Some of you regular Tiddlerosis readers may have already figured out by now that I have always been a sucker for two particular types of Honda tiddlers: specific CL models and rare blue versions of certain models. In a few cases these two parameters overlap, such as in the CL-90, but for the most part, they remain separate. Although red is not my favorite color, when you combine bright red with a sufficient amount of silver or chrome trim, I get pretty overheated for those little sweethearts, too. You won't find me driving a red car. I even prefer Corvettes and Ferraris in some other color, but motorcycles, that's a horse of a different color.
Take this gorgeous 1966 race-kitted CB-160, for example. I drool just looking at this machine that currently resides as my wallpaper. I wish I could hear the scream of those flat-black megaphones at full song! I am using this photo in this story because I don't have a photo of the machine I am about to mention, and I cannot even find one on the internet. If anyone out there has a photo of one of these, please comment to let me know! I referred to this CB-160 racer as kitted because the mystery machine is another kitted 160, the earliest CL-160's built by dealers on CB-160's from what were referred to as CL kits. I understand that these were offered in the same four colors as the CB of the time: red, blue, black, and white, although I don't think I have ever seen a blue or white one. I am certain that I saw a number of red and black ones in my local dealership in 1967, and possibly 1968. Yes, we all know the CL-160 was continued as the CL-160D with black frames and body-colored gas tanks, but that's not the beastie I'm interested in. I want to see one in red, blue, or white.
I know these were built and sold in 1967 because that was a special transition time for me. I had already crashed the daylights out of my '63 red and silver YG-1, leading my parents to wisely take it away from me and replace it with a pool table in our basement. If you're a fan of That '70's Show, you know what I'm talking about! Add a pool table and subtract the weed and you have my parents' basement in 1965-67. After a few years of pool hall maturity, I had finally talked my parents into letting me buy a mini-bike in the summer of '67. Yeah, I know all the hip kids were in San Francisco with the big sickles and the weed in 1967, but I was in Mississippi hoping just to swing my leg over something without pedals. I managed to upgrade my parents to a sweet little '66 C-100 Cub if I promised to ride it mostly off-road. In case you don't believe that, I do have photos, but you'll just have to wait a while to see them. I found that innocent little black Cub at the Honda shop while drooling over the CL-160's. Even though I knew the real CL-160's didn't have no stinking electric foo-foo starters, I was still drawn like a hippie to Woodstock by the red and silver beauties that looked just like Scramblers when they were actually Super Sports in Scrambler suits. I'm not sure what I would have done if I had actually seen a blue one on the showroom floor. If I could have rustled up $630, I could have just let my parents throw me out of the house, keeping the pool table for themselves. I guess it all was a moot point because $630 was a lot of loot for a college kid in Mississippi in the Sixties.
As soon as I saw the original Honda Scrambler, the CL-72, in my 1962 Honda brochure, I knew I was hooked. As if the beautiful red and silver paint combination wasn't enough, this thing created the best howl of any twin-cylinder engine in all of motorized history! If you have never heard one with its baffles removed, as most were back in those good old days, you've missed a true aural treat. A couple of years after I calmed my parents down, I rode a CL-77 and a CL-160 and these have always reserved a special place in my motorhead brain. A close friend of mine even had a red CL-160 with a pair of open, upswept megaphones that screamed like a banshee and was a treat to ride! The bike I eventually sold is the one I most wish I hadn't, the blue 1970 CL-350 I drove to San Francisco from Mississippi twice.
Here is my plea reprise. If any of you guys has a photo of a silver and blue, red, or white 1967 CL-160, I would certainly like to add it to the Tiddlerosis website for others to see. I have photos of the real CL-160 and the CL-160D, but not the little beauty that was sandwiched in time between these two. If you study this series of machines carefully, you will see that the progression ran as follows: 1965 - CB; 1966 - black (skidplate) CL; 1967 - real CL continues and CL kits begin; 1968 - CL kits end and are replaced by the CL-160D. Production of the CL-160D was phased into the CL-175 that looked almost identical, but it had chrome fenders, a five-speed gearbox, and turn signals.
Honda CL-160
Honda Scrambler Chart
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