According to specialist motorcycle insurance broker Carole Nash, 30 year old motorcycles are classed as ‘vintage’ and can benefit from a number of additional features on their insurance policies. With that in mind, we at Insidebikes decided to look at some of the hottest new models from the class of 1992, to welcome some of the latest members to the club.
It was a busy year, 1992. The UK saw a General Election. It was the last ever double Olympic year, with the winter games in France and the summer games in Barcelona, while football fans were enthralled by Euro 92, which saw underdogs Denmark win against the odds.
In the motorcycling world, Wayne Gardner won his final 500cc Grand Prix at Donington Park, a controversial race best remembered for Kevin Schwantz grabbing a marshal’s oil flag after crashing out at Redgate corner. It was also the season Wayne Rainey won the last of his three world titles.
Yet another American, Doug Polen, won the second of his two world superbike titles in 1992, just the fifth year of the championship. It was at Donington Park, in April, that Carl Fogarty won his first race onboard a privately entered Ducati. The feisty Brit’s performances and great rivalries, combined with groundbreaking coverage from British broadcaster Sky Sports and a direct link to the bikes we ride on the road saw the start of a golden decade for the series.
‘Foggy’ also featured in one of the all-time great Isle of Man TT races in the summer of ’92, breaking the lap record on a Yamaha OW-01 but ultimately finishing second to Steve Hislop, whose fairytale win on the Norton rotary remains one of the most iconic TT moments.
Talking of road bikes, Britain was in love with sportbikes. Grey import 400s were arriving from Japan by the container load, while zingy two-stroke race replicas like the Kawasaki KR-1S and Suzuki RGV250 were enjoying their final fling before emissions laws would eventually render them obsolete. Meanwhile, big bruisers like the Kawasaki ZZR1100 and Yamaha FZR1000R ‘EXUP’ also sold well and laid the foundations to the modern bikes we know today.
Yamaha was also doing well with the budget XV535 Virago cruiser and introduced the humble Diversion to replace the XJ600 in 1992, while Aprilia gave learners a sportbike with drop-dead gorgeous looks, stunning handling and an engine which, when de-restricted, could power it to a 100mph top speed. It was called the RS125 and a serious rival to the Cagiva Mito.
But there’s one bike from 1992 that towers over them all: the Honda CBR900RR, aka the FireBlade.
It’s staggering to think that the original ‘Blade is now a ‘vintage’ bike but indeed it is. Designed to be lighter and sharper handling than anything else on the road, the FireBlade was more like a bored-out 750 than a big and bulky litre bike of the time. Indeed, at the time of conception, the CBR was meant to be a 750 but with Honda having a four-cylinder VFR to take care of racing duties, the ‘Blade didn’t have to play by the conventional rules required to make a bike eligible to go racing. So it didn’t.
Project leader Tadao Baba was fastidious in his quest to save weight. That 16” front wheel may compromise stability (and makes finding suitable rubber a challenge 30 years on) but it’s lighter than the more usual 17-incher. Likewise, Baba-san eschewed fashionable upside down forks (which were only just being introduced to high spec bikes in 1992) in favour of the fractionally lighter conventional telescopic forks. There were even holes drilled in the fairing, for goodness sake.
But the FireBlade just looked so good too. Honda might have a reputation for conservative styling but the designers clearly didn’t get the brief with this one. With its twin headlights, exposed modern beam frame and drilled fairing it looked aggressive and purposeful, especially in the most sought after red, white and blue livery.
Surprisingly, prices for these first-year FireBlades have not gone through the roof, possibly because plenty were sold in the first place, and the latest generation Fireblade remains a flagship of the Honda range, with a 30th anniversary model inspired by the ’92 original introduced for 2022 to celebrate one of the company’s most iconic models.
Fancy something newer?
Bikes between 20 and 30 years old qualify for classic motorbike insurance and can often be picked up a few thousand pounds. So what models from 2002 are we welcoming to the classic world in 2022…?
Two decades ago we saw one of the biggest changes ever seen in motorcycle racing when the 500cc World Championships switched to 990cc four-strokes and was rebranded as MotoGP. The new machines raced alongside the 500s in the first year but the writing was on the wall for the strokers, which failed to win a race all season. Valentino Rossi, who went into the season as the final champion of the 500 era, dominated on the five-cylinder Repsol Honda RC211V to retain his title.
The one loser from the new MotoGP class was the Superbike World Championship, which would see its top riders and manufacturers defect to Grands Prix in 2003, but the 2002 season was an epic with American rider Colin Edwards taking his second title for Castrol Honda after a titanic battle with Ducati’s Troy Bayliss, best remembered for the winner-takes-all season finale at Imola.
World superbikes were still having a big influence on the bikes we could buy in the showrooms in 2002 and created a number of low-run, high spec, homologation specials that would become highly collectable classics the minute they were announced. Ducati launched its first 998 models, the ultimate evolution of the iconic 916 series, with the sole aim of retaining superiority in superbike racing, but there was love for another new Italian, the Benelli Tornado Tre.
Benelli had been bought and revived by washing machine magnate Andrea Merloni, owner of the Indesit brand, and the three-cylinder Tornado was designed to race in world superbikes but was too slow and unreliable. It was a sales flop too, but the futuristic styling won many fans and today it enjoys a small but enthusiastic cult following.
On the roads, British riders were going crazy for the new generation of 1000cc superbikes and Suzuki GSX-R1000s and Yamaha YZF-R1s were flying out of the showrooms. Honda was still resisting going down the full litre route with the FireBlade, although the final model in the CBR900RR line was launched in 2002, with a 954cc motor at its heart.
Supernakeds and streetfighters were starting to become a ‘thing’ too with the Ducati Monster S4 and new Aprilia Tuono beginning a trend of putting full-fat sportbike engines in unfaired bikes. Another notable arrival in 2002 was Suzuki’s V-Strom 1000, which would spend the next two decades quietly establishing itself as an underrated but highly worthy all-rounder.
Finally spare a thought for Triumph, who went into the year ready to celebrate their centenary but ended up rebuilding the company from the ashes of a fire that flattened their Hinckley factory in March.
The revived British brand was basking in the glow of the rebooted Bonneville, introduced one year earlier, and put out ‘Centennial’ editions of some of its most popular models, which have added value to collectors today. The Daytona 955i Centennial Edition can be identified by its British Racing Green paint and single-sided swingarm, while the orange and silver Bonneville T100 Centennial Edition is rarer still. Only a handful of 2002 Bonnevilles were made before the fire, making them rare and coveted today.
What about the future classics?
2012 really doesn’t feel like so long ago and it’s hard to believe that some of these bikes which came out ‘yesterday’ are now deemed ‘future classics’ by Carole Nash.
The landscape of the motorcycle industry had gone through a period of change between 2002 and 2012 but was starting to stabilise. Having peaked in the latter part of the Noughties, sportbikes were falling out of favour, in part due to the global financial crash of 2008, and overall the landscape was not looking too dissimilar to that of today. BMW’s GS adventure bike and Honda’s PCX 125 scooter were then, as now, riding high in the sales charts – even though the headlines still went to the fastest and most powerful machines.
Ducati arguably had the bike of the year in 2012 with the new 1199 Panigale S. Replacing the outgoing 1098R, which had claimed the 2011 World Superbike title with Carlos Checa onboard, the Panigale knocked on the door of the fabled 200bhp club and was the most powerful V-twin of the time.
It was a real technical innovator with its monocoque chassis, semi-active suspension and the kind of sophisticated electronics we’ve come to expect today. While the Panigale failed to deliver the levels of race track success enjoyed by its predecessor, as a road bike was an instant classic, never mind a future one.
The middleweight 600 supersport class was on its knees by 2012, but that didn’t stop the then Harley-Davidson owned MV Agusta from launching the gorgeous F3 on an unsuspecting world. The 675cc three-cylinder format had been highly acclaimed in Triumph’s Daytona 675 and the MV took the concept a step further. It was a fantastic sportbike from one of the most evocative names in motorcycling, but a combination of high prices and low demand for middleweights kept them rare. It enjoyed some success in supersport racing around the world though, giving it plenty of future classic kudos.
Kawasaki also breathed new life into the hyper sports touring category with a new, 200bhp, ZZ-R1400 for 2012. It earned the title of ‘fastest accelerating production motorcycle’ even if the top speed was still capped at a ‘mere’ 186mph (300kph) as per the Japanese manufacturers’ self-policed agreement. Triumph, meanwhile, eyed up the big-selling BMW R 1200 GS with its new Tiger Explorer, although it will go down as one of the British company’s rare flops in recent years.
And proving that not too much has changed since 2012, electric motorbikes were getting headlines back then as well, with American startups Brammo and Zero bikes both on sale to early adopters. Classic electric motorcycles? Surely not!
Benefits of classic motorcycle insurance
Owners of classic motorcycles can often take advantage of a range of benefits when taking out a policy, such as low mileage discounts, a low excess of £50 and salvage retention rights.
Another key benefit of getting classic bike insurance is having an agreed value clause for free. This means that you’ll be paid a pre-agreed sum should your motorcycle be stolen or written off, instead of being paid the market rate value at the time of the claim. This is particularly appealing to classic motorbike owners, as the market value may not always reflect the true value of the bike.
You’ll also have peace of mind knowing your classic motorbike insurance covers various situations in addition to your time on the road. For example, if you plan to show your motorbike on a static display at a show, then you’ll know it’s protected in the worst-case scenario.
- A low excess of only £50
- Free agreed value
- Riding other bikes
- Low mileage discounts
- Cover for club rallies
- Static displays cover
- Salvage retention rights
- Up to 10% off for owners club membership
