900f with very intresting mods

Posted: Thu Aug 22, 2013 7:50 pm

This was taken at the 25th Annual Vintage Japanese Motorcycle Club Meet on Aug 16 – 18, 2013 at White Rose Motorcycle Club in Spring Grove, Pennsylvania:
Not my pix and not my bike...thought someone put alot of work into this...had to share.

Posted: Thu Aug 22, 2013 7:59 pm

The guys name is Mark and he has raced F's quite a bit. This one is just his street bike. I've known Mark for a number of years and he is always building/selling modified F bikes.

Posted: Thu Aug 22, 2013 9:06 pm

Is he a member here? If he's capable of this, I'd love to see what else he does to our bikes.

Cheers from Toronto.

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 11:41 am

I can't be the only one that thinks that's fugly can I?

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 11:53 am

Don't want to hurt the guys feeling, but I tend to agree Andy. Get rid of the head light, and kick the end of the exhaust up to match the lines of the bike and you might have something. Not personally wild about that paint scheme when combined with the red frame, don't know just doesn't appeal to me.

On the plus side, the single sided swinger is pretty cool, and the USDs on the front are a nice piece, and I do like the way he made use of the single sided swinger and bring up the back, he just needs to tweek the can end up to match the line of the rear cowl.

JMO
david

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 11:54 am

Andylarkin wrote:

I can't be the only one that thinks that's fugly can I?

No! +1

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 11:58 am

Andylarkin wrote:

I can't be the only one that thinks that's fugly can I?

Fugly!

With a better paint scheme, better headlight and a nicer finish to the tail pipe, this would be a really cool bike. Smile

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 1:56 pm

Ok, I know I'm coming at this from a wanky graphic designer/photographer viewpoint, but the same principles apply across all design… and that is balance and harmony of shapes.

The single sided swingers are from a completely different generation of industrial design where angles changed - I guess because of the advancement in CAD, wind-tunnels, tyre technology etc etc - and as such you have to pay great attention to lead lines and parallels.

The obvious rule breaker here is the silencer which directly conflicts with the lines of the bodywork, enhanced by the high contrast between the base colour and the high visibility striping.

The headlight and indicator cluster also leave a massive gap in front of the headstock and un-necessarily lengthen the perceived length of the bike. This in turn makes it look lower than probably intended, which along with the lower ride height overall takes it into a sort of semi drag bike look… never my favourite area of motorcycle design, although I fully appreciate the reasons behind it.

It is, by the looks of it, beautifully executed, but from a personal point of view it just doesn't marry the two elements - old school UJM design with modern suspension and wheel/tyre developments. Especially when you look at what places like Sanctuary do with their radical updates of 70s / 80s hardware. Or Don's Barn Door update on this here site.

To me the mechanical element is hugely important, but if you don't get the aesthetics right, you've sort of lessened the end result

Absolutely no insults intended to the builder, cos at the end of the day, it's his machine and he should be well pleased with how well its been done mechanically. Far beyond my capabilities that's for sure.

Would love to get in on the purely visual elements of some of these updates before a spanner (wrench) is wielded… but then if I did that it would probably look great but handle like a bag of sand.

Anyway, enough of my old bollocks…

Rolling Eyes

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 6:24 pm

Here's 2 more pics of the same bike I shot at MidOhio Vintage Days. Didn't get to talk to the owner.

Posted: Fri Aug 23, 2013 10:22 pm

You gotta appreciate the work that went into it. But I can't get past the headlight Shocked

, the blinkers and the motocross bars.

Sometimes, when you try and update these bikes with different front ends and single-sided swingarms, the end result just doesn't flow - too much of a mish-mash.

Of course, that's not to say it doesn't perform heaps better, which maybe more important to this guy. It's his bike and he likes it so that's cool of course.