Custom Motorcycle Archives | Wind Burned Eyes

Inside Purpose Built Moto’s 1967 Honda CB77 Super Hawk Revival

Some customs begin with a clean sketch and a detailed brief. This 1967 Honda CB77 Super Hawk began as dusty storage tubs labeled simply “Honda” and a frame bolted to a square-tube engine stand.

Owner Richard bought the bike on a whim in 2004. It had spent years being hauled to race meetings around Australia, then sat in a garage for nearly two decades before arriving at Purpose Built Moto in pieces. Bikes with that kind of racing past keep landing on builders’ benches, and Ellaspede recently reimagined a Ducati Mike Hailwood Replica with similar reverence.

The track history gave the build its direction. Racing pedigree has fueled other standout vintage builds this year too, like Fuch’s Workshop’s championship-winning Yamaha TX500 flat tracker. After sorting and cleaning every salvageable part, the workshop assembled a rolling chassis, which let this Honda stand on its own wheels for the first time in 20 years.

1967 Honda CB77 Super Hawk custom racer revival in red and black by Purpose Built Moto — Photo: Purpose Built Moto, via Pipeburn.

From Boxes to Rolling Chassis

The forks had been lengthened and rechromed years earlier. The worn-out rear shocks were the hard part, since period-correct road-racing units proved scarce, so the team sourced off-road shocks and had Joe at Ride Dynamics rebuild and re-angle them.

Rebuilt wheels wear polished Borrani rims over brakes that were stripped, repaired, polished, then updated with hydraulic actuation and Kustom Tech master cylinders.

A Fresh 350cc Heart

The 350cc conversion needed only new rings and a light hone. The head received fresh valves, guides and springs, and the ignition was rebuilt around a new stator, rotor and starter motor.

Amal carburettors made way for Mikuni flatslides breathing through DNA pod filters wearing PBM’s delta motif. Up front, restored clip-ons, two-button switches and a 48mm speedometer pare back the cockpit around a 4.5-inch Flashpoint LED headlight.

Exactly one part escaped the rethink: the fibreglass racing tank, a defining piece of this bike’s history. The new tail traces its half-moon profile into a side-number-plate shape and a tidy ducktail.

Tipping the engine forward echoed the original racer’s stance and opened room for a true 2-into-2 exhaust, with sand-bent stainless headers running into welded torpedo mufflers built to sing as the revs climb. That soundtrack is the detail I would queue for.

Paint stayed deliberate: luminous red on the tank and tail, black pinstriping, and a blacked-out nose, laid down by Sam at Colour Fuel in Sydney.

Before the Super Hawk, Honda was best known for pressed-steel commuters, and the 305cc original brought a tubular frame, telescopic forks and a dependable overhead-cam twin good for 100 mph. That machine is often called Honda’s first genuine sportbike.

Purpose Built Moto has history with the brand, from its earlier custom Honda XL500 scrambler through to this Super Hawk revival. After almost two decades in pieces, the bike is back on the road and ready to rev.

Source: Pipeburn

How Ellaspede Reimagined a 1981 Ducati Mike Hailwood Replica

A 1981 Ducati Mike Hailwood Replica is a piece of racing history, and most owners would restore one to factory spec. Owner Glenn took his MHR to Ellaspede in Brisbane instead, with a brief to honor its past while reworking the stance, performance and details.

Ducati introduced the MHR in 1979 to mark Mike Hailwood’s Formula One TT win at the Isle of Man, earned on his return to racing after more than a decade away. Brisbane’s Ellaspede has history with odd briefs, including a custom Honda Zoomer. Builders elsewhere keep finding fresh angles on Italian classics too, and Reset Cycles’ custom Moto Guzzi V1000 is a recent standout.

Custom 1979 Moto Guzzi V1000 by Reset Cycles

Charles Poelmans spent twenty years building custom cars and restoring vintage Maseratis before turning his attention to motorcycles. His workshop, Reset Cycles, sits in the south of the Netherlands and combines his fabrication skills with a love of Italian engineering.

The donor bike is a 1979 Moto Guzzi V1000 G5, a big touring machine from Mandello del Lario, where the marque recently unveiled its 105th anniversary editions. Charles stripped it to its core elements: frame, engine, wheels, and bodywork.

Fuch’s Workshop Transforms 1972 Yamaha TX500 Into a Flat Tracker

Yamaha introduced the TX500 in 1972 as their first middleweight four-stroke twin. The 500cc vertical twin featured dual overhead camshafts, four valves per cylinder, and an Omni-phase balancer to manage vibration.

The bike was innovative for its era but suffered from excessive heat, warped valve seats, and cracked cylinder heads. Yamaha dropped the TX name after the TX750 failed, and the model later became the XS500.

Inside Brothers Garage’s 1990 Yamaha RD350 YPVS Restomod Build

In 1983, Yamaha released the RD350 YPVS, a two-stroke giant-killer that embarrassed many a 750 on both road and track. Known as the RZ350 in North America, the 370-pound, 55-horsepower smoker carried the Yamaha Power Valve System, a variable exhaust port valve that delivered low-end torque without sacrificing top-end power.

The model never enjoyed the suspension, braking, and materials advancements that transformed sportbikes in later decades. That gap makes the RD350 a natural restomod candidate, and previous custom RD350 builds have explored the same potential.

Tomas Gurrieri of Brothers Garage had wanted an RD350 YPVS since childhood. When he finally found a 1990 model, it had been abandoned for over 15 years.

The chassis and engine were salvageable, but everything else needed replacing. Gurrieri sourced a 2001 Suzuki GSX-R750 for the swap.

The entire front end, including USD forks, brakes, clip-ons, master cylinder, and wheel, came from the Suzuki. Out back, the GSX-R donated its swingarm, wheel, brakes, footpegs, and rear brake master cylinder.

Brothers Garage Black Widow Yamaha RD350 YPVS with GSX-R750 front end and carbon fiber tank — Photo: Brothers Garage, via BikeBound.

Full Carbon Fiber Bodywork

Gurrieri fabricated one-off carbon fiber pieces for the fuel tank, tail section, and front side fairings. A larger aluminum radiator improves cooling over the stock unit.

The front fender is a modified GSX-R750 piece adapted to the RD’s proportions. A custom-built GPS speedometer sits inside the original gauge housing, converted from mechanical to digital.

The exhaust is custom-made and modified. The engine itself remains factory spec, with only gaskets, clutches, and routine maintenance addressed.

Gurrieri estimates four or five extra horsepower from the exhaust. All that carbon and aluminum dropped 25 kilograms from the original weight.

The “Black Widow” sits at 140 kilograms, or roughly 310 pounds. That is 55 pounds lighter than the stock bike.

“With the larger tires and upgraded brakes from the GSX-R750, the riding experience is like that of a track bike, only much lighter,” Gurrieri said. “It has so much torque that the front wheel lifts off the ground in the first three gears.”

Gurrieri runs Brothers Garage from Málaga, Spain, where he moved from Argentina three years ago. His YouTube channel documenting the build has surpassed 750,000 views.

I always appreciate when a builder keeps the engine original and focuses on chassis and weight instead. Gurrieri preserved the two-stroke soul and built modern hardware around it.

He credits his brother, Lucio Gurrieri, as a constant partner in the project. The result is a 310-pound two-stroke with superbike-grade brakes and suspension.

Source: BikeBound

Custom 1996 Suzuki Bandit 1200 by Colin Worth

Introduced in 1996, the Suzuki Bandit 1200 took the bulletproof air/oil-cooled GSX-R1100 engine, bumped it to 1152cc, and dropped it into a steel frame for a naked streetfighter.

The formula was simple: big torque, cheap purchase price, and nearly unlimited modification potential.

That spirit of affordable performance lives on in Suzuki’s modern lineup, with the SV650 confirmed for 2027 with an all-new SV-7GX engine.

Inside Marc Wilmington’s 2009 Ducati Hypermotard Raptor Build

Ducati introduced the Hypermotard 1100 in 2007 as a supermoto-style machine with a 1078cc air-cooled Desmo V-twin. Pierre Terblanche designed it to combine supermoto agility with a heavier, torquey V-twin character.

The 1100S was the up-spec version with improved suspension, brakes, and forged Marchesini wheels. MCN described the original as having a “pathological penchant for wheelies.”

Marc Wilmington, a UK builder who has owned more than 30 motorcycles since a teenage Suzuki TS50X, chose a 2009 Hypermotard 1100S for his first full custom build. He wanted something that looked like a manufacturer concept before the boardroom watered it down.

Marc Wilmington Raptor Ducati Hypermotard 1100S studio shot — Photo: Marc Wilmington, via BikeBound.

REZ Industries Turns 2024 Honda Monkey 125 into a Chopper

REZ Industries has turned a 2024 Honda Monkey 125 into the GeeGee Chop, a small-format chopper built in Taiwan for a customer who planned to ride it. The project keeps the Monkey’s original frame and rear twin-shock suspension instead of converting the bike into a hardtail.

That decision leaves the donor bike recognizable beneath the taller front end, ape-hanger bars, and bright flame paint. The result follows the proportions of a traditional chopper while retaining the compact Honda platform, much like other custom vintage motorcycle builds.

Custom 1976 Bultaco 340 TSS by Jets Forever

Bultaco’s TSS racers were built for the sharp end of road racing, pairing light weight with increasingly potent two-stroke singles. Jets Forever’s latest machine takes that competition lineage and stretches it toward the dry-lake racer tradition, using a 340 TSS engine as the center of the design.

Built by Jeff Duval, the Montjuich Class 340 TSS Competition Client carries the name of Barcelona’s famous circuit and the spirit of Bultaco’s racing history. It looks part Grand Prix machine, part straight-line special, with a long stance that makes the polished engine and huge expansion chamber impossible to miss.

Custom Ducati Multistrada 1000S by Pit Lane Moto

There are plenty of classic Ducati models that make obvious café racer donors, but the first-generation Multistrada has rarely been one of them. Pierre Terblanche’s tall, heavily faired sports-tourer was deliberately unconventional when it arrived in the mid-2000s.

Yet beneath all that polarizing plastic sat some of Bologna’s finest hardware of the era. For their latest project, dubbed “Desmo Corridore Caffè,” UK custom workshop Pit Lane Moto stripped a 2005 Ducati Multistrada 1000S DS back to its bare essentials to unlock its true athletic potential.