"I just had to have this Honda"
Every now and then a motorcycle comes along that you "just have to have", and that's exactly what happened when Jørgen Lund heard about a Honda CL450. Even though his garage at home in Gjerdrum was already well-stocked with heavy and fast asphalt burners, he just had to have this off-roader. A "ground-breaker" for speed and excitement on gravel forest roads can be a fun experience.
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Jørgen Lund from Gjerdrum was well into his teens when his interest in old vehicles began. The trigger was, in short, his acquaintance with a Kawasaki H2-750. For those who know this fierce 2-stroke, it is not difficult to understand that such an acquaintance does not go completely unnoticed. For Jørgen, the H2n became more than a brief acquaintance, it became a passion and not least a career as a tuning expert on this very engine. The 3-cylinder 2-stroke that Kawasaki unleashed on a motorcycle-hungry market in 1972 can, with a little "modification", match today's superbikes from 0-100 km/h. In classic drag racing, where Jørgen has gradually gained many customers, the triple is hot and it holds up.
Not just 2-strokes in the garage
Now, however, Jørgen's horizon is wide, despite the fact that the garage is reasonably well-stocked with several copies of the H2, and among the hysterical 2-strokes stood a somewhat rare motorcycle, which in many ways represents another extreme, namely a Honda CL450. Because where the blood-trimmed Kawasakis leave long black stripes in the asphalt, the Honda was intended for free travel on dirt roads far out on the American prairie. In other words, we are talking about off-road. If the model was not exactly intended as a 2-wheeled tiller for savage driving over logs and stones, at the time it was an offer in a segment that was growing, especially in the USA.
Lightly modified road machines
The first off-roaders were basically lightly modified road machines, and the CL 450 is no exception, rather the rule. The starting point for the model was Honda's breakthrough machine from the 1960s; the CB 450 Black Bomber. We are writing in 1965, and with this motorcycle Honda took a long and important step on the road to a leading position as a motorcycle manufacturer. It is interesting to note that in the advertising of the time Honda wrote that "You meet the nicest people on a Honda ".
Harley gets competition from outside
Knowing that Harley-Davidson was the dominant motorcycle brand in the United States at the time and that the brand was associated by many with long-haired hippies who often led a dissolute lifestyle, Honda positioned itself as far more "stuerene". Harley-Davidson by comparison, had no model to offer in the off-road segment, but was to get one through a collaboration with the Italian Aermacchi. The result of this collaboration resulted in the small 2-stroke SX250, confusingly similar to Yamaha's DT250.
Growth, prosperity and new motorcycle models
The 1960s were an important decade in American and European economic history, where Norway also experienced increased growth for both the working class and the middle class. The shadow of the war had faded away, purchasing power was increasing and new consumer goods were becoming available. The MC manufacturers had of course proven themselves with this development, and the model segment was expanded. The CL450 was in many ways a classic Street Scrambler, or trial as some chose to call this type of motorcycle. The latter term is somewhat misleading, however, because the trial machines as we know them today already existed in more or less the same form as early as the 1960s.
Street scrambler
The street scramblers differed from the street model with simple features; a cross handlebar, knobby tires, and not least a high-mounted exhaust system. So all you had to do was find the nearest dirt road and give it a go. If we look at contemporary motorcycle brochures, from the 1960s and 1970s, the advertising images for this type of motorcycle are often taken far outside the urban asphalt jungle. Forested hills, mountains and open plains formed the background, and gave associations of free movement on a motorcycle, almost like a separate adventure adventure.
Liberal road traffic law
This was more or less legal in many American states due to the liberal road traffic laws. This opened up a new segment in which the CL450 was one of the pioneer machines. The model was produced from 1968 to 1975. As a never-so-small curiosity, we can mention that it was possible to buy a conversion kit for the CB450 as early as 1967. This consisted of a higher seat, cross bars and a high-mounted exhaust system. Over time, these street scramblers developed into more pure off-road machines as we know them from, among others, Yamaha's DT series, Suzuki's TS series, and not least Honda's XL series, which replaced the CL series in the 70s.
