The Sparks Are Flying

Nutters gets down and dirty and starts cutting away more redundant parts. When will the phoenix rise from the ashes?

- John Nutting

Fast progress was made with the CRK Triumph 1200 project over the winter, culminating in the promised structural alterations facilitated by the quick and effective use of an angle grinder that created a dramatic light show. But then we decided to visit our eldest daughter in Australia and progress stalled.

You’ll recall from the March issue of CMM that I wanted to build a version of the bike I’d ridden in the Isle of Wight where Ian Saxcoburg produces his Café Racer Kits for customers around the world. The CRK 1200 Roadster was a highly impressive hunk of a machine that I immediately took to, for its refined and smooth engine, immense flexibility and relaxed riding style.

The idea behind Ian’s conversion kits is that you can take a cheap-to-source donor machine such as a Honda CX500 or the​ T300 series Triumph triples and fours, and after you’ve stripped off redundant parts, bolt on CRK’s made-to-measure kit of parts to create your own custom machine. The kit is broken down into subassemblies that can be bought as you going along. CRK provides an instruction manual so all you need is a toolkit, spanners and a socket set, plus a modicum of skill in using them.

Having a vision of what you want the bike to look like also helps with the planning, along with adequate space in a garage or workshop. An improvement in my garage lighting followed with the installation of LED strip lights on either wall, which helped with my vision.

First step had been to acquire the donor 1200 Trophy, a 1996 four-cylinder 1,180cc model updated from the original version of 1991, strip its copious and heavy bodywork and touring equipment, and whittle it down to the basics.