Apart from its unusual engine, the RE5 is mostly a conventional roadster, albeit with some peculiar styling details thanks to Italian industrial designer Giorgetto Giugiaro.

Other manufacturers whose bikes reached production include: DKW, Norton[4] and Van Veen (who used a derivative of the NSU/Audi engines developed for Citroën).

[10] Research and development continued till the end of that decade, leading to the signing of a technical licence with NSU in November 1970,[10] Suzuki being the 20th firm to do so.

[13] Despite having only a single rotor, the RE5's engine was mechanically complex and its numerous subsystems made for a heavy motorcycle.

[14] Rotary engines produce a lot of heat, and the RE5 had water- and oil-cooling, and double-skinned exhaust pipes.

[16] Separate oil pumps fed (respectively) the main bearings and the inlet tracts (to lubricate tip seals).

[23][25] Although the RE5 was less powerful than the contemporary Suzuki GT750,[26] the engine had excellent torque, and was generally smooth,[27] but it exhibited "grinding vibration" at around 4,000 rpm.

[29] The complex B-point system (explained below) gave smooth running on overrun[30] and some engine braking.

The bikes sometimes exhibited a dead spot or hesitation during acceleration as the carburetor transitioned from primary to secondary throat.

[34] After the novelty of the RE5's rotary engine had worn off, reviewers found only its handling to be its winning factor over other bikes.

In 1985 Cycle World criticised the RE5 as expensive, over-complicated, underpowered, and hideous; and they declared it to be one of "The Ten Worst Motorcycles".

[35] The Norton Classic was an air-cooled twin-rotor bike developed by David Garside at BSA, with a fundamentally different design approach.

Apex seals were made of a special material known as Ferro Tic, which was a combination of sintered ferrous alloy and titanium carbide.

[39] The surface of the trochoid chamber which the apex seals rubbed along was coated with a CEM (composite electrochemical material) consisting of nickel silicon carbide.

This small butterfly valve pivots in the rotor housing inside the secondary port and is directly controlled by another of the throttle cables.

[44] If this was allowed to happen, when the secondary throat finally opened the engine would first swallow an induction charge contaminated with exhaust gasses causing a momentary misfire and felt as a dead spot or hesitation in acceleration.

Carburetor tuning involves adjusting cables controlling the primary butterfly and the port valve, among other things, illustrated by Suzuki Service Bulletin Nine.

One way to solve the problem is to shut off ignition entirely on overrun, but this leads to excessive contamination of the combustion chamber by unwanted deposits, which can cause the apex seals to stick.

One set of points ran on a dual lobe cam for normal operation, firing the rotor every face.

It also served to smooth the lumpy feel of the bike as RPM reduced on overrun and addressed some issues with backfiring (more correctly, "afterfiring").

To cope with this, and probably capitalizing on their previous experience with water cooling, Suzuki opted for a liquid-cooled engine using two separate systems.

[17] A centrifugal pump sends coolant around the external rotor jacketing but via an intricate path in an attempt to even out the massive thermal stresses.

[17] Further lubrication specifically for the tip, corner and side seals is provided by oil from a tank located under the seat.

The internal pipe ends in a removable stinger drilled with numerous holes and wrapped in a fibreglass-like material.

The stinger (or spark arrestor as Suzuki calls it) exits the exhaust system at the end of the external shell.

Even so, Suzuki found it prudent to fit heat shields on the outside of the pipe to further protect riders and pillions.