Topic: Japauto anyone?

[Raul CB750K1]

Japauto was the french Honda importer back in the 70's. They made their own interpretation of the Honda superbike. Some Japautos did come to Spain, but only the deep-pocketed could afford it. To the cost of the new bike you had to add the cost of the Japauto parts and labour, that is, the Japauto was about three times more expensive than a bone-stock CB750.

I have read a lot about them, but never saw one in the flesh. Until a couple weeks ago.

I spent my holidays on Salamanca, over my in-laws. There is a small, neat automobile museum there. I've been there a few times -not many motor-related activities in such a small city-. This time I was delighted to see that the last floor was dedicated to the motorcycle, with bikes from private collectors. And there there was, not only a CB750K2, CBX1000 or Goldwing, but a Japauto. Check the 1000 cc cylinders with the stock head.

[Raul CB750K1]

It is pointless to put more bike pictures -you know what a bike or car museum looks like-, but I thought you would find this interesting. In 1920, electric motors were not that cheap. Shops had only one electric motor, and with pulleys and leather belts they could use the motor energy to spin all the "hand tools" such as drill, buffing wheel, grinding stone etc. and the lathe as well.

[Bob550four]

its truly amazing how far we've come.   that japauto bike is sweet looking.

[gerhed]

Great museum- I especially like the shop display.
The Smithsonian in D.C. (Arts and Industries Bldg,) used to have a similar display
and they would start it up on Saturdays--the building has since been "renovated" and
all the good stuff is missing   !

[ekim98]

I worked in a machine shop that still had the belt drive system in the back bay but nolonger in use. I'll bet it got quite noisey with those belts flapping all the time.

That's one nice looking bike. Really like the tank and seat.

[MRieck]

 That cylinder block sure looks better than those RC units.

[Bodi]

The overhead drive system in factories and shops goes way back to water power. You can't have a water wheel for every machine! When steam engines appeared one could put a factory anywhere - not just beside a river. That's what allowed the mechanical revolution... rivers can't power infinite water wheels but you can have as many steam engines as you can supply coal for. Steam engines are labour intensive though, you need an expert operator and help to handle the coal and ashes. Plus they explode. So gasoline engines supplanted the steamers and electric motors replaced them where the electricity was available. All the machinery of the time was overhead drive, so factories were still built to use it. You didn't want a gasolie engine at every machine, and electric motors were large and dangerous in their way too. Once small efficient electric motors were invented self-powered machines appeared.
Several years ago I helped rebuild a overhead shaft powered blacksmith shop for a film project. The coolest machine was a triphammer, when you hook up the belt it raises and drops a nasty big hammer on an impressively large anvil and makes a hellish noise, and lots of sparks shoot out if you happen to have some red hot iron in between. Power was from an antique gas engine with a 5' flywheel with a mecahnical governor that held the exhaust valve open and inhibited the spark above the desired RPM.

[turboguzzi]

It's not only the overhead drive system that shows you how much we advanced..... those Japauto's could make their way to spain as they were (re) "assembled" in france. During Franco's reign, hardly any imports were allowed into spain, surely not from lowly Japan!! but something made in neighbouring France could be somehow let into the country.

TG

[Raul CB750K1]

It's not only the overhead drive system that shows you how much we advanced..... those Japauto's could make their way to spain as they were (re) "assembled" in france. During Franco's reign, hardly any imports were allowed into spain, surely not from lowly Japan!! but something made in neighbouring France could be somehow let into the country.

TG

Exactly. During Franco's dictatorship, there was an international embargo and we had to make everything pretty much ourselves -I mean our parents-. In the last two decades or so, the rest of the World loosen up a bit, and so did Franco. Little by little imports were permitted, but depended from where. For example, the car that motorized the country was the Seat 600, a clone of the Fiat 500 and built under licence. The same happened with Ducati, NSU, MV Agusta and many other marques that were built in Spain under license.


I have talked before about my Yamaha-engined Sanglas bike. The government let Sanglas buy japanese engines, under the condition that the rest of the bike would be spanish-made. Even the carbs had to be spanish-made Amals, and so the later Sanglas are easier to mantain because they had the original Mikunis. In order to let import a japanese bike, it had to have a given percentage of parts manufactured in Europe -as with the Japauto- or you must have friends among the politicians. When you had to wait almost a year to get your telephone line, a friend in the high ranks could get your telephone installed in a couple weeks. And the same goes about registering a bike.

Anyway, the Japautos had a great reputation, and surely they deserved it. I opened this thread because I thought many of you never heard about them before, as Rickman, Egli or Tracy are more known.

[Jerry Rxman Griffin aka MuthaF'er]

Nice shots Raul. First I've seen. Now if I could just get my hands on those cylinders! 

[MRieck]

Nice shots Raul. First I've seen. Now if I could just get my hands on those cylinders! 

Yeah....I'd use those too Jerry.

[sohc4]

Besides their 950SS and VX1000 kits (the first used the stock block while the latter had their own), Japauto also heavily engaged in endurance racing.  They were using Dresda chassis, but also built their own chassis nicknamed 'Panthere':

http://www.satanicmechanic.org/japauto.shtml

Despite the fact their big bore kits were labeled 950 and 1000, they all had 70mm bore and 970cc displacement.

They were using (cast) pistons manufactured by JPX, see

http://www.satanicmechanic.org/bigbore.shtml

and scroll down to 70mm.

My Japauto kit came with my Martin Honda, which could be imported to Spain because it was considered a French make (Martin chassis and Japauto engine - they even stamped in their own engine number 1000VX1172 to make it a French engine.):

http://www.satanicmechanic.org/martin.shtml

Cheers,
Axl

[Jerry Rxman Griffin aka MuthaF'er]

Axl,

Your website is really looking good! Keep up the ongoing improvements.