SUZUKI T500/GT500
It’s the big two-stroke twin that took on the British four-stroke 650s – but what’s it like to buy and own?
Steve Cooper recalls the flexible, practical two-stroke twin.
If, in your mind’s eye, two-stroke twins are all about powerbands, coming ‘on-pipe’, riding to the red-line and then hooking up another gear, perhaps these next few pegs aren’t really for you. Why: because Suzuki’s big-bore stroker twins dance to an entirely different tune and one that’s largely forgotten.
The original T500 Cobra from 1968 was designed and built to compete head-on with the period British four-stroke twins of the period, and by Suzuki’s reckoning a half-litre two-stroke twin was more than up to the job. Doling out some 46bhp at just shy of 7000rpm and offering 38ft-lb of torque, the T500 I Cobra was a stunning achievement for what was, in essence, a large capacity T20 250. The Suzuki was a little lardier than the BSAS, Triumphs and AMCS of the period and its handling not quite so good. However, for a bike many in the Western hemisphere thought would be variously impossible to carburate properly, prone to overheating and/or be a slug, the big two-stroke twin certainly proved its point.
Although Suzuki was perfectly capable of making buzz bombs that thrived on revs, like the RS67 125cc racer that delivered 42bhp, the T500 was engineered in an entirely different way. With massive flywheels and very considered porting, the T500 was atypically flexible for a stroker and would happily pull from low revs without the need to rag the motor and tap-dance on the gear pedal. It wasn’t long before folk dialled into the bike and started to buy it in volume. The press bikes of 1968 had admittedly rather squirrely handling. However, this was rapidly countered via a longer swingarm for the bikes released to the public. Updated barrels, stronger pistons, a two millimetre drop on carburettor choke size and more modern profile panel work saw the Mk2 delivered for the 1969 season along with a new name. Carroll Shelby of racing car fame and the Ford Motor Company took issue with the Cobra moniker so the bike became the Titan instead.
From there onwards the bike received year-on-year cosmetic upgrades vaguely in line with other models in the range, with supposed changes to porting in some markets. Perhaps the biggest revision came post-1973 with the K model where the lower crankcase half was re-designed (see boxout). Suzuki knew they had a winning formula from the off and so saw little need to meddle with it to the point where the K and L models of 1973 and 1974 are hard to tell apart. The final M models were sold at discounted prices in the UK simply because the Yamahas and Kawasakis of the day were just faster, cheaper and generally more ‘youth-focussed’.
To a point this was a reasonable perception and by 1975 Big Tee had started to get something of an old codgers rep, but Suzuki had a plan in hand that would help them transition from two-stroke to four-stroke in 1978. For the 1976 model year the bike became the GT500 and sported new panels and gauges along with a disc brake. Inside the crank had been re-worked to allow the use of electronic ignition in the guise of Suzuki’s PEI (Pointless Electronic Ignition). In this format Suzuki eked out three more model years, effectively giving the original design a 10-year life span, which was something almost unheard of at the time.
Although the earlier models have always enjoyed something of a cult following, many of the later T500s and all of the GT analogues rapidly fell into what’s politely known as hack status. Cheap as chips to buy, simple to maintain, easy to repair and not heavy on consumables, many were literally ridden into the ground.
Fortunately, times have changed and the bike that was once just an antiquated blind alley of a stroker is now back in the public eye and a consistent player on the classic scene. The bike’s easy-going nature, dogged reliability and understated charm are now very much part of its appeal.
Not every stroker has to be a do-or-die missile and not every ride has to be a manic, throttle-cablestretching, tear-arse experience. If you wanted a bike that is easy going, has a singularly unique character in spades, is deceptively fast when given its head and simply comes back for more time after time, then this is it.
Everyone should have the chance to sample this grand old dame of the classic world at least once, but be careful as you might just get hooked. It’s almost the ideal two-stroke for people who don’t like two-strokes – which is pretty much what Suzuki set out to produce in the late 1960s.