I blame David Hasslehoff for the demise of MZ. Until he jumped on the Berlin Wall and destroyed it with the power of his songs, the quirky Germans produced millions of cheap and cheerful bikes for those behind the Iron Curtain.
Building up to motorcycles for the masses, the MZ firm had a lot of race success in the 1950s and 1960s, and the defection of MZ racer Ernst Degner during the 1961 Swedish Grand Prix at Kristianstad is the stuff of legend. It also meant the two-stroke secrets of MZ engineer Walter Kaaden ended up in the hands of Suzuki.
After the wall came down, there were still some interesting bikes and racing series for MZs. The precise handling MZ Skorpion Sport 660cc single lives on in club racing after featuring in a single make series, while the Baghira was a decent enduro/motard bike for the price. In the 2000s, the MZ1000S appeared alongside scooters and bargain bikes for the Southeast Asian market. But nothing took hold, and the company passed through Malaysian hands (like so many car and bike brands), before being bought by former GP stars Ralf Waldmann and Martin Wimmer, but ended up in bankruptcy in May 2013.
All of this is a long build-up to explain my impulse purchase of a 1989 MZ125. What should have been a mundane trip to the local shop for bread and cow juice took an unexpected turn when I spotted the little East German for sale in someone’s front garden.
So for less than the price of a new pushbike, I became the proud owner of a non-running MZ125. It was last used about a year ago, but after refusing to start one morning it was left for dead in a garage. The previous owner was a young professional lady who has now bought a Kawasaki ZX6-R!
I’m guessing the problem with the MZ is something silly, but it could potentially be more sinister. On the plus side, the 5,000-dd miles are genuine and backed up with a fistful of old MOTs. Even cuter is the handbook and other MZ pieces of advice. And condition-wise it’s quite tidy, although as the new owner, I would say that.
Some MZ125-based cafe racers do exist for puttering around Shoreditch, and if people can become emotionally attached to Honda CX500s and Urals, then there must be a market for the MZ, especially as it was produced the year the wall came down. I’ll let you know what I find…
The MZ125 (1987 model year) was my first – and only – motorbike…
I loved that the supplied toolkit was all you needed to strip the whole bike down to component parts and rebuild it. Not sure if it was standard issue, but mine came with a sort of mini Haynes manual – no diagnostic tips, but the full dis/re-assembly instructions. Very handy in the pre-internet era, as very few places had repair instructions for them!