Honda’s immensely popular SH-series has been given a slightly sportier upgrade for the Milan show. I’m not a fan of big-wheeled scooters, but the reviews of the SH have been over the top with praise, and there’s clearly demand in the U.S., especially because Honda’s U.S. line is a bit weak in the mid-displacement range.
3 thoughts on “Honda “sporty” SH at EICMA”
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This is the bike that the CFMoto products are modeled after. I can understand why Honda would not want to bring their version in to just compete with knockoffs. And these are so close that their brand could be damaged by confusion. They’ll stay out of this mess if they know what’s good for them. Now if they wanted to bring in a 100cc plus 4 stroke small wheel scooter I think they could learn from yamaha with their vino 125. They’d sell to the point of scarcity. Think Lead 110.
I say “Bring them over here, Honda! Love to see you try that!” Slide show!
You don’t see Honda’s SH over here because Honda, like the other Big 4 Japanese motorcycle companies, cares only about selling crotch rockets to 20somethings and cruisers to Baby Boomers. The Seattle motorcycle show is coming up, and I am looking forward to giving the Honda people my annual ration of shit about how the SH 150 is a scooter someone could actually WANT, and how Honda has a bigger, better dealer network than any other scooter manufacturer (and therefore could better offer the hand-holding the majority of scooter buyers today require). Unfortunately, the dollar’s free-fall means an SH 150 would now cost more than a Vespa LX 150, but Piaggio might raise the price at some point in the future.
The SH 150 was the most popular scooter in Rome when I was there a couple of years ago. I could count the Vespas I saw during my week-long stay on my fingers. But as long as Honda in the U.S. sees scooters as nothing more than a way to get Americans who are afraid of anything with two wheels and an engine into their fold, there’s not much point in even trying to tell them we’d like to have SHs. The market for scooters is just too small.