Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/127255
, . . - - -. , - - - - - -- ~ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -- - - - - - - - - - - --- - - RIDING IMPRESSION HondaCIIR600F ยท ~ (Left) H onda's CBR600F is based on the three-year-old Hurricane model, but it's still an excellent all-around street bike. (Below) Comfortable seating po sition, neu tral steering and strong brakes make it a good handler, but its spindly fork tu bes and underdampe d shock are taxe d by ro ugh roads. where its only limitatio n is marginal ground clearance. It's fairly easy to drag the footpeg on the left side, while the pipe touches down - first on the right. Around town, it's hard to fault the CBR. Whi le other testers have slighted the CBR's ergo no mics - especia lly with regard to taller riders - we had no such com p laints. Our tall est tester is 6' 1" tall, and he found the CBR 's acco mmoda tio ns to be' relatively spacious, even during long sti nts in the saddle (at least within the confines of the bike's 4.4-gallon fuel tank, which hits reserve at 130 miles). The allenvelo p ing fairing offers excellent wind protection, and the riding positio n' though sporting, is far less racer: like tha n that of th e Yamaha FZR600. In terms of comfort, we found the A Hurricane by any other name By Br ia n Catterson Photos by Ken Faught r en more horsepower. That's a lot in a bike that displaces just 598cc. In fact, if you believe Honda 's advertising, it's nearl y a 10% in crease over the o utput of las t year's CBR600. H ow m u ch ho rsep o wer a re we ta l king? We ll, H onda spo kes me n won ' t disclose performa nce fig ures, but sub tly hidden away in th eir dealer sales literature is a sente nce sta ting: "Compact 598cc DOHC liquid-cooled in-line four-cylinder engine produces a phen omen al 155 horsepower per lit er . . ." Do a little math and you 'll find that th e J apanese manufacturer is claiming a whopping 93 bhp at the cou n tershaft for the little 600, in a u nderhanded sort of way. Winds of ch ange Ten more horsepower. H onda didn 't do anything radi ca l to achieve this performance boost. The CBR was already a capab le performer - i t just need ed a new lease on life. Honda engineers simp ly juggled th e cam timing ' for more peak power, redesigned the four-valve combustion cha mbers and pistons to raise the compression ratio from 11.0:I to 11.3:I, and added a black-painted, stainless steel, four -into-one exhaust system to improve flow . Carburetion settings and ignition advance were also altered - to comp lement the other changes. On the drive train side, the clutch was strengthened to better cope with the additional power output, wh ile the shi ft fork was modified to help prevent missed sh ifts in the close-ratio . . sixspe ed tran smission - a frequ ent problem with past CBRs. Say it ain't so, Hugo 34 We'd love to go on record as saying th at this power increase translates to (Left) Honda claims 10 more horsepower for the Fvmodel's engine, achieved through changes in cam timing and compression ratio, and the addition of a Ireer-Ilowing exhaust. (Right) Fairing does a good job of protecting the rider from th e windblast. a substantial performan ce boost, but .in plain truth, it just isn' t so. In backto-back co mpa riso n testing with an original 1987 H urricane, th e 1990 CBR600F felt on ly marginally faster on the top end, but with a noticeable loss in mid-range power. Nothing dramatic. The most noticeabl e improvement .o n the '90 mod el is the crisp throttle response from its bankof four 32mm CV Keihi n carb uretors . The engine builds revs quickly, with power com ing in hard at 6000 rpm and peaking at abou t II-grand, then tapering off to th e 12,000 rpm red lin e. It 's a n excellent powerplant, with o n ly occasiona l false neutrals detr acting from its otherwise stellar performan ce. Un fort unately, whil e Honda went to great lengths to hop up th e CBR 's motor , they totall y neglected the bike's chassis and running gear. and as a result these are its weakest po ints . While the Hurricane's twin-spar steel fram e was mor e than adequate when it was first introduced three year s ago, it' s.sadly lacki ng in compa rison to th e com pe titio n 's latest offerings. espe ci ally to th e Kawasaki ZX6' s a ll-. a luminum piece. The CBR' s Showa .suspensio n compo nen ts are plush on the freeway, but on a tight, twisty, bumpy road the spindly 37mm fork with T RAC anti-dive and underdamped single shock just can't keep up. There's not mu ch the owner can do to help the fork since its only adjustment is through air pressure valves at the top of the fork legs; the shock o ffers more in th e way of adjustability with three-way rebound damping and seven-way spring preload. The narrow, 17-inch Bridgestone Exedra bias-ply tires are also below pa r. Though they work fine on the sma lle r Honda Hawk and CB-I , the CBR 's additional weight and (especiall y) power cause them to break traction with a la r m in g reg u lari ty. Fortunately, they'r e quite predictable as well as forgiving. High performan ce rubber wou ld improve traction , but wo uld likely overwhelm the sus pe n sio n compon ents even further. On th e posi tive side, the CBR's neutral steering, nimb le ha ndling and pow erfu l dual front disc brakes with two -piston Nissin calipers make it a pl easure to ride fast on a smooth road, bike's only real shortcoming to be engine vibration, which resulted in a slight tingling in . the rider's fingers an d toes. Taken by storm When the Hurricane was first released back . in 1987, it took th e middleweight sport bike market by storm. Not only was it the best th ing going on the street, but in the hand s of road racers such as Doug Polen and Thomas Stevens, those first Hurri canes thoroughly dominated the thennew 600cc Supers port class. And Honda sold them in droves. . One year later, a certain Senator Danfort h, misled by the insurance industry, shook up the motorcycle ind ustry by proposing legislation to ban the so- ca lled "killer b ikes. " Meanwhile, a number of insurance companies ha d take n the matter a step fu rther by blacklisting certa in sport bikes, one of whi ch was the H ond a Hurricane. . Fortu nately, the AMA convinced Danforth and the insurance industry that they were mis informed, and the resu lt was that Danforth dropped his legislatio n, and most of the in suran ce