The signature red color, the unmistakable sound of the two-cylinder two-stroke engine: The “big” Jawa 350, in particular, was and remains an object of desire for many collectors and motorcycle enthusiasts. At the Jawa and CZ meet-up, enthusiasts of Eastern European motorcycles gathered on Sunday at the Chemnitz Vehicle Museum. While the motorcycle wasn’t necessarily rare, it was at least a status symbol, recalls Dieter Wenzel of the Chemnitz Association of Jawa Enthusiasts, who used to work on these machines professionally. The Jawa 350 was also known for its somewhat temperamental nature: “As you can see here, the cylinders are relatively close together. There was a cooling problem, and that’s where the bikes would sometimes seize up.”
The name “Jawa” is linked to Chemnitz, as it is a combination of the name Janeček and the manufacturer “Wanderer,” which had produced motorcycles in Chemnitz, among other things, until after World War I. Engineer František Janeček eventually bought Wanderer’s motorcycle division and named the motorcycles—which were henceforth manufactured in what was then Czechoslovakia—“Jawa.”
