At the risk of going out on a limb here, we’d cautiously suggest the earlier Suzuki GT550s are very possibly some of the best half-litre stroker triples to have ever come out of Japan.
Not wishing to raise the ire of Kawasaki H1 owners here we’d further add that, for the period at least, the Hamamatsu bike has better road manners as well. Yes, agreed, the GT550 was never a Tarmac-rippling missile but it had been designed and built to an entirely different criteria. The firm’s ethos had been to offer a range of bikes that presented a two-stroke equivalent to Honda’s range. The concept had begun with the range-topping 750 and percolated across the middleweight bracket as well.
