The Blue 'Max

It was some fifteen years ago that I bought this bike as a stock, full power V-Max. I hitched a ride to Southampton, bought the ’Max and rode it back to Cornwall! Back then it had just 8000 miles on the clock and although I’d always intended to customise it [Steve is a member of NCC Kernow, so the customising part goes without saying. Ed], I never thought that it would turn out the way that it has…

- Steve (Ncc Kernow)

I initially rode it around as a stock bike but I soon wanted to change things! So I contacted Steve Taylor at Taylormade to enquire about a fat rear end as I’d seen other Maxs with this done. I struck a deal with Steve for one of his 250mm split rim solid alloy wheels with tyre, modified swinging arm and billet caliper. Now I had the wide rear end I wanted, I then uprated the rear shock absorbers and changed the seat unit.

I bought a complete front end from a crash damaged 2008 Kawasaki ZX6R and Jim, a mate of Col’s at Thor Motorcycles, made a set of billet yokes, 3-inch extensions for the forks and all the spacers for the wheels and calipers. A top job—thank you, Jim. I then resprayed the frame and bodywork and that’s how it stayed for a couple of years.

But then I decided that I wanted to change things again! I set about cutting off the rear subframe and modified the swinging arm to accept a mono shock set-up. The stock fuel tank was removed and I bought a Slingshot tank to mount over the standard air box. And that was as far as I got…

Now, I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard it say that you can’t chop a V-Max. So, with the ’Max sitting unfinished in the corner of the garage, I wanted to prove all those people wrong and build something that, as far as I knew, no-one had done before with a V-Max. So I started to build a jig in order to fabricate my own one-off hardtail frame.

I had most of what I needed in the way of wheels, forks and, of course, the engine. So, first things first, I positioned the engine and rear wheel in my new jig and then I offered up the front end and stood back to look at the lines. More rake was needed, so I pushed the front wheel forward by another couple of inches.