Katana Owners Club U.K.

Just a quick enquiry - does anyone have a vague idea of how many pop-ups are still in one piece in the UK? So bikes that are on the road or in storage, but not ones that have been broken up and sold off as parts, but may still be registered in the UK? The 'how many left' website only has numbers for all variants of 'GSX750'. Cheers!

Did you get your pop-up rebuilt?

In reality there is no way of knowing, there was no way knowing how many came in to UK in 1986 or how many came in in the grey market boom in the late 80's early 90's.

A good number have moved on to other parts of Europe after being imported here.

I suppose we are the best option to guesstimate I wouldn't expect more than 20 actually road worthy machines.
These find out websites are less than useless they depend on information no one want to depart.

Do we have a register? If so, I'm happy to provide my bike's details, if not, might it be worth doing?

I did try to get a register for each of the models some years ago, but there was no interest ....in fact many people asked why?
The reality was it could have been useful as a history of each machine and useful when the magazines come a calling.
Any register we do can't be complete unfortunately as there are many Kat owners out there who won't join the club for various reasons so we can't compile their machines .

Well 1 here checking in

I have one of Malc's old ones, one of the 'original 25' full power pop ups which I bought off him early this year.



Just been and bought a new battery for it today funnily enough!

I'd like to see a register. I did a register for another limited bike on another forum and we've actually identified nearly half of the run!

Cheers
Nito

The register of pop ups really fails because there isn't any concrete proof of the actual numbers imported in '86 , but then from ' 91 through to 96 the grey import hey day brought in more. But again no concrete numbers . Said that before haven't I ...mmmmmm

Nice to see Malcs old machine is being used,,

Cheers, yes it had some light use this year and has just been sorn'd this month until April. It'll probably get treated to new tyres next year.

I guess all you can do is quantify/claim the ones that are here on the forum so at least there is a resource/mechanism, maybe as a sticky in the pop up section for owners to check in?!

Yes could do that , we will look into it ? Will give it some thought ref info required etc
Nito you may need new tyres before the trip to Denmark in August then eh?

We would recommend BT 45 Bridgestones as best for this machine.

Cheers Fossie,

As a life long Pirelli fan I think I'm going to give the Pirelli Sport Demon tyres a go. Size wise, I think I'll be fitting;

120/80/16 Fr
130/80/18 Rr

Fitted at the moment to the bike is;
110/90/16 (which isn't an ideal fitment) although I was given a 120/80/16 Bridgestone with the bike also but I'll be fitting new as no idea on the age of that tyre.
130/80/18Rr. t has Avon Roadriders fitted at the moment, plenty of tread on them but the rear has a very slow puncture I think as I need to top it off every now and then and the front isn't the correct fitment for the bike, it's pretty tight clearance width wise against the front mudguard.