was launched back in 1978.

Confirmation of some very radical thinking shone through in every feature of the CX. The angle of the vee twin engine was only 80 degrees, and not the customary 90, thus allowing the bike to be a lot narrower. As a consequence that omitted 10 degrees did result in fractionally more vibration, but this however was not really sufficient to worry about. Even the cylinder heads integrated a slight twist to angle the carbs inwards to prevent them striking the riders knees.

Of course due to this twist, the fitting of overhead cams were impossible, so the four valves per cylinder were operated by push rods. Yet in spite of this setback the CX still had a 9750 rpm rev limit. The clutch was also geared to rotate in the opposite direction of the crankshaft, thus cancelling out any torque reaction. It also had a brilliant elevated riding position in addition to a massive seat and handled very well for the standards of the day, having a top speed of around 105mph which was pretty respectable at the time and of course it was extremely competitively priced.

Major criticisms when it was launched ended up being incredibly few and were restricted to its weight which at 467ibs for a 500 the CX was a bit of a porker. Furthermore the mass was carried high up due to Honda's designer Soichiro Iramajiri placing the crankshaft higher than the gearbox. As a result the CX was a little top heavy, but this did little to dent the testers rave reviews. Even the camchain tensioner gremlins that troubled the very early versions did very little to dent overall sales.

1980 saw Honda launch the CX 500A this was a small superficial tart up with better colours and a small fly screen included with the instrument cowling. A year later came the B model almost identical except for having black wheels.

1981 saw the custom version arrive having the then customary stepped seat, pull back bars and 16 inch rear wheel which was overlooked by everyone except the short in stature who found that this was a CX they could sit on.

1982 saw the massive change with the launch of the CX500 Turbo, the CX500 Eurosport and the CX500 Silver Wing. the turbo was a technological revolution and also  the Eurosport took over as the basic CX. Essentially the engine remained unchanged but the framework now boasted Honda's pro-link rear suspension, twin pot caliper front brakes, anti dive forks and a more sleeker styling. Unfortunately it was still heavy and having undergone a major price rise no longer cheap, in comparison to the new crop of sports 550's being unveiled. The Silver-Wing wore the top half of a Gold Wing faring with a colour matched luggage set making it even more, if not far to heavy for a 500 but additionally very expensive,  as a result it sold in very restricted numbers.
Late 1983 saw Honda enlarge the capacity which was increased to 650. This truly changed the CX Eurosport into an excellent all round motorcycle and gave the CX Turbo truly blistering performance. Sadly this was the swan song for the CX and it was dropped from the Honda Motorcycle range in 1985

Very little really, there was in fact just one major snag apart from a dodgy batch of big end bearings relating to the very early models and that was the camchain tensioner. Despite being a pushrod engine the CX500 cams were still driven by a chain and the uneven firing sequence and unusual cam profile put more than usual strain on the chain and broke the tensioner. Honda released modification after modification and eventually had it sorted with the CX500A. Thankfully every one of the mods can be retro fitted to all the earlier bikes and thus any rattly CX vanished into history. Any bike on the market now should have been well sorted. Other than that very little in the way of parts are needed, alternators can burn out relatively quickly, and the odd water leak from the back of the engine usually showed up on abused motors. Valves could sink into the four valve head, but this was more often than not only found on high mileage engines well over 80,000 miles or more. If looked after the Honda CX500 is more than capable of phenomenal mileages..

Personally for classic collect-ability I would go for an original CX500 A or B model which are the best looking, with better paint and that little fly screen really finishes it off. As always buy the best that you can afford, restoring a worn out CX500 can be expensive, so avoid anything that smokes or rattles and always if possible check out the charging system. The Custom model has always been in lower demand, and can be found at bargain prices. Personally I would avoid the Silver Wing, for me its slow, wallowy and looks horrible. If you can find one, any of of the Turbo models would be a true classic. The Honda CX650 Turbo, would be my choice as it was faster, had a lot more torque and overall a far nicer bike to ride than the 500 version..