Suzuki T500. From superbike to kilo banger

BV NIMAG started in 1964 with the import of Suzuki motorcycles in the Netherlands. That turned out to be a bull's eye, because in 1972 Suzuki was the best-selling motorcycle brand in our country after Honda. The patriarch of the T(itan) 500 was the Suzuki Cobra, the T500 point 1. And the 500/FIVE was the warm-up for that again. Making such a big air-cooled two-stroke two-cylinder? No one had succeeded yet! And the Suzuki Cobra was also reliable and fast. That the first-generation Suzuki T500 (with their 34mm Mikunis and worry-free port timing) had massive gas mileage? Well: you only used such a thing to drive as fast as possible from gas station to gas station.

Evolution to the Suzuki Titan

In the days of the fat Suzuki two-strokes, the average age of us motorcyclists was really about twenty-five years lower than now. The world was not yet imbued with the now all-dominant fear-mongering that sees motorcyclists stuff yellow vests into their ears to prevent visible hearing damage. And driving? You always just did that as hard as possible. Then at least you were there before anything could happen.

It was good times for the big Suzukis. And their popularity of the Suzuki T500 increased significantly when the 'Cobras' turned into 'Titans'. From scary snakes to children of gods from ancient Greece. The most important thing in that transition was that the 'T(itan) 500's were considerably less thirsty than the Cobra's due to a changed port timing and the mounting of 32 instead of 34 mm Mikuni's. The chainstay also lengthened, making the T's such brave trotters with room for two and luggage. The Cobra tanks with the now dated chrome sides disappeared and the unique 'suede' buddy seat simply got a skai jacket.

Problems and adjustments

The Suzuki Titan was the machine that had to prepare the Hamamatsu brand for the 4s. The fact that the machines were subsequently hardly changed during their entire construction period was stark proof of the soundness of the design and the quality of the execution. The actual only real pain points were the pitting that could occur on the XNUMX's sprockets^e in 5. ^e gear. That problem was caused by too little lubrication (and something complicated with rotational speeds) at high speeds plus a design flaw in the lower crankcase. Both issues were addressed for the 1973 model year. But don't buy a Suzuki T500 whose box makes the sound of a steam locomotive pulling heavily.

End of the era and lasting appreciation

The Suzuki T500 evolved – or devalued – from an absolute top model to a competitively priced discontinued model. The era of two-stroke rule was over and in the latest advertisements Nimag offered the Suzukis for an extremely competitive 3.999 guilders. The fact that the T500s have already outgrown their 'offer of the week' factor is now proven by the fact that nowadays you have to pay at least the same amount of euros for a neat copy. The T500s were – and are – beautiful, sleek machines. They steered well for their time and the engines were smooth and gave enough torque and power even at lower revs. This made the 500 cc two-stroke twin tough competition for the British 650 cc four-stroke twins, which were at an absolute low in quality at the time. This combination of properties led to very good sales and a blowout in the supplier area.