Last week John Wheeler profiled some of the main marques at the Cologne Intermot show - here he gives a flavour of the rest of the event BikeTest: Intermot Motorcycle and Scooter Fair, Cologne
Intermot, the International Motorcycle and Scooter Fair, alternates between Cologne and Milan.
As reported last week, this year it was held in Cologne at the massive Kölnmesse exhibition complex. Intermot used seven of the 11 halls which make up the centre. Each hall is as wide as and around half the length of O'Connell Street and, by the time you have been round it all, you know you are neither as young nor as fit as you would like to think you are.
This year the organisers said there were 1,132 suppliers presenting the entire spectrum of motorcycles and scooters.
What was especially noticeable, apart from all the usual suspects, was the extraordinary number of Far Eastern manufacturers, mostly names you have never heard of, all offering a huge range of mopeds and scooters, with others showing every kind, size, shape and colour of ATVs and quads.
At a rough guess there were over 750 Far Eastern mopeds and scooters, and at least as many ATVs and quads.
The motorcycle manufacturers' exhibits were spread around five of the main halls with a plethora of other stands exhibiting any and everything remotely connected with motorcycles.
If you were going into the business of manufacturing a new motorcycle you would find here all the component makers for which you could wish - the majority being from the Pacific Basin and, very noticeably, they are mustard keen to earn your business.
This was in contrast with some of the household names in the world of motorcycling who, clearly, are doing sufficiently well not to have to bother trying.
One major player, who should know better, had all its literature in German, notwithstanding the fact that this is supposedly an international event which attracted visitors from all over the Northern Hemisphere. Some merely referred you to the internet.
It has become the custom at such shows for some motorcycle manufacturers to stage launches of their new products. These, customarily, are spread out during the first day, supposedly the Press Day, but the media barely get a look in because of the hordes of dealers who are meant to have the second day to themselves.
To attend even some of the launches means trekking to and fro between half a dozen halls - and each seems to be a mile apart.
Once there you have to withstand a barrage of deafening sound, be entertained by riding gear-clad dancers, after which the "all new" products are unveiled often by some star of the track who has probably never ridden in traffic.
To hear some of the spiel stressing the huge advantages of this year's cosmetically or surgically enhanced product over last year's, you wonder how, if it really is such a leap-forward, the promoters are not mightily ashamed to have foisted last year's product on a gullible public.
As the good book tells us, there is nothing new under the sun. But that does not mean there is nothing of interest.
Indeed, for anyone with an interest in motorcycles and their ATV/quad cousins, a once in a lifetime visit to Intermot should be a must.
This is especially true for those of us living in Ireland with its - by comparison with almost anywhere else - utterly minuscule market.
This week we are concentrating on some of the highlights, especially some of the interesting things you might never come across anywhere else save at this truly international shop window.
Top of our list of must-see machines for far too long has been the very rare Swiss-made MonoTracer. This looks a bit like a missile, or plane shorn of its wings, in which driver and passenger sit in line in a perspex domed cockpit.
It is powered by a BMW K 1200 engine. It has a top speed of 300 km/h and has a potential 55 degree lean angle. Riding it has been described as "flying at an altitude of two feet".
It is aimed at a discriminating clientele; at the likes of Porsche 911 owners, people used to flying their own planes and who also like motorcycles. It is priced at €52,500, to which you have to add VAT and VRT, making it a €65,000 indulgence. There are only around 100 in existence. Later in the year we will be taking one for a test ride.
Anyone with an interest in sidecars would be impressed by the sheer range and superb quality of models available to our Continental cousins - every one of them for right-hand side fitting. Amongst the unusual were ELM's GT Twin shown attached to a Honda GL 1800. This is the first sidecar we have ever seen with two wheels.
Even stranger is their Variablo. Here the sidecar body, which has an outboard motor at the back and rowlock holes for oars, detaches from the frame and, presumably, floats. Viewed from a nautical point of view we felt it should carry a large health warning.
Aldy was showing an all-pink version of their AirTec1 50cc moped. On display was the Honda GL Gold Wing which now comes with an airbag and GPS as standard. A version was displayed with the airbag deployed. At a demonstration at the start of the show, Honda activated the air bag with a rider on the machine to prove that, to the disappointment of sceptics, the airbag did not blow the rider off the back of the machine.
For those with an interest in Classic machines there was an opportunity to see a very rare, 1972, Munch 4, 1200cc TT6. In those distant times it was the "monster" bike.
There was an exhibition of custom bikes of such extreme exaggeration as to be completely un-rideable, one priced at €130,000. The German Royal Enfield dealers, Sommer, were showing a Sommer/Royal Enfield Bullett chassis fitted with a 500cc Hartz diesel engine. This produced 23Nm torque at 2,000rpm and needs but 2.5 litres of fuel for 100 km.