1986 Kawasaki GPZ1000RX A1

• Professionally restored by Jap Retro
• Only a couple of hundred miles since the rebuild
• Stored as part of a private collection

Kawasaki followed up its trend-setting GPz900R Ninja superbike of 1984 with the GPZ1000RX. Introduced in the autumn of 1985, Kawasaki's new flagship sports bike boasted an engine stretched to a full one litre together with a new wrap-around steel perimeter frame complete with aluminium swinging arm and Unit-Trak rear suspension. The latter had been carried over in modified form from the GPz900R, as was the air-damped front fork and anti-dive brakes. Rubber mounted in the chassis rather than a stressed member as it had been in the '900', the heavily revised engine now produced 125bhp, an increase of 13 horsepower over the smaller GPz. Sixteen-inch wheels were fitted at both ends, the rear shod with a massive (for the time) 150/80 section tyre. Wrapped around the new frame was a larger, more smoothly contoured fairing with integrated indicators, bungee hooks and passenger grab rail, its superior aerodynamics, and those extra horses, enabling the GPZ1000RX comfortably to exceed its predecessor's top speed of around 150mph despite a slight gain in weight. But while the iconic GPz900R would live on in the Kawasaki range until 1997, the GPZ1000RX lasted only a couple of years before being superseded by the ZX10. Today it is one of the rarest of the big Kawasakis.

The fastest production bike of 1986, this first-generation A1 model was acquired by our vendor a few years ago in running condition and without excessive mileage (32,528 at time of cataloguing). He wanted to return the machine to 'as new' condition so entrusted it to a professional restoration company (Jap Retro) for a total, 'last-nut-and-bolt' strip and rebuild using new parts where required. On completion the GPZ was ridden for only a couple of hundred miles and then stored in the vendor's private collection.

The rebuild is fully documented by images on a memory stick, which is available for prospective purchasers to view on request. There is also a video of the machine running, available to view on the Bonhams website. Accompanying documents include a current V5C and a quantity of MoT certificates (most recent expired 2019), while it should be noted that the HPI report records the previous colour as black. Two keys present.