JeriKan Motorcycles is another custom builder who has thier own take on the BMW Boxer custom. Based down in Nice in the South of France Jérémy & Mark got going after meeting John & Nico from 4h10 in Paris, and the rest is custom-building history.
“This bike started the day when one of my clients wanted to sold his BMW R80RT 87. Personally, I am not a follower of monolevers but certain occasions can not be missed , so I bought this machine without really knowing what to do. Unlike the BMs I’ve made before, it was impossible to conceive of a cosmetic monolever approaching what I used to do. So I used this base to try to do something different than anything I had done so far.”
Jérémy felt that the monoshock setup leaned the bike towards a cafe racer design, but with the emphasis more on ‘cafe’ than ‘racer’ and to offset the modern rear-end he wanted to add a vintage feel to the bodywork and paint. “I opted for keeping some parts “neo” (modern) changing the entire rear frame loop, using flexible LEDs for the taillight that perfectly follow the shape of the loop and rear turn signals that are integrated into the fairing near the rear shock in little cone. A design that was also adapted into the bar end.”
Fitting the Martin bikini fairing with twin headlights was such a pain that Jérémy almost abandoned the idea, but he persevered with a lot of modification and clever bracketry, which was well worthwhile as this feature really defines the bike and helps it stand out from a pretty large crowd.
“I also opted for the “retro” by choosing a simple cream with gray lines paint in matt finish, saddle in genuine leather recalling the tank, aluminium signal switches of an old Honda CB, full polishing all aluminum parts of the machine which some have the patina of time, deliberately leaving the foot holds original rather than rearsets and customizing the speedometer with my logo and the number of the machine’ #9.”
Jérémy also wanted to avoid black in any elements of the bike, which meant lots of extra work. “…the frame has been repainted, the cables were all covered with braided stainless steel sheath, the damper has been polished and the spring has been painted, the speedo as well as the battery and the original air box (hideous!). I wanted to embellish the flux in the color of the engine so that the machine keeps its origins performance. Other parts were covered with aluminum tape and we even repainted the spark plug covers, and gas taps.”
“Chrome mufflers were polished to a matte finish, the cylinder heads were removed, the manifold lengthened then covered with a triple layer of cream coloured thermal tape to match the bodywork and to keep a maximum visual coherence.” The small fender is a reworked item from a Honda Goldwing.
Unusually Jérémy got rid of the side stand (keeping the centrestand) on the basis that starting up a Beemer that’s been leaned over for a while gives off a big black puff of smoke (true) which he found annoying. Fair enough.
So how do they feel the bike turned out? “The result is ultimately what I expected with a vintage rather typical machine a little sporty but vintage. A quality finish and a few innovations that I like to bring such as the sheath or blind fairing bolts for example while remaining in sobriety.”
On a website full of custom Boxers (with many more to come) it’s great to see how far they can be stretched into different looks and vibes. The monoshock seems to work really well without ruining any retro vibe, and with Jerikan’s attention to detail in the finish this bike is completely ageless as well as dripping with class. See more from Jérémy & Mark on Facebook or here on the Bike Shed.
The pictures are made by Pierre Turtaut
First appeared in thebikeshed.cc
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