Hodaka Sl175
HODAKA SL175
CYCLE WORLD TEST
A 1972-Vintage Woods Bike With Good Manners And A Stout Heart
Skeptics who believe motorcycles tested by magazines have been lovingly massaged prior to the test and are thus far better than the actual bikes sold in stores would have gnashed their teeth at the arrival of the test Hodaka.
When first seen, our SL175 was on display at a trade show. It was trucked to the CW shop directly from the show and when it arrived it had . . .
No gas in the fuel tank.
No oil in the injector tank.
No oil in the transmission.
No grease in the steering head or swing arm pivot.
No lube in the cables.
No electrolyte in the battery. and
No oil in the air filter.
Plus the bars and triple clamps hadn't been tightened and half the wires for lights and such weren't plugged in.
No fear. Hodaka also supplied one of their giant owner's manuals, complete with break-in procedures and illustrated parts lists. What we did was follow the instructions while poking here and there and borrowing grease guns and nipping off to the parts store for battery juice.
As you'd guess. we enjoyed every minute of it.
The men of Hodaka wouldn't have it any other way. They are not careless. It's just that Hodakas are traditional motorcy cles and that means if you aren't willing to learn the machine firsthand, you probably wouldn't like it anyway.
Building to the old ways isn't without its problems. Hodaka is a small company. One could say it's an American motorcycle because Hodaka as we know it began when an American rider persuaded a small Jap anese engine and engineering company to design and build bikes for the American style and market. The big outfits weren't making real off-road machines then and Hodaka became the mount to have in the woods or in the desert. They were always strong and always had small engines and they went like mad and won everything in sight. In their day.
When the pie got large enough. in came the big guys and shortly they were building real racing motorcycles with incredible en gines and yards of suspension travel and brand new models every week, at fair prices. This was and is great for racers, but it's pushed the smaller firms into other directions.
In Hodaka's case the push has been back to basics. While the motocross and hard-core enduro bikes get the publicity.
there are countless riders who'd rather have controllable power than peak power. who prefer a bike that can be ridden well rather than ridden fast. These are the people Hodaka hopes to attract and the SL175 is one of the ways they expect to do
The SL175 isn't exactly new. The model began as a 175 enduro bike six years ago. Hodaka's headquarters are in Oregon. next door to the woods. The staff at head quarters rides in the woods and in end uros. They decided the company needed a dual purpose 175, with the scales tipped a hit toward the off-road side of dual purpose. The factory in Japan built a prototype. the riders in Oregon ran it in an end uro. back it went for changes. back it came for more riding. This went on for six years. until the Hodaka crew figured they had the specifi cations right.
The engine's displacement was natural. Many enduro associations have classes for 175s. More useful, the 175 is a nice corn promise for non-racers. Done right, the 175 can be nearly as agile as a 125, while offering extra torque and low-end power to grunt the bike up hills where a smaller engine would demand to be kept on the pipe. wheel spinning.
Hodaka believes in durability so the 175 engine began with the cases used on the brand's 250 engine, with a smaller bore and a new crank giving 173.3cc. At 64 x 54mm. the engine is well over square. not usual in a low-rev engine. The Hodaka engineers say this was done as something of a corn petition option: The stock porting and exhaust pipe keep the power peak fairly broad and low. A competitionminded owner could build a screamer with revised porting and pipe and he'd have an engine that will work at high revs. (Or. the Hodaka 250 will bolt right in. if desired.) Main design feature of the engine is Hodaka's Alumiferric cylinder, an iron inner core with protrusions for the ports. Cast aluminum fins are cast over the core. The combination gives the light weight and excellent cooling of aluminum and the strength and long wear of an iron bore. The inner cylinder can be re-bored out 0.040 in. One design requirement was that the SL175 not have a high seat. With the conventional frame, swing arm and sus pension, the 33.5-in, seat height is just about average for a middleweight dual purpose bike and so is suspension travel. Hodaka's reasoning here is that the ex tremes of travel aren't needed for the rid ing that the SL is supposed to encounter and the lower the seat, the more nimble the SL will be in tight situations, as well as being better suited for younger riders and women. Also there are experienced types who plain don't feel right perched in the air. so the SL offers an alternative. As a small company. Hodaka gets to buy many of its parts from outside suppliers and in turn can specify good parts. The SL has Preston Petty plastic fenders and a Skyway spark arrester/silencer which meets forestry and highway rules. Dogleg levers, quick throttle, folding footpegs and a folding shift lever are standard, as is the usual assortment of turn signals. head light. reflectors and battery needed for road licensing in most states.
The 30mm carb was picked for smooth ness rather than power and the 7: 1 com pression ratio (measured from closing of exhaust port to TDC) is mild. Because the engine is basically a 175 in a 250 package. it is understressed and thus should run without problems for a long time.
The frame is a straight ahead piece of sound engineering, with no surprises or innovations. It's a full double cradle, with the backbone's two tubes laid out in overunder fashion, from the steering head back to a Junction at the rear of the gas tank. The downtubes are side by side, from the steering head under the engine to the swing arm pivot, where the junction forms the bottom of a double triangle. The for ward legs meet the backbone and the rear legs join to a rear ioop for fender and luggage rack. The shocks mount on gener ous gussets. which are also used at down tubes and steering head. The design is tidy and so are the welds. The KYB shocks are gas/oil with progressive rate springs and are set at close to 45 deg. The center mount-axle forks are also KYB.
HODAKA SL175
$995
The SL's forks work just fine for a bike of this caliber. Nearly 7 in. of travel is sufficient for riders exploring the limits of the bike, and spring and damping rates work well for lesser speeds. Con sidering the dual-purpose nature of this 175, the KYB front end is ideal.
The stock KYB shocks should be well received by SL175 riders. Spring rates yield a comfortable ride onand offroad, with no compromise in handling. The shocks' compression damping is slightly on the heavy side, allowing ad ditional control in the rough stuff, and sufficient damping for two-up riding, should the need arise. Tests performed at Number 1 Products
Thoughtful touches include springloaded catches for the seat, which lifts oil' for access to battery and oil tank. The tank holds one quart, w hich gives an oil range of several hundred miles. The fuel tank holds three gallons, enough for 100 miles under extreme use and maybe 120 under normal conditions. One odd lack is a reserve position for the petcock. The Hodaka guys say they never thought about that and added that because the fitting and threads are standard, it shouldn't be too hard to swap for a petcock with standpipe and reserve position, which is true.
Perhaps for cost reasons there are no protective boots for the clutch and brake lever pivots.
Beyond those two items, it’s hard to find anything missing. The metal tool box has a cam-type latch, snug and secure. Starting is primary kick, always useful and there are. as hinted earlier, grease fittings for the various bushings and bearings, even for the shifter. The chain tensioner could be called overkill, in that the sw ing arm pivot and countershaft sprocket are close together and thus the chain tension doesn’t change much. But chain tensioners are popular, so one is furnished.
The luggage rack is standard on the SL. Carriers like it used to be fitted to most trail bikes, although they now are hard to find even as options. Too bad, as racks are useful on the trail.
The fuel tank is painted, not chromed. The cost of continuing that unique trademark was too much for the market to bear.
What the 1978 Hodaka SL175 is, in brief, is a 1972 motorcycle with mandatory updates of the road gear and some modern touches in the suspension.
For cowtrailers, 1972 was a good year. and so is the SL 175.
The road half of dual has been compro mised only in a few small ways. The wheels each have one rim lock. On the road, the lock keeps thc wheel out of balance and although the fork will handle most of the disturbance, the bobbing wheel does make itself felt through the bars.
The softly tuned engine is quieter than most two-strokes and starts with one or two gentle kicks. Power is adequate for town and country. The strong low end makes traffic easy and although one cannot actu ally speak of a power band, the engine can he felt to flex its muscles midway through the rev range. Even less is there a top end: when the carb is pulling all it can pull. the engine tops out and that's that. What the SL175 will do is reach a legal cruising speed. say 55 or 60 mph. and hold it for hours at a time. The understressed nature of the machine even keeps vibration within comfort range. The quick throttle works well with the controlled power. Not having peakiness to handle, one can roll it wide open without fear of leaps forward or lifted front wheels. Seat padding isn't es pecially generous but again, the low height explains that.
Brake leverage has been chosen for con trol off road and on pavement the rider must squeeze or step with more force than the stopping power of the two small drums seems to warrant. It stops within a reason able distance, so that's no problem. Where the SLI75 lives is off the road and in the woods. Operative words here are
The Hodaka is unfailingly polite. The frame, swing arm and forks are more than strong enough for the power and speed and there are no quirks. Even with trials tread the front wheel sticks to the ground. in sand or mud, and the SL goes where pointed. What appears to be limited travel on the specifications chart turns out to be enough. For some of us, extra wheel travel means going out of control at a higher rate of speed. It follows that less travel means less speed and perhaps no loss of control. A firm, well, choppy ride on the highway becomes just right for soaking up the ripples on the trail. The progressive springs at the rear are strong enough toward the end of their travel to make it difficult to bottom the back wheel by accident. Nor did the shocks fade after hours on the trail. They aren't doing that much work.
Hodaka has been building bikes like this for years and it shows. The skid plate doesn't look wide enough, but with static ground clearance that's twice the averaged wheel travel, the SL175 doesn't run into things and the plate is fine. Front turn lights mounted below the bars are different> and they are protected when the Hodaka falls on its side, as we did to it on occasion. leading to the conclusion that the Hodaka guys also fall over and have learned from that how to keep the lights from being bashed.
Couple things on the engine. There is all the power needed to maintain a 24-mph average. Because there isn't any top end the 175 will plug alongjust off idle. good as a trials bike threading through rocks. There is no powerband hut the power is there to loft the front wheel on demand, in first or second gear.
One flaw. If the bike is laid down, the carh floods. The engine will start and then runs at about 600 rpm while emitting distressed clouds of smoke. This will COfl tinue until the petcock is turned off and the float bowl runs dry. No harm done but this did give pause when it happened in a ravine too steep to push the bike up.
Against that. when running an errand of rescue for another bike, the test SL175 literally hauled two men and a boy across a meadow so sodden that the rear wheel sank to its axle. Not one murmur of pro test.
Good manners. The poet said kind hearts are worth more than coronets, so the Hodaka's stout heart and good manners are worth more than trophies.
