Vtx Show-Shocker

VTX SHOW-SHOCKER

Chicago was Honda’s kind of town for sneaking in a stunning new and totally unannounced VTX1800 concept bike to sit alongside the Jesse James “Killer Café” custom that made CW’S February, 2004, cover. Billed simply as “VTX Concept 1,” the big V-Twin had elements of an industrialized Rune, in the sense that style is king, but finishes were more brushed aluminum than polished chrome, the trailing-link front end a fine example of this. Coolest styling riff was the fat rear alloy “axleless” rim-spokes on either side support stub axles with nothing but air in between!

This Future Bobber definitely looked like a runner, and Honda design people were crawling all over the place interviewing show-goers about the bike. Production potential? A call to American Honda’s PR department revealed nothing. On the heels of the under-seat-radiator VTX nabbed during desert testing (“Spy Stuff,” October, 2003), something big is obviously up with Honda’s biggest V-Twin cruiser. -Mark Hoyer