Katana Owners Club U.K.

Did the US 1000 Kats really have CV carbs instead of flat sides?

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre ... 2767124628

Yes they did and that one has the 85mph speedo!

http://www.classic-car-history.com/85-mph-speedo.htm

UB

yep, the slide carbs give a performanc boost, but they were too dirty to allow the kat 1000 to get through some of the north american states strict emissions regs, so kat thousands sold in the american market were fitted with the cv carbs that the 1100's got. the 85mph speeedo is another north american thing, the logic was that if the blanket speeed limit was 55mph (remember this is just after the oil crisis) then the spec for vehicles was set to discourage excessive speeding, so regardless of the vehicles top speed, their speedos could only allow 30mph over thee maximum posted speed limit, hence 55mph plus 30 gves 85mph. this was supposedly to stop people bragging about how fast they were going or how fast theyre thought they could go, if you couldnt see the speedo saying 120mph, the idea assumes, then you arent going to actually try and do it....

the other giveaways to a north american model are the side reflectors, orange at the front, red at the rear, another american legality, and the slightly different tailpiece, which if you notice is slightly extended at the top so that it sticks out over thee tail light, i think its because us construction regs stated that the tail light needed to be a fixed distance behind the rear wheel spindle.

having said all that, thats a realistically priced tidy katana and is probably worth every single penny.