Nowadays there’s a lot of crossover in the custom motorcycle world be it styles, trends or brands. Adam’s one of those guys who builds what he likes and builds it how he wants simply because he loves motorcycles just for the sake of motorcycles. His engineering and construction skills are evident on every square-inch of this almost-raw bike and if you appreciate quality work like I do, you just might give this bike a good look-over and find a few things you could use on your own build.
Adam built this café racer/street fighter from an ubiquitous mid-70s Honda four, a 1978 CB750F Super Sport if you’re keeping score, and got rid of most anything from the 70s except part of the frame and the engine. The stock twin shock swingarm and the frame tubing aft of the rear engine mounts was unceremoniously (I assume there was no formal ceremony) whacked off and a Gasser Customs’ one-off, single-sided swingarm was grafted into place.
I assumed this was just some Ducati piece levered into place at first, but then I took a look at it and realized this was all hand built. Adam did this because he needed different dimensions to fit the frame geometry, shock mounting and style of this bike. The vertically-mounted mono shock has a beautifully-crafted, heim-joint top-mount rocker working the shock from new Vee-shape mounts just under the seat area. Notice also the extra gusseting Adam added in the rear triangle to take any abuse while making the frame stiffer for better handling and a bit of style too. I do especially like how he built up the rear tail section with an angled loop of tubing going over the top of the rear subframe to form a frame for the one-piece, bolt-on aluminum tail panel. Really nice stuff.
Up front a inverted fork from a late model Yamaha sports bike wearing dual radial-mounted calipers holds a super-lightweight Marchesini wheel between its beefy fork legs. It’s a huge step up from the old stock spindly Showa fork and brings the modern back end in harmony with great handling, braking and modern good looks too. The difference in wheels and tires alone would be tremendous. Adam also machined new triple clamps to get the correct steering geometry he was after for modern handling. The owner of this bike intended to use it and use it hard. Check out the tires and there’s barely any chicken strips to speak of. Pretty cool too for a “show bike” to not be wearing unblemished rubber as you’d expect.
Besides completely rebuilding and refinishing the engine, Adam punched it out to 836cc with other internal work to match. A new bank of racy Keihin CR crabs sucking atmosphere through K&N filter pods gets the mixture lit in the bigger bores which provides the sound exiting through Adam’s gorgeous 4-2-1 stainless exhaust. Check out the workmanship on this piece. Yowza!
Finally, we’re getting to the elephant in the room and to me, that’s the aluminum fuel tank in all its highly-finished raw beauty. No welds were harmed in the making of this tank as you can clearly see. It’s a thing of mechanical beauty with just a touch of a sense of humor added. Apparently the owner of this bike showed Adam photos of WWII aircraft and wanted the feel of that in the bodywork. It may not have nose art, but it is a work of art in itself. I really dig the cap. Up front there is an aluminum nose cone with a nice dash behind it over that projector beam headlight. Eh, I’m not too crazy about the headlight, but then I’m an old guy.
The owner also got a pretty comfortable ride with a set of slight-rise Rizoma handlebars that knock it out of the clip-on café style. Rizoma also made the rearsets that are so smooth to operate with their tight clearances and needle-bearing levers. Hey, even the seat looks potentially comfortable with ample padding instead of just the usual thin strip of bare foam that’s so uncomfortably common these days. Anything Adam bought for this bike was of the very highest quality and some times it ain’t worth re-inventing the wheel.
So all in, the new owner got the bike of his dreams along with an Artistry In Iron entry all courtesy of Adam Gaspic and Gasser Customs. This bike is so much more than building any old junkyard Honda into a junkyard café. It’s a highly-engineered, well-built
motorcycle worthy of being invited to the Artistry In Iron Show that just happens to be a Honda. Sometimes it’s the build, not the brand that counts.
For more info on Gasser Customs visit their website http://gassercustoms.com/
that is more than worth the click. It’s one of the few up-to-date custom motorcycle sites with great information and many, many bike photos. Or, if you insist, you can go the old social route, but you’re on your own.