Written by Martin Hodgson

From Switzerland, you head up over The Alps to Milan, swing east for Venice before rounding the Adriatic and opening the taps for a full days ride across the Balkans. Here you find yourself on the outskirts of Belgrade in front of a nondescript industrial building. This is the journey one man took to find Nemanja Ugresic of Serbia’s Clutch & Brake Motorcycles. Six months later he returned to collect his hand beaten bodied and brilliantly emblazoned 1990 Ducati 750, for the final return leg of his European custom bike expedition.

Written by Martin Hodgson

With the Northern Hemisphere riding season now upon us, builders in the top half of the globe are unveiling their latest creations. Those looking to make the most of the summer sun and the conditions that surround them will surely have spent the winter producing just the right bike. Enter Scotland’s JM Customs who’s hit the brief out of the park with a stunning Moto Guzzi Scrambler. From the bones of a 1986 V65 Florida ‘The Flying Scotsman’ is ready to shred the streets.

Written by Martin Hodgson.

On the port of Hiroshima, in a nondescript two-story building with rust marks staining the roller doors, you’ll find the headquarters of Heiwa Motorcycles. Here amongst the crowded chaos of vintage motorcycles and associated parts you’ll find the team building some of Japan’s best classic customs. For fortunate Western Australian Tony Wong, a friendship with the company’s head honcho, Kengo Kimura, has resulted in a brilliant road going revival called ‘Chilli Mussel’. From the bare bones of a 1963 Triumph T100SS comes this gorgeous classic that’s full of subtle flavours.

Written by Martin Hodgson

Keep those two wheels turning; across the endless climbs through the Pyrenees, before taking the summit of Alpe d’Huez on the way to the finish line. No, it’s not the Tour De France but how Anton Knutsson of Injustice Customs spends his motorcycling holiday in the European summer; and it gave him an idea. What would be the perfect custom bike to complete the stages of cycling’s grand tours? With the help of BMW and Ohlins he’s built the answer, a 2019 BMW R nineT Urban G/S that’s ready to bring the thunder to the mountain tops, rightly named ‘Thor’.

Written by Martin Hodgson

Somewhere in those teenage years most of us, wide-eyed and bushy-tailed, are bundled into a careers advisors office and asked what we want to do with the rest of our lives. Given a whole ten minutes, if you’re lucky, you’re soon agreeing to a job you didn’t even know existed. Now leaving dazed and confused many stumble on this path forever; but not Madrid’s Antonio Schefle. At 40 he packed it all in to follow his dream of building custom bikes. Each a unique expression of his client’s deepest desires, like his latest BMW R65 ‘Invader’, purpose fit to monster any type of road.

In the beautiful country air just outside the Spanish city of Madrid, Antonio setup 72 Cycles Performance in 2012 to pursue his passion. But for him, it’s not just the name of a company or a workshop that builds bikes. It represents his own personal brand of artistic interpretation of the customers ultimate custom craving and then bringing each to life in mechanical form.

Written by Martin Hodgson.

The agony and the ecstasy; that’s the roller coaster ride you learn to live with when you enter some of the world’s most prestigious motorcycle shows. But from his base in Russia’s beautiful cultural capital of St. Petersburg, Leonid Skakunov, has found a way to balance the triumphs with the adversities. And out of heart break, fuelled by determination, he took a bone stock 2011 Ducati 796 and crafted a show winning machine. It rolled into his Drive-in Workshop as a Monster and left as the God before you, Prometheus.

Written by Martin Hodgson

Two of our favourite surprises of 2018 was the release of the Royal Enfield Twins and the emergence of South East Asia as a hotbed of custom bike craftsmanship. So it comes as no surprise to us here at Pipeburn HQ that the two have been combined to produce this stunning creation. With the 2019 Bangkok International Motor Show fast approaching, Royal Enfield approached Thailand’s Zeus Customs to build them a crowd pleaser on an insanely tight deadline. Head honcho Mooyong answered the call and delivered this stunning 2018 RE Interceptor 650 to award winning success!

Written by Martin Hodgson

Over recent decades Ducati has sat near the top of the Superbike pack, with the new Panigale V4R now the absolute benchmark and undefeated in WSBK competition. But when the company introduced the Sebring 350 in 1965 it was the biggest bike in their line up and often raced against multi cylinder machines with twice the capacity. So to pay tribute to the little bike that could, Stephen Brisken has taken a beat up ’65 and beautifully transformed it into a machine that is a perfect mix of cafe and racer.

Written by Martin Hodgson

The old saying ‘Think globally, act locally’ often has us in the custom motorcycle scene looking around the globe for inspiration for our own bikes. But this week I’ve learnt about a builder much closer to home, another bike nut who calls rural Australia home. Mark Lloyd Riddell has plied his trade around the world and now settled in Albury, combines his incredible skill base to produce the most amazing of machines. MLR Custom Coachbuilder’s bring us their latest work, a Hot Rod Harley called the Larry bike, it’s a craftsmanship connoisseur’s wet dream!

As closely related as they are, the custom worlds of two and four wheels rarely meet. But that wasn’t always the case, with the original Hot Rodders and Cutdown bikes of all kinds, sharing a common philosophy of shoving the biggest engine into the smallest frame possible…