Category: BMW R nineT

A pair of BMW R NineT customs channeling the past and the future, a glorious Rickman Metisse, and an all-time classic Honda race bike. It’s a mixed bag this week.

Rickman Metisse by Chelsea Borchert The Rickman Metisse is the quintessential desert sled, and one of the most iconic motorcycles ever. It was developed by the Rickman brothers in England in the early 60s, as a kit that could be ordered to fit the owner’s motor of choice (which, more often than not, was a 650 cc Triumph twin).

But did you know that you can still build a MKIII Metisse today? That’s exactly what Chelsea Borchert did. Her dad had a 1962 Rickman Metisse, so when she sold her last bike and started figuring out a replacement, the nostalgia hit hard. To compound things, she realized that she lived near the original Rickman factory—and that her parents were close to Wasp Motorcycles, who still manufacture Rickman frames. Bingo.

Chelsea ordered a kit from Wasp, and sourced a 1966 Triumph Thunderbird as an engine donor. Everything was hauled over to her dad’s workshop, where father and daughter began piecing it together.

The Metisse kit comes with the frame, all the bodywork (including a fiberglass tank), the swing arm, foot pegs, stand and coin chain adjusters. Chelsea added the forks and hubs from a 1974 Triumph Adventurer, polishing them up to a better-than-new finish. The idea was to build a street legal Metisse, so this one has lights at both ends, turn signals, mirrors, and switches from a Kawasaki. [More]

BMW R nineT R7 by Roland Sands Design If this R nineT custom looks familiar, you’re probably thinking of the NMoto Studio nineT kit we featured recently. At a quick glance, they could be siblings. But in reality, they only look similar because they’re emulating the same bike: the 1934 BMW R7.

Roland Sands Design took a very different approach with their homage to the one-off art deco boxer. The team started with a motor and transmission—then built the frame and replica bodywork from scratch. I was lucky enough to see the bike in the flesh at the Mooneyes show last weekend, and there’s a ton of trick stuff going on.

Those side panels—which were hand made from aluminum—not only look great, but hide away wiring too. The fenders are actually two Indian front fenders that were lying around in the RSD workshop, and the headlight bucket is from a Ural, and accepted the stock R nineT gauge with minimal fuss. Then there’s that color: a deep midnight blue that could almost pass for black.

A few modern touches from the RSD catalogue help keep this vintage-style machine unique. Those include the engine’s breastplate and valve covers, the floorboards, and a set of 19” Traction flat track wheels.

On the right, the brake’s been converted to a linked system with a heel shifter. There’s a heel pedal on the left too, but that’s actually the clutch; gearshifts happen on top of the tank, with a small shifter that harks back to the original R7. Everything is highly neat and tidy, and even the handlebar cabling has all be run internally.

There’s too much goodness to cram into this page, so we’ll sum it up with a score instead: ten out of ten. [More]

Honda CX500 by Seb Hipperson The Honda CX500 is a fickle donor. We’ve seen many that miss the mark horribly—but when a builder manages to make it work, the results are astounding. And Seb Hipperson’s certainly made it work with this sharp CX café racer.

His CX doesn’t come across as extreme on the first pass, but it’s well sorted. He’s added Honda CBR600RR forks, Tec Parts shocks that have been re-sprung to match his weight, and a new front brake setup. There’s a lot of fresh work inside the motor too, along with a pair of upgraded Mikuni VM34 carbs.

Seb’s done some subtle tweaking too. He lopped the top section off the fuel tank, then welded in the top of a Yamaha XJ tank. Then he added some fiberglass work to the bottom edge, to give it a smoother finish. The subframe’s custom, complete with little parallelogram-shaped areas that are now filled in with fiberglass side panels (where the air box used to be). Even the wheels are a mash-up, with bits from the GL1100 and CB900 grafted in.

A metallic grey paint job—capped with graphics in the Valvoline colors—finishes it off. Seb says he’s currently using it as a London runabout, but reports that it held its own at a classic track day at Caldwell Park. And we believe him. [More]

The Honda RS750 It seems like hooligan flat track events happen every other weekend, and that means builders are building bikes to enter them with. But this Honda isn’t some haphazard hooli-racer—it’s a bona fide race bike from the 80s. So although it doesn’t meet the ‘custom’ or ‘bikes of the week’ criteria, when it popped up in our feed this week, we knew we had to share it.

The story goes that, by the mid-1980s, Honda was dominating most styles of racing—except flat track. So they started developing a new flat track race bike, using the liquid-cooled 52-degree, SOHC 742cc V-twin from the XLV750R (also known as the Africa Twin). The RS750 was then developed around the motor.

The RS750 started taking names straight out the gate. It won its first race out, at the 1983 De Quoin Mile. Then Bubba Shobert and the late Ricky Graham won six races each in the next season, with Graham narrowly beating Shobert in the overall. Shobert hit back the following year, and took the overall title three years in row. [More]

Aurora by Mehmet Doruk Erdem Social media is full of renders of custom motorcycles—but we have a chronic aversion to them. That’s because nine times out of ten, they’re vaporware; concepts that never see the light of day.

But Mehmet Doruk Erdem gets a free pass. His designs are evocative and extreme—and he’s got a solid track record. His Alpha concept, for example, was masterfully translated into metal by builder Mark Atkinson.

This is his latest design: ‘Aurora,’ based on a BMW R nineT. It’s a commission, and Istanbul-based GB Motobike are booked to build it. Mehmet’s kept some of the nineT’s core bits—like the fuel tank and tail bump—but he’s reworked it with extra bodywork and an extremely aggressive stance.

Some of the details are bound to cause headaches, like the exhaust that appear to exit through the tail unit. Still, it’s a killer concept, and we’re looking forward to seeing it come to life.

Roland Sands massages the R nineT into a vintage-styled thing of beauty, plus the strangest official BMW Motorrad concept bike we’ve ever seen, and a sneak peek at the 2019 Norton Atlas scrambler.

BMW R nineT by Roland Sands Design If you’ve been keeping score over the past few years, you’ll know that Roland Sands has incredible vision. No matter which direction he chooses to pursue—tracker, bobber, chopper or racer—the result is invariably spot on. And this build is no different, with an R NineT massaged into the perfect mix of old and new.

Drawing inspiration from the ovals of the Hooligan series and the elegance of BMW’s extraordinary R5 Hommage, Sands’ R NineT is part bobber and part tracker. The aesthetic mix created by the 19-inch hoops, custom rolled fenders and iconic 1950s ‘Pagusa’ solo seat sounds weird on paper, but is a stunner in pixels. And the fenders aren’t the only new bits of metal either.

The bodywork, including the frame covers above the intake, was all shaped in house. And even thought the frame has been left mostly stock, it has been detabbed to clean up overall appearance. That bone-white paint, courtesy of Chris Wood at Airtrix, doesn’t hurt either.

Of course, the RSD catalog was consulted at length as well. The master cylinders at both front and rear are RSD units—as are the foot controls, valve covers and the gorgeous breastplate that adorns the mighty boxer. And that boxer respires a touch easier, thanks to a set of carbon K&N filters that replaces the old airbox, plus an RSD slip-on exhaust. [More]

Yamaha Virago by KSC Speedshop Remember a few weeks back when we featured a stunning Virago in this column that wasn’t a Greg Hageman project? Well here’s another one. And it may be even prettier.

‘MC02’ is the product of Massimo Carriero and his partner Fabian. They run Italy’s KSC Speedshop, an outfit that specializes in designing and developing aftermarket moto parts. They wanted to create a modern cafe racer, with performance that tipped its hat to racing roots. That meant ditching the Yamaha’s bars and mid controls for clip-ons and rearsets—but it wasn’t a simple affair. A new set of triples was machined and an R1 front end was clamped in to fit.

That meant an immediate upgrade to both handling and braking up front, so the rear was modified to suit. The swingarm was massaged a touch and a Sachs piggyback unit levels stance and keeps things under control.

The bodywork on the Virago is a mix of old and new, featuring a tank from a mid-eighties Kawa GPZ, a Ducati Panigale front fender, and a few CAD-developed one-offs. The rear hugger and the seriously stubby subframe are KSC originals, as is the new front fairing. [More]

Pagani Mini Cross by El Pasillo Is this this toddler-sized scrambler what the world needs to convince young ‘uns to embrace two-wheeled culture? The brainchild of Gonzalo Carranza, this custom Pagani Mini Cross scrambler was designed for his moto-loving two year-old son.

The lad immediately proclaimed “Dad, this bike is so good!” and we couldn’t agree more. The 50cc 2-stroke Pagani (called ‘Little Killer’) was designed with an old Jawa ML180 in mind, because Gonzalo’s son Hipolito always gravitated to one in the El Pasillo garage—but couldn’t quite swing his tiny legs over its saddle.

The plastic Pagani gas tank hit the recycle bin, and in its place now sits a custom 2-liter ¾ size peanut. As with many full size customs, the subframe is gone too, in favor of a custom perch that delivers a flattened scrambler stance. The new headlight admittedly looks a touch small on this Pagani, but proportionally speaking, everything else seems well sorted. And speaking of sizing, even Hipolito looks like he won’t outgrow the Little Killer any time soon. [More]

BMW Motorrad x Blechmann R nineT concept You may not believe it, but this futuristic bit of tinkering started out as an R nineT too. Commissioned by BMW Motorrad, Bernhard Neumann has churned out a concept that’s equal parts Magpul, Ridley Scott and moto designer Ola Stenegärd.

Neumann calls his bizarre creation Giggerl, which translates from German to ‘chicken’ in the King’s English. Because, as he puts it, “I have built a chicken with underarms and headlamps.” But don’t think for a minute that means that Neumann didn’t take the job seriously. He may have a penchant for obscure naming practices, but his abilities forming metal are second to none. Hence his own nickname ‘Blechmann,’ which means ‘tin man.’ In fact, the Tin Man has handcrafted everything here, apart from the levers, handlebars and forks.

The frame, tank, subframe, seat, exhaust and bodywork are all one-off units. One flows into the other and into the next with impeccable accuracy. Say what you will about the concept—which we really dig—but the execution is absolutely incredible. Observed alongside BMW’s in-house concept that we featured here a few weeks back, maybe it hints towards a new sci-fi infused design language for the Bavarians? [More]

The new Norton Atlas scrambler Triumph is set to reveal a bigger and even-scramblier Scrambler later this year, and the standout offering in the Scrambler Ducati range is the Desert Sled. So it’s not surprising that other brands want in on this action. What may surprise though, is that it’s Norton that wants your dirty money. And based on these renderings, we’re optimistic.

Norton has certainly pegged the Desert Sled as its design inspiration, but has stayed traditionally British as far as the motor is concerned. The 2019 Norton Atlas will be powered by the front half of Norton’s V4 superbike engine and is rumored to come in three levels of performance: mild (70 hp), wild (100 hp) and bonkers (175 hp supercharged).

Our guess is that this Scrambler will debut with the mild version of that motor and, from what we see here, should be decently outfitted for less-travelled paths.

There are spoked wheels at both ends, with what we’re guessing is a 19-inch front—which should keep things nimble in both paved and dirty conditions. The wide bars and tapered waistline should offer decent control from a standing position and, as long as it’s not made from tinfoil, that skid plate should keep the internals staying internal. Here’s hoping final executions don’t stray too far from digital intentions. [More]