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Stories of Bike

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“Stories of Bike is simply about the sharing stories of riders and their custom bikes. Motorbikes aren’t only a machine from which we derive a basic pleasure in riding, but rather something which connects us to many things: friends, family and our environment both urban and natural…It is these connections, these stories, I wish to share with your fellow riders,” writes Cam Elkin on the Stories of Bike website.

Based down under in Sydney, Australia and feeding of the area’s café racer scene, Elkin has put together a budding web series that focuses on individual motorcyclists and the unique machines they ride. It won’t take you long to realize that there is a clear moto-hipster vibe that’s going on with the Stories of Bike series, which to be honest gets old pretty quick if it’s not your thing (it’s not ours).

But, at the end of the day the video series is all about motorcyclists talking about their bikes, and the stories thus experienced from the saddle — so, what’s not to like about that? Five episodes deep so far, we have to say that the production and storytelling here is some of the best we’ve seen. Enjoy the episodes after the jump — we did, despite the skinny jeans.

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Bikes

Radical Ducati 7½ Sportiva

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It has been a while since we posted about those crazy Spaniards at Radical Ducati, but long-time readers will remember fondly the exquisite custom motorcycles that Pepo and Reyes have created from the various pieces of Ducati’s finest.

It is hard to pick a favorite from machines like the Radical Ducati RAD02 Imola Cafe Racer, Radical Ducati Café Veloce, Radical Ducati Mikaracer, Radical Ducati Raceric, and Radical Ducati RAD 02 Corsa EVO, but our moto-lust keeps bringing us back to the Radical Ducati 9½ – a café racer styled motorcycle that uses an ST2 motor, a Monster 900 frame, and a 916 fuel tank and swingarm.

Getting its name from the ST2’s 944cc engine displacement, the 9½’s designation should tip-off where the Spanish firm has gone in its creation with the Radical Ducati 7½ Sportiva. Another water-cooled machine, the 7½ Sportiva ups the ante with the Ducati Superbike 749R taking the honor as its donor bike, while still remaining true to its predecessor’s café racer look and feel.

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Bikes

Ducati Monster S4R Concept by Paolo Tesio

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While the Ducati Monster S4R is a special machine in its own right, using a water-cooled four-valve superbike-derived motor, this custom by Paolo Tesio caught our eye as something singularly different from the Italian brand’s fine work. First creating a custom subframe, tail section, and fork guards in CAD, Tesio’s finished motorcycle compliments the original design of the Monster S4R quite well, in a balanced “evolution, not revolution” sort of way.

Complete with an underslung box-style exhaust, the look is clean, different, but still very true to the Monster’s café roots. Our favorite part is perhaps the least functional, as the fork guards give a girder front-end feel, and are tastefully emblazoned with the retro Ducati logo. If there is enough interest, Tesio says he will make a kit available to S4R owners. More tragically small and horribly cropped photos after the jump.

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Bikes

Sbay Jerry – Fine Art Meets Motorcycling

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While the United States has always been a center for custom motorcycle fabrication, a biker renaissance is currently underway on Spanish soil. It shouldn’t surprise us that one of the largest and most rabid places for motorcycling is fostering some of the most beautiful motorcycle masterpieces in the world, this is after all the same country that brought us Dalí, Goya, & Picasso.

Of course you have seen Madrid’s Radical Ducati gracing our pages, but some of our most favorite work comes from the folks over at Sbay. Truly two-wheeled artistry, our love affair first started with the Sbay Flying 1800, but we find ourselves in serious motorcycling lust with the firm’s latest creation: the Sbay Jerry.

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Bikes

1979 Honda CB650 by Trillion Industries

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Here at Asphalt & Rubber, we don’t feature too many bikes that subscribe to the “modern-take on the retro look” hipster theory of motorcycling. Maybe it’s because we prefer to go fast rather than look cool, or maybe it’s because we don’t own any form fitting denim pants — honestly, it could go either way on that one. That being said, we know what we like, and more importantly when know what we like when we see it, and that pretty much sums up our thoughts on the 1979 Honda CB650 by Trillion Industries.

Beginning life in the mundane, the Honda CB is a crowd favorite with the retro-turned-hipster crowd for making modern takes on the café racer design aesthetic. Don’t get us wrong, we have seen plenty of café racers that we like, and the market segment enjoys a small but militant following of motorcycle enthusiasts. However, rarely does a Honda CB, no matter how much beauty school it has attended, floor you in your seat. This work by Derek Pauletto however, would be the exception to that statement.

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Bikes

Moto Guzzi V7 Clubman Endurance Racer by Luca Bar

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When the Moto Guzzi V7 Clubman Racer debuted at EICMA in 2009, it looks like we weren’t the only ones smitten by the bike’s retro yet refined presence. Moto Guzzi’s creation also caught the eye of the purveyor of pixels himself, Luca Bar of Luca Bar Designs, as the Italian designer plans on having a V7 in his garage, albeit with a slightly different look and feel from the stock model.

Basing his design off the endurance racers of the 1970’s, Bar is constructing a streamlined forward fairing for his Guzzi. Of course the process is added by his talented eye for design, which brings us the render you see here. Staying true to the classic lines of the Clubman, we think there might be more demand for such a piece than just the one destined for Bar’s garage.

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Bikes

Sbay Flying 1800 Custom Cafe Racer

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Here’s to starting Monday morning off right as we bring you the Spanish-made Sbay Flying 1800 custom café racer from Sbay Motor Company. If cruisers from a certain American manufacturer could look like this, we imagine that talks of an aging demographic would cease to exist as the Flying 1800 has ample doses of eye-candy, sportiness, and innovation.

Between the 3.7 gallon carbon fiber tank that is hangs below the oil-holding frame and above the motor, the rear taillight that integrates into the tail section like a Ducati GP9/GP10, and the tasteful use of copper pipes that we liked so much on the Confederate Fighter, there’s plenty to get you drooling on this bike as it borrows from some of the best ideas in motorcycle design.

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Bikes

Ducati 350 Café Racer – Proof That Less is More

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Christian Klein’s Ducati 350 Café Racer might be a work of art, and it’s certainly an example that you don’t have to make an elaborate motorcycle to make something visually stunning. Using a Ducati 350 Scrambler motor, Klein has ported and polished the single-cylinder lump, and then fabricated a custom steel frame to make his creation. Klein was meticulous in his construction, taking several years to perfect his machine. The attention to detail has paid off though, and we especially like the custom made exhaust that wraps around the rear shock, and comes to a minimalist conclusion under the rider’s handmade seat. Photos after the jump.

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Bikes

Radical Ducati Café Veloce

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Seeing how popular the work of Radical Ducati has been on our site, both with the Radical Ducati 9½ and Radical Ducati RAD02 Imola, we thought we’d bring you another one of the Spanish group’s fabulous creations: The Radical Ducati Café Veloce. Based off a Ducati Sport Classic, the Café Veloce features the same DS 1000 air-cooled two-valve motor, and steel tube frame as the now discontinued Ducati, but grows upon the Sport Classic’s cafe inspired lines.

Tastefully refining the Café Veloce into a sleeker and more dynamic package, Radical Ducati has created the Café Veloce to be devoid of Ducati’s more bland touches to the GT1000. In case you haven’t noticed yet, we’re smitten with the Café Veloce, even if it’s not usually the kind of thing we’d go for in our own garage. Photos after the jump.

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Bikes

Radical Ducati 9½

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From the guys at Spanish firm Radical Ducati comes the 9½, a Ducati ST2 motor wedged into a Monster 900 chassis, making an Italian beauty that’s part cafe racer, part streetfighter. Drawing inspiration form Ducati’s single-cylinder race bikes from the 1970’s, the 9½ is not only a looker, but is comprised of parts from Ducatis long forgotten past (but perhaps more memorable bikes, if you can handle that oxymoron).

If you look closely you’ll see pieces from not only the ST2, Monster 900, but also from the Ducati 916 Superbike (swingarm and rear-wheel), and 999 Superbike (fuel tank). Some other Radical parts enter the mix as well from its RAD series, and the result is a retro-esque bike that looks scintillating, classy, light, and fast. Keep your eyes trained for more bikes from Radical Ducati, we expect we’ll see some more great pieces (like this Radical Ducati RAD02 Imola) from the firm as they continue their Desmo mash-up. Bunch o’photos after the jump.

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Opinion/Editorial

How to Save Harley-Davidson – Step 2: Shift Your Product Lineup into New Segments

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35 motorcycles, 7 model lines, 4 chassis, 3 motor families, & 1 market segment, that’s Harley-Davidson’s product line by the numbers. Where many large production motorcycle companies might have 30 or so motorcycles that span the entire gamut of motorcycling’s different sub-markets, Harley-Davidson has put all of its eggs in the heavy cruiser market. This singular pursuit of one market segment has not only been the cause for Harley’s success, but also a significant contributing factor to the company’s recent downfall, which has led to a recently rumored leveraged buyout.

As the old idiom goes, one should not put all their eggs in one basket, which is exactly the faux pas being committed here by Harley-Davidson in its product offering. Businesses, especially public ones, should always have an eye on sustained long-term growth, and a key element to that goal is a well-diversified position in their appropriate industry. Taking this lens and applying it to Harley-Davidson, one can immediately see a portfolio that has been extensively mismanaged by focusing on only one segment of the total motorcycle industry: the heavy cruiser market.

What this has effectively created is a motorcycle company that looks like Alfred Hitchcock’s take on Baskin Robins: 31 flavors, but they’re all Rocky Road.

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