因此，您20岁，想要一辆运动摩托车，但是您没有足够的钱来600（或您的保险公司将不批准）。但是，您想要一辆带有足够果酱的自行车，以摆脱自己的方式。请不要250。

或者，假设您是一个年纪大的人，一个想要通勤者而不是巡洋舰的人，便宜但也很有趣。

Or, say you’re interested in track days and even club-level roadracing, but you’re not interested in duking it out on a 600.

One bike can satisfy all these demands, the low-priced, reliable and agile Kawasaki Ninja 500. Usually shuffled to the back of moto-mags in some sort of “budget bike comparison” story, the Ninja 500 was an under-appreciated machine for decades. Despite that, it’s become one of the most influential bikes in modern-day motorcycle design.

The Bike That Came In From the ’80s

The first Ninja 500 was also called the Kawasaki EX500 or GPZ500, depending which market you were in, and it was a natural progression of Kawasaki’s budget bike series. Since the mid-’70s, Kawasaki had sold air-cooled 400 and 440 parallel twins as practical all-rounders, using the same engine to power cruisers, standards and even tourers in some markets. In the mid-1980s, the engineers took the same basic idea, but added liquid cooling. The new engine went into the LTD454 cruiser and eventually the EX500 and beyond.

With a decades-long production run starting around 1987, there were changes to the Ninja 500 engine and carburetors over the years, but generally speaking, the eight-valve DOHC 500 engine made about 60 horsepower at the crank and 50 at the rear wheel. You had to wring the neck out of the motor to hit max power, as peak output hit around 9,500 rpm. You were getting the ’80s sportbike experience, but on a budget. You were a low-dollar Tom Cruise en route to the Danger Zone.

Seeing the early EX500 models, it’s easy to see that styling was closely related to the GPZ900, without true full fairing coverage. That changed over the years, as Kawi revised the model in 1994 and slightly revised the looks. You might think later bikes had better-looking bodywork, but even those models often suffered from gaudy graphics. In 2001, my old boss Rob Harris said this about the bike: “I’m not sure why Kawasaki gave the graphics job to the guy in the flares and unfeasibly large collar. It’s straight out of the seventies and that multi coloured reflective Ninja logo would only look cool to the stoned and insane.”

当您进入500座相当宽敞的驾驶舱时，您不会注意到图形（与大多数运动型自行车不同）。如果您是一个新骑手，那么您对自行车达到100 mph的能力（自行车世界测试人员的速度为1至118 mph）感到更加兴奋。如果您是一个年长的骑手，那么您对全能价值感到兴奋。随着后来的型号从16英寸的车轮（在原始车轮上找到）变为合适的17英寸车轮，车手有更好的轮胎选择，半级运动摩托车开始引起人们对现金意识俱乐部赛车手的兴趣。

That’s where the Ninja 500 built itself a secondary reputation. The engine itself was strong enough for racing, particularly if you mixed-and-matched some failure-prone parts out. Suspension wasn’t great, but you could improve it with stiffer springs, and a new rotor and pads made a big difference for the single-disc front brake.

一些系列实际上将Bone Stock Ninja 500授予自己的课程，但是如果您在允许更多机械猴子业务的种族组织中，您可以在Suzuki SV650或Kawasaki Ninja 600上交换一些关键位，并急剧改善您的500件相对较少的现金。

由于自行车在赛道上的受欢迎程度，多年来，对引擎和底盘进行了大量的动手研究，该机器仍然有一个强大的论坛。多年来，其他只有街头自行车拥有的崇拜者都没有崇拜的追随者，但是机器新利18苹果曾在讨论中弹出多年来，囚犯经常使用忍者500来建立各种酷项目。

The end of the Ninja 500

多年来，忍者500在“运动中量级预算自行车”类别中几乎没有反对。最接近的竞争对手是Suzuki GS500，尽管这些机器是出色的机器，但川崎在大多数方面都很出色，而且更可取。

然后，SV650于1999年出现。500名忍者士兵在Kawi的阵容中又持续了十年，但实际上，SV拼写为Little 500的终结。或者是这样？

Kawasaki didn’t cancel the Ninja 500 so much as it updated it, into the modern 650 platform. Now, more than 30 years after Kawi debuted the original 500 twin, the 650 engine remains a cornerstone of the company’s lineup. And if you look at the past decade or so, you’ll notice something: Almost all the other manufacturers are moving towards parallel twin motors as well.

欧洲和日本的OEM几乎全都在500-800类别中销售液冷双胞胎，我相信川崎500阵容的长期成功有助于实现这一目标。不要误会我的意思，由于有或没有忍者500，该行业很可能会朝着平行双胞胎迈进，因为这是一种经济的设计。但是，多年来，川崎的500年代证明了一家公司可以从便宜，有趣的双胞胎中赚钱。本田在2013年带来了自己的500双双胞胎，从那时起，几乎所有其他人都加入了船。

今天的忍者500

像忍者500一样有趣，我不确定我是否更喜欢现代本田500。我更喜欢本田的EFI和可选的腹肌。更重要的是，您可以找到一个最近的模型本田，良好的钱。相反，在H-D的鼎盛时期，Ninja 500就像Harley-Davidson Sportster一样：许多人买了它们，而不是一辆更昂贵的自行车，因为它们已占用现金。这转化为长期缺乏维护，骑手太便宜了，无法购买油和过滤器或调整阀门。许多二手示例是N OW的良好示例。

这并不是普遍的，您仍然可以找到今天清洁的忍者500。This 2009 model(last year of production!) at Englehart Motorsports Company in Wisconsin is a good example. With11,942 mi里斯在里程表上，这台机器应该剩下足够的寿命，因为它不可能错过太多的机油变化。除非开火时听起来不错，看上去很干净，否则经销商不太可能接受这样的旧机器。这种造型有点俗气，但比1990年代的芭比娃娃风格的车身要好得多。

You could leave it stock for commuting, or morph it into a racebike. Or, you could go the route that many older Ninja 500 owners have explored—add a better windscreen, some luggage, and you’ve got yourself a low-priced sport tourer.

唉,价格并不准确ly low on this bike—it’s listed at $3,790, and you could probably get something newer for that money. Or maybe you couldn’t, thanks to COVIDnomics? Or maybe this Kawi looks super-clean in person, and is well worth the dosh? Hard to say, but I would probably attempt to get that price tag dropped at least a grand, and I wouldn’t even drop that much coin unless I saw the bike up close.