The Honda 50 For Discerning Gentlemen and Teenage Punks! | Season 4 – Episode 69
Wheels Sep 13, 2024
The Honda 50 is an extraordinary machine in the history of motorcycling. The Honda Cub as they are more properly known is a series of small displacement step-through mopeds developed as a cheap and reliable solution to urban transportation.
The story goes that Honda co-founder Takeo Fujisawa demanded that their new cheap small displacement motorcycle must be designed so that one could comfortably ride it with one hand while carrying a bowl of Soba noodles with the other. Produced by a barely 10-year-old Honda corporation in 1958 as a reliable machine for urban transport in Japan its popularity grew, and it was quickly exported to America and Europe.
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The bike was advertised as the everyman’s transportation, one did not have to have a well-developed sense of mechanical intuition or a dedicated biker lifestyle to own one. In America they were advertised to women and young men with the iconic and wholesome ‘You meet the nicest people on a Honda’ campaign. This was at odds with the burgeoning outlaw image of those who rode American made Harley Davidsons.
By the late 60’s one was as likely to see a Honda Cub parked up in an urban back alley in New York or London as they were to see one flying down the streets of Tokyo. There was another place however, perhaps unlikely and almost certainly not initially planned for by Honda where the Super Cub really took off in popularity, this was rural Ireland. The Honda Cub, colloquially known as the Honda ‘50’ or ‘Nifty-fifty’ is arguably the machine that more than any other got rural Ireland motoring. Before this the only option for step-through low displacement motoring was something like the more expensive German-made NSU Quickly.
The flood of cheap Japanese Honda 50s that came into the country allowed post-men to trade in their bicycles and significantly shorten their working day. It was a machine farmers could take down country bohereens and down to Mass on a Sunday. It was a machine that women could ride comfortably and cover long distances (a claimed 150 miles to the gallon of petrol!) as well as going into town for the shopping (although I doubt any of them carried many soba noodles back from the shops).
Almost everybody of the generation that lived through the ‘60s and ‘70s will have a multitude of stories about the Honda 50 when shown a picture of one and the nifty-fifty is revered to this day with many Honda 50 appreciation clubs, Honda 50 endurance racing and the sky rocketing prices for Honda 50 barn finds. At over 100 million units it is the single most produced motor vehicle in world history and there is a big culture of customising Honda Cubs in Asia.
Unsurprisingly Cork-based Medaza Cycles, who build “cycles for distinguished gentlemen and teenage punks” decided to focus on a Honda 50 for their latest build as they specialise in taking strange motorcycles that would usually be considered ugly or unsuited to customisation and working with the challenges therein.
The donor bike itself was a 1983 Honda 50 that had been lying around for years neglected in a shed. After digging it out the first task was to strip the bike back to the pressed steel monocoque frame. This was bobbed and widened at the back to take a wider rear wheel than the original.
The engine mounts on the original frame were strengthened to take the extra weight of the bigger Zongshen 150cc engine which would normally be used on a pit bike. The next step was the front end. The original forks are an iconic aspect of the Honda 50 and so they were kept but heavily modified. Firstly, they were widened by 25mm to take a wider wheel and brake drum. Then they were converted into a springer style suspension set up, which was fabricated in stainless steel. The shock for the springer was taken from a Fox mountain bike as it has rebound adjustment and a selection of different stiffness springs available, so the front suspension for the bike is fully adjustable.
The front and rear wheels are from an MZ 250. The original MZ hubs were machined, polished and rebuilt with 16-inch alloy rims. The next step was to build a stainless steel subframe to carry the saddle and the fuel tank. The fuel tank was hand fabricated in aluminium. The subframe, tank and saddle set-up give the bike its distinctive silhouette.
The exhaust silencer, swing-arm, taillight and oil cooler were all CNC machined out of billet. The exhaust pipe itself was hand fabricated out of stainless-steel tube bends. Given that there is no chrome plating facility in Ireland all the finishes you can see are achieved using aluminium and stainless steel. The kickstart, gear level, rear brake lever and actuating arm were all remade in stainless. The bike has a windscreen (as every Honda 50 should have a screen) which is a scaled down copy of the screen from a Suzuki Katana.
The bike is great fun to ride on the road and it has been to many custom shows and events in Ireland and beyond. The bike was given the name “Kabu” – ‘cub’ in English translates to ‘kabu’ in Japanese. On it’s first outing at the Killarney Bike Fest in 2022 the bike won Best in Show – it’s hard to believe a Honda Cub would take the first prize at a Harley festival! It has also been shown at the Bike Shed in London and at Wheels and Waves in Biarritz, France.
Sources of Information and Video Credits:
Free Make
Check out our previous Honda 50 video stories:
The ‘Nifty Fifty’ Honda 50 – a star of the story of Irish mobility https://fb.watch/umUEkCdpEv/
Ralph Bryans – Ireland’s Only Grand Prix World Champion 1965 https://fb.watch/umUHUY17EJ/
If you have an idea for a story, email Kevin Reid [email protected]
