NOBODY seems to quite know when the alloy of copper and zinc that’s more commonly known as brass became the ‘must-have’ material for custom bikes, but it’s a recent trend that, although very much a modern thing, can be traced back, pretty much, to the dawn of motorcycling. Words &
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I’ve been riding and building bikes as a hobby for 42 years. I had a pretty common list of bikes to begin with: FS1E, RD250, Z650, CBX1000, have done loads of track days, and previous builds’ve been featured in Superbike, Streetfighters and AWoL magazines, all based on the Honda CBX1000
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I first clapped eyes on The Vampire, as Nik christened this bike in 1989 when he wrote it up back then – it was featured in issue 166, and was on the cover of the 1990 Yearbook too, but it didn’t look quite like it did then (or does now).
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So that’s it – all the rounds of the BSH Custom Champs for 2019 are done! And here are the winners! You can see more pictures of all these bikes in the October issue of Back Street Heroes, which is winging its way to subscribers now and will be on
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We’ve had a lot of fairly exotic and obscure brands in Back Street Heroes over the years, mostly British or American it has to be said, but I think this is the first time we’ve had a French Motobecane. Words: Nik Pics: Simon Everett Motobecane are most famous for the
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The following tale is a little convoluted, a little bit of a translation from a guy who doesn’t have English as a first language, so please excuse me if things go a little awry here and there, okay? Words: Nik Pics: Robert ‘Drake’ Kaczmarek Robert ‘Drake’ Kaczmarek was in the
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I’d been having a good clear-out up the garage after a spending a fair bit of time over the winter hoarding bits, and out in the daylight it became apparent that there were pretty much enough knocking about to build another bike… Words: William Bedford Pics: Simon Everett I’d need
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Over the years I’ve learned not to put my lid on before I get the motor running, ’cos if my bike decides to be a bastard I can get pretty warm kicking and kicking, and I have, in the past, still been out of breath when I get to the
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Every so often a bike lands here on the BSH desk that, no matter how much we try, is almost impossible to find out any info about. The XS650 you see is one such bike… Words: Nik Pics: Garry Stuart Our Garry found it at Northwest Customs in Warrington (01942
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After growing up watching his old man building bikes in the kitchen, Anthony Pearson always wanted to build his own one. Words and pics: Nik After a couple of years of spraying bikes for other people, he decided it was time, and got advice from an old friend who knew
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