• Production version of a special bike built for Mike Hailwood

• One of only 500 built with fairing and colour scheme

• Complete motorcycle with all its original, hard-to-find parts

• Non-runner for restoration

By the end of the 1970s, the Japanese motorcycle industry had risen from obscurity some 10 years previously to be regarded as the makers of some of the world’s best motorcycles. The Japanese, it seemed, had perfected the art of making a motorcycle that was both lightning-fast and always reliable. In Yamaha’s case, the XS1100 (or XS11), built from 1978 to 1981, represented the best it had to offer.

Equipped with an air-cooled four-stroke, dohc four-cylinder engine of 1,101cc with shaft-drive, it was Yamaha’s largest-capacity bike at the time and telescopic forks, swing-arm rear suspension, dual front disc brakes and a rear disc brake helped keep it all on the road.

The XS1100 marked Yamaha’s first four-stroke four-cylinder, but the technology was well-proven, being derived from the four-stroke three-cylinder XS750 model, which had been received well. The engineering in question was good enough to win accolades from the motorcycling press; in 1978 and 1979, Cycle World named it the Best Touring Bike, saying ‘we had ridden ours over 100 miles before going to a drag strip and knew it was a bullet’. Cycle said of it, ‘the XS is a Rolls-Royce with a blown Chrysler hemi motor’. While critics drew attention to its heavy handling, that didn’t stop the XS1100 from having a successful endurance-racing career in Australia.

European XS1100s differed slight from US-market ones, and one model unique to Europe was the Martini special edition. When Yamaha learnt Mike Hailwood was returning to the Isle of Man TT in 1978 after 11 years away, even though he was riding a Ducati, it sensed a great publicity opportunity and supplied him with a special XS1100 equipped with a wind tunnel-developed fairing designed by John Mockett and finished in the colours of their sponsor Martini, so he could again familiarise himself with the course. 

This had the desired effect and a limited run of 500 Martini XS1100s was produced to go on sale to the public, all identified by their two-piece front fairing which let the screen turn with the handlebars, and the famous livery. The fairing in particular greatly enhanced its touring appeal.

This XS1100 was bought by the vendor, a well-known figure in the classic motorcycle world, from the Netherlands in 2012, having been resprayed in silver at some point earlier in its life. 

Since the bike is in need of restoration, the vendor is offering it for sale as he realises he is unlikely to get round to completing it.

The bike comes with limited paperwork, but it does have all its Dutch registration documents and documentation from the DVLA’s Notification of Vehicle Arrivals (NOVA) service, which means there is no import duty or VAT due and it is eligible for an age-related plate.

Cosmetically, the XS1100 is not in a particularly bad way, but it does have certain defects in the paint, especially along the base of the seat, and pitted chrome. Obviously, the silver paint the bike currently wears is not its original scheme and it rather disguises the special nature of the Martini edition. 

In purely practical terms, a full repaint is hardly necessary but since the bike will have to be partially dismantled and repainted anyway, we think the best course to follow would be to restore the whole vehicle to its original Martini colours.

The brightwork will want to be replated and the wheels may benefit from being refurbished if they are to look their best, but many smaller parts and the seat possess just a light patina and we do not feel it would be detrimental to the bike’s restoration if they were to remain as they are.

Crucially, all the bike’s original parts remain with it, so the restoration should just be a straightforward case of going through it one piece at a time. Owing to the rarity of the bike, certain original parts can be very difficult to source, but with this one, everything is present and correct. It is a matching numbers example, with the engine and chassis both being 2H9-005574.

As with the rest of the bike, the mechanical assemblies are all complete, although unfortunately the bike has become a non-runner after almost 10 years of storage. However, we are assured it should not take much to get it going again. 

The vendor reports that he rode it briefly after importing it in 2012 and says it ran well with no rattles or excessive smoke and that second gear, a known weakness with XS1100s, was working perfectly. He advises that it should only need a new battery and a cleaned-up carburettor to bring it back to life, but it is being sold as a non-runner.

Of course, having not been run in almost 10 years, we are not able to make any guarantees as to its present mechanical state, but we have no reason to suppose it should need anything besides the most straightforward recommissioning.

With any normal XS1100, the appeal ought to lie simply in the fact that it was named the Best Touring Bike for two years running so, if you want to do long-distance touring, you couldn’t really do much better. The Martini edition, though, offers that little bit more. With this bike, you get something which is extremely rare, highly collectable, visually striking and connected with one of the all-time motorcycling greats, Mike Hailwood.

Although it is being sold for restoration and has lost its distinctive colours, the Martini XS1100 should be a very straightforward project requiring only minimal work to get it looking good and back on the road. It could be an ideal first-time project and, if you don’t mind getting your hands a bit dirty, you could have it ready to enjoy for the summer.



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