The Under Appreciated Touring Bike Of The 80's

[canuckrider]

In my humble opinion the Kawasaki 1300 Voyager was hands down the winner in big bike touring in the 80's it was just to damn big. It was made for riding from coast to coast. I have owned both a Honda & Kawasaki now. But I love my GL1200, I can tour with it or go cross town for a coffee.
Here are some photo's of my 1984 Kawasaki 1300 Voyager (Sold) and my 1986 GL1200 Aspencade.

[paradise97402]

Wow, I remember going into a dealer and looking at those..and thinking MAN that is a bike! I had my 1000 gw with all my Vetter stuff, so I passed, but I thought about that bike for years.

[neoracer]

a friend had a 98 a couple years ago with 3800 miles,looked ansolutely brand new,was a nice bike and definitely a rocket,had it about a year until someone decided it was worth alot more than he paid for it,than he upgarded to a '10 ultra classic
i would have to say appearance wise it was a 84-87 goldwing clone with an 83 style fairing,did have some nice features though

[canuckrider]

a friend had a 98 a couple years ago with 3800 miles,looked ansolutely brand new,was a nice bike and definitely a rocket,had it about a year until someone decided it was worth alot more than he paid for it,than he upgarded to a '10 ultra classic
i would have to say appearance wise it was a 84-87 goldwing clone with an 83 style fairing,did have some nice features though

Hi neoracer ;
Your friends bike would have been the 1200 Voyager and I agree these looked like a take off of the 1200 GoldWings.
But the photo's I have posted is the 1300 Voyager built from 1983-1986, Inline Six Cylinder Fuel Injected. This bike was big (huge) and fast, fast, fast.
It seems each time Kawasaki brings out a redesign of this bike it gets smaller. It's a shame they didn't follow in Honda's foot steps and keep improving on the original design.

[1060dsl]

Nice bike that's for sure but that second gear issue was a killer! Not to mention it had a high center of gravity and weighed a ton similar to the CB900 and the Yamaha XS1100

[admin]

They really are a nice bike, but, I did not like the fact that you had to adjust the valves with shims (complicated and expensive) compared to the GL1200's hydraulic adjusters and working on the Kawasaki was a big chore just to access any components unlike the GL1200 which is very accessible to work on. Also, it seemed like the plastic on the fairing did not hold up well over time, because, most I see today have many holes and cracks in the fairing and other plastic parts.