Commando prices surprising....

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MexicoMike

MexicoMike

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While out an about on the IOM this week, I found an unusual lack of older motos that interested me. In fact, the ones that did, with the exception of the Black Shadow I referred to in another message, were all 70's Japanese bikes like the 900 and 1000C Kawasakis, the Honda CBX, etc. 10 years ago I wouldn't have looked at them twice...or even once. So obviously my taste/opinion has changed, but that's not the point of this post.

Having trouble sleeping last night I got on the UK auto trader motorcycle section and started looking for some of these old bikes. What I found was that with a very few exceptions, the '70's Japanese bikes I liked were all selling for at least 2x the price of a Norton Commando. Typical decent Commandos were in the £5-7k range! The least expensive CBX I could find was around £14k. The KZ Kawasakis were more - up to £20k. Yes, you can get a CB750 Honda for the price of a Commando but I would have thought the Commando, being produced in far fewer numbers would bring considerably more money than the CB 750...or the Kawasakis. I was really shocked at the price of the Kawasaki Mach III and IV. They were even higher than the KZ! Having owned a Mach III back in the day :eek:, I REALLY don't understand that! :rolleyes:

The world's gone mad! o_O
 
Couple of recent NZ sales
Best features
MkIII had CNW Starter
MII had Maney light weight crank
 

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Not disputing what might be in their mag, but online they show:

Used Bikes for Sale - Autotrader UK

www.autotrader.co.uk www.autotrader.co.uk

Anything ebay below £7k is usually US import requiring work and registering........ or customized!!!!

norton commando | eBay

Find great deals on eBay for norton commando. Shop with confidence.
www.ebay.co.uk

But from daily browsing of 'classic' cars there's an awful lot of nice stuff unsold, customers and interest dying off, perhaps?
 
MexicoMike said:
While out an about on the IOM this week, I found an unusual lack of older motos that interested me. In fact, the ones that did, with the exception of the Black Shadow I referred to in another message, were all 70's Japanese bikes like the 900 and 1000C Kawasakis, the Honda CBX, etc. 10 years ago I wouldn't have looked at them twice...or even once. So obviously my taste/opinion has changed, but that's not the point of this post.

Having trouble sleeping last night I got on the UK auto trader motorcycle section and started looking for some of these old bikes. What I found was that with a very few exceptions, the '70's Japanese bikes I liked were all selling for at least 2x the price of a Norton Commando. Typical decent Commandos were in the £5-7k range! The least expensive CBX I could find was around £14k. The KZ Kawasakis were more - up to £20k. Yes, you can get a CB750 Honda for the price of a Commando but I would have thought the Commando, being produced in far fewer numbers would bring considerably more money than the CB 750...or the Kawasakis. I was really shocked at the price of the Kawasaki Mach III and IV. They were even higher than the KZ! Having owned a Mach III back in the day :eek:, I REALLY don't understand that! :rolleyes:

The world's gone mad! o_O
Click to expand...
Generally the Japanese bikes from the same era are more expensive than British bikes now
Have you seen the price of a a fizzy these days
Or an Elsie or RD ?
Admittedly a lot of them are for sale prices
And not what they actually sell for
 
Try to find bits like exhaust systems for some of these Japanese bikes - not nearly as well supported as the Commando but with the rising value perhaps that may change.
 
Mark Savage said:
Corrected for you...

tongue in cheek emoji...
Click to expand...
Hiding my head in shame here.... 'somebody I know'... ;-)... has an amount of 'O' gauge model railway locos hanging on his wall, collected over the years....
Current value??? F*ck all!! There is zip/zero/niente interest in the stuff these days. Adverts spring up, and stay there, week upon week.
One large retailer commissioned a range of locos/carriages/wagons, within six months they were being advertised 'at cost'.
My bike attracts very little attention from youngsters, luckily I've never bought 'for investment'. As I've said before, I reckon it could easily end up as 'landfill' because I reckon the marketplace when I expect/hope to die will have shrunk due to a myriad of mitigating circumstances.....

IMHO :-)
 
EstuaryBoy said:
Hiding my head in shame here.... 'somebody I know'... ;-)... has an amount of 'O' gauge model railway locos hanging on his wall, collected over the years....
Current value??? F*ck all!! There is zip/zero/niente interest in the stuff these days. Adverts spring up, and stay there, week upon week.
One large retailer commissioned a range of locos/carriages/wagons, within six months they were being advertised 'at cost'.
My bike attracts very little attention from youngsters, luckily I've never bought 'for investment'. As I've said before, I reckon it could easily end up as 'landfill' because I reckon the marketplace when I expect/hope to die will have shrunk due to a myriad of mitigating circumstances.....

IMHO :)
Click to expand...
American Flyer or Lionel?
 
The Black Shadow man was likely sitting on the biggest heap of declining assets.
Those bikes saw their peak valuation about 5 years ago.

Glen
 
The answer lies in the survey of ages frequenting this forum. Commandos were the bikes of our youth.

The same happened with cars like Model A Fords. An older generation loved them and the prices went up. Those folks died off , prices went way down, and the mussel cars took over as the cars of a groups youth. Maybe in the future computer tuned cars with those ridiculous wings will be collected. I can hardly stomach them but perhaps my parents may have thought of the mussel cars the same way,,nah.
 
A friend just bought a 1974 Z1a. Only seen photos of the bike, but it looks good. He paid ~£17k for it. Cool in that he also has a modern Z900, and the Z1 is the same colour scheme. Other bikes he looked at were in the £20k range.
 
JimNH said:
The answer lies in the survey of ages frequenting this forum. Commandos were the bikes of our youth.

The same happened with cars like Model A Fords. An older generation loved them and the prices went up. Those folks died off , prices went way down, and the mussel cars took over as the cars of a groups youth. Maybe in the future computer tuned cars with those ridiculous wings will be collected. I can hardly stomach them but perhaps my parents may have thought of the mussel cars the same way,,nah.
Click to expand...
Mussel cars? I prefer clam cars personally. ;-)
 
A lot of young guys look at our old bikes with envy. They don't realise why we have them. Usually it is because we had them back then and kept them. The only modern bike I have ridden was a VFR400 Honda. It did everything perfectly. I think the kids ride those sorts of bikes and never know why old bikes are so attractive. When I ride a motorcycle, I like to feel the hairs growing on my chest. If you ride an H2 Kawasaki two-stroke fast, it will probably scare you shitless - that is not what I am talking about. A 1963 Triumph Bonneville is the real deal. A Commando would be good, but it is de-tuned Atlas. A Norton 650 SS might be the best. But the 1963 Bonneville handles just as good.
My brother has a friend who has a 1963 Bonneville. He walked out of a shop to discover some bikie gang members loading it into a utility truck.
 
acotrel said:
A lot of young guys look at our old bikes with envy. They don't realise why we have them. Usually it is because we had them back then and kept them. The only modern bike I have ridden was a VFR400 Honda. It did everything perfectly. I think the kids ride those sorts of bikes and never know why old bikes are so attractive. When I ride a motorcycle, I like to feel the hairs growing on my chest. If you ride an H2 Kawasaki two-stroke fast, it will probably scare you shitless - that is not what I am talking about. A 1963 Triumph Bonneville is the real deal. A Commando would be good, but it is de-tuned Atlas. A Norton 650 SS might be the best. But the 1963 Bonneville handles just as good.
My brother has a friend who has a 1963 Bonneville. He walked out of a shop to discover some bikie gang members loading it into a utility truck.
Click to expand...
I hope your brothers friend retrieved his 63 back off the bastards
 
One of my friends worked for S.R.Evans in Melbourne doing predelivery on Nortons and Japanese bikes. They use to take them to the Richmond Boulevard tp road test them. The Nortons were right up there with the H2 and H1 Kawasakis. I would never have believed that was the case. Back in those days, we did not buy many new bikes, so we did not really know the comparisons. Even these days, there are probably not many people who know what a Commando can do. I once saw a good rider win an A Grade All Powers race with an 850 Commando - in about 1973. There were some very fast bikes in that class back then.
 
Most of my Norton and Triumph customers are in the 40s and 50s and got into British bikes in their late 30s and 40s. They are generally too busy to hang out here with us old guys! Small sample size but there is still an allure to motorcycles that look like motorcycles. So many modern bikes look like a couple of wheels with an uncomfortable mess in-between, IMHO.

I've owned Triumphs since 1968 so I'm certainly not against them, but what the devil? Is there a frame and engine somewhere in there and I assume a cup is need to ride it. Maybe it stings like the wasp it resembles? Probably fast though :)


2018-Triumph-Speed-Triple-RS-Review-Sport-motorcycle-5.jpg
 
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