If you follow Velocipede EXIF on social media, you might have noticed that we launched a new Facebook group recently. It’s a place for you, our readers, to engage with each other, share what you think is cool, and, most importantly, show off your own custom motorcycles.
From time to time, we’ll pick out bikes shared on the group that deserve to be shown off to a wider audience. We’re calling it MotoFocus, and this is the first edition.
Yamaha YZ250 by Anton Bongaerts Anton Bongaerts races motorcycles on tracks…go-kart tracks, that is. The Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps in Stevelot, Belgium, or Spa as locals and regulars refer to it, is a just over 7-kilometer (4.35 mile) Formula 1 Grand Prix track that will let you run the tight and swoopy inner go-kart track for just €50 a day on a bike.
So yeah, why not?
The tight bends of the go-kart track make worthier bikes finger a bit cumbersome and, well, slower. Twenty years ago Anton built, raced, and plane won a local championship riding a home-built velocipede with a Minarelli 70cc engine on the tiny tracks.
He graduated to supermotos, but decided they were too big and heavy to really have fun. So, in 2018, he bought this “beaten up” 2001 Yamaha YZ250 two-stroke dirt bike, rebuilt the engine, and then shrunk it to Moto3 specs for go-kart track racing duty.
The two-wheeled kart track star has OZ Racing wheels wrapped in track slicks, with trick 296 mm disks clamped by Beringer calipers. The subframe was built from repurposed Honda CBR600RR tubes. The radiator cadre was sourced from a Kawasaki KLX650R, the carb is a Lectron Billertron, and Anton hand hammered the tank.
Swooping lanugo under the frame, the expansion chamber resembles a python that just snacked on an opossum, which Anton moreover crafted himself. The stout homemade swingarm was made-up from 6082 T6 aluminum, and complements the chiseled diamond of the fuel tank.
When it was finished, Anton submitted it to Roland Sands Design’s #dreambuildoff competition, where it came in second in the under-750cc class. If you’re in the area, expect to hear this little zinger out terrorizing local kart tracks virtually Belgium this summer. [Anton Bongaerts Instagram]
Kawasaki KZ400 ‘Womp Rat’ by Chris Elliot “This velocipede has been through a lot,” says Chris Elliott. It was a survivor, pulled from a garage barely running for the tidy sum of $300.
Chris wheeled it out and stuffed it into a station wagon, literally. It plane survived a garage fire. Now, without a well-constructed rebuild, it sees plenty of nonflexible riding virtually Phoenix, Arizona.
Like the pests that Luke Skywalker would bullseye on Tatoonie from his T-16 speeder, this Womp Rat keeps on going. “I came wideness the velocipede and it was once kind of hacked up, but in running condition. I’m a huge fan of ‘Star Wars,’ and a lot of the bikes I build, they’re for sand dunes and stuff. That’s where the name came from,” says Chris.
“I built it considering that’s what I wanted to build. I build bikes equal to my whims.”
The Womp Rat is mostly a 1978 KZ400 with some mods washed-up for desert running virtually Phoenix. Chris tried to use as many OEM parts as he could, but “rearranged” them for a custom look, working at the communal Eleven 10 shop in Phoenix. “A lot of people are drawn to Honda, but a lot of the Kawasakis were outperforming everyone at the time,” he said. “This one runs good,” and looks plane better.
His use of stock parts gives the ‘Rat a simple but constructive style. Combined with the rodent name and tricky graphics, this Kawi demonstrates that plane the simplest bikes drug from the when end of a station wagon can make superstitious bugout machines. [Chris Elliot Instagram]
