(The Bike Yamaha Should Have Built)
In 2006 I fell in love with “bobbers” after ogling a few at Ruidoso. I had wanted a small street bike for around town so I decided to build a bobber. Started checking want-adds and found a pretty rough 2004 Yamaha 650 V-Star for a reasonable price. The engine was solid but the bike had been owner painted (badly). The first thing I did was remove the plumbing nightmare, EGR system. The bike had a mono-shock and open driveshaft so it already had the “hardtail” look. I cut the stock metal fenders down substantially and made new mounts. Next, I removed the fork-shield covers. There were lots of available accessories for the bike so my credit card got to know the internet real well. I added forward controls to replace the floor boards, drag-style handle bars, Kuryakin signal-lighting and mirrors, bobber-style taillight, custom made bobber seat, windshield, and white-wall tires. After completely rewiring the bike, I stripped it back down and had all the metal work professionally painted “Victory Red” to match my ’46 pickup. I spent about three months building the scooter.
It was a fun street-bike but too “buzzy” to ride above 60 for any length of time. After about a year, my “roving eye” got the better of me and I fell out-of-love with the bobber and in-love with dual-sports, specifically a 2008 KLR 650 with a thousand miles on it. I sold the bobber for enough to buy the KLR. A young lady who had just started riding bought it, which was good ’cause it was really a little small for most guys.
