Kawasaki always did things slightly differently to its Japanese motorcycle manufacturing counterparts. While Honda, Suzuki and Yamaha were making little bikes, Kawasaki went the other way with the BSA-inspired 650cc W1 twin. The company’s involvement in bikes stretches back to 1948 when it began supplying component parts to other companies as well as designing its own motorcycle engine. Under the Meihatsu brand, the company released 150 cc and 250 cc four stroke engines in 1953, and produced its own complete motorcycle – a 125 based on the ubiquitous DKW/BSA Bantam concept – in 1955.
But it was the Kawasaki takeover of the long-established Meguro brand in 1964 that launched it into the forefront of the Japanese market. Meguro’s T1, a 500 twin, became the W1 650 under Kawasaki’s stewardship, and sold reasonably well in the key US market. The smaller models also gained a foothold in the US, to the point that Kawasaki had a complete range stretching from 60cc through to the 250 cc and 350 cc twin (A1 and A7) and to the big four stroke twin, but the company’s design staff hankered for a real breakthrough that would stamp Kawasaki as a real innovator.
The result was the Mach III, or H1, which was conceived in great secrecy and code-named Blue Streak – a triple cylinder 500
