Suzuki RE5

The Suzuki RE5 is a motorcycle with a liquid cooled, single rotor Wankel engine, made by Suzuki from 1974 to 1976. Apart from that unusual engine it is mostly a conventional roadster, with some peculiar styling details from the Italian designer Giorgetto Giugiaro, including a tin can instrument cluster and a tubular tail light. It was one of very few Wankel engined motorcycles ever produced, and of the four major Japanese makers only Suzuki took one into production. The project began in the mid 1960s and Suzuki signed a technical licence with NSU in November 1970, the 20th firm to do so. The astronaut Edgar Mitchell endorsed the launch, and the warranty offered a full engine replacement within 12 months or 12,000 miles. The engine was complex and the bike heavy, with water and oil cooling, three oil reservoirs and five throttle cables. There were two production models, the 1975 M and the 1976 A, and about 6,000 were built.