This summer kicked off with the first ever Yamaha Dealer Built competition. The initiative follows from the massive success of Yamaha’s Yard Built campaign that has seen the world’s top customizers collaborating to create stunning builds based on the Sport Heritage range. The activity saw European Yamaha Dealers create the coolest custom motorcycles to rival the top customizers. The project brought the Yard Built world to life in dealerships across Europe with a total of 41 ambitious entries creating stunning custom machines from the Sport Heritage range.

Once the bikes were completed, over ten thousand bike fans from across Europe cast their votes on the 41 Dealer Built bikes entered to help choose the four category winners. As a result the winning SR400, XJR1300, XV950 and VMAX custom were revealed in all their glory at the Glemseck 101 event in Germany in September alongside the world’s best custom machines.

“This project has proved a great validation that the custom scene is truly alive and kicking not just in the niche custom world, but has been embraced across Europe by our dealerships,” commented Yamaha Motor Europe Product Manager Shun Miyazawa. “The end results have been really impressive, with some stunning builds that wouldn’t be out of place sitting alongside the top custom builders. More importantly it shows that our Sport Heritage range of motorcycles are the perfect base for personalization. Many of the builds featured genuine Yamaha accessories, showing that with a little imagination you can make your own custom bike easily from one of the Sport Heritage machines without any cutting or welding to the frame, putting custom abilities within the reach of our consumers.”

For the VMAX category, the winner came from France. Liberty Yam created a stunning tribute to legendary Yamaha France icon ‘JCO’ with a muscular Café-Dragster build in 60th anniversary yellow and black colours. The cool half-fairing is inspired by the MT-OS and compliments the aluminium loop back, carbon details and leather seat. The VMAX is lowered by 2cm and also features a quick shifter with control on the handlebars. There is a larger rear rim and the added weight puts the finishing touches to its amazing potential for accelerating.

The winning XJR build of the Yamaha Dealer Built competition comes from German dealership Motorrad Klein. Motorrad Klein’s build celebrates the race track with a Noriyuki Haga inspired take on the iconic machine as it celebrates its 25th anniversary. The XJR1300 uses one-off custom made triple clamps by BKG with milled Yamaha Yard-Built Logo, blasted with glass bead and anodised. BKG-3D handlebars are added with a Motogadget digital rev-meter/tachometer, Motogadget grips, buttons, M-Lock-System, handlebar-indicators and mirrors. The ‘Klein’ runs on forged aluminium painted and polished PVM 5Y Spoke rims with wave design FE-brake discs and 2015 YZF-R1 brake calipers. The front end gets MT01 forks, DLC coated inner tubes and modified damping. A Bridgestone Moto3 front rain tyre and a hand made rear keeps everything glued to the road and Magura HC³ radial forged brake and clutch-cylinders keep control.

Further modifications include a Billet rearset kit, sprocket cover, swingarm pivot covers, custom fuel injection covers and oil cooler side covers. Öhlins shocks with black anodised parts provide the damping and an OVER-Racing modified and black anodised swingarm, an OVER-Racing black anodised sub frame kit with a hand-made seat set the rear off. At the front is a Yamaha Sport Tracker mudguard and an Alu-sprocket. The finishing touches come thanks to a white ceramic coated exhaust system with Akrapovic “silencer” and Brandy-Red paintwork from a 1973 Yamaha RD350.

The winning bike in the XV950 category came from Portuguese dealers Yamaha Motor 7 with a fantastic scrambler inspired build featuring two distinct colour schemes. For Motor 7, the Dealer Built competition was a chance to get back in touch with their youth. Choosing the XV950, they looked to create a bike that made them remember the 70’s/80’s, decades when the predominant style was the Scrambler. That’s why they decide on this style, a style that was part of their youth and that made them remember their first contact with the motorcycling world. The choice for the decoration of the “M7#001-Twins”, was a way for Team Motor 7 to honour the Yamaha brand. Featuring a split colour scheme depending on which side of the bike oyu look at, they chose the white and red in memory of Yamaha’s 50th anniversary celebrations and the yellow and black in memory of the 60th anniversary this year. The XV950 is transformed with a raised rear custom subframe, scrambler tyres and after market bars. A beautiful custom hand made leather seat sets off the bike whilst an akrapovic exhaust system makes the perfect soundtrack.

Motor Madrid proved to have the winning touch with their SR400 build for the Dealer Built competition, choosing the smaller capacity iconic machine as it’s not a common bike on the streets of Madrid features limitless modification possibilities. The SR400 was treated to a stunning bronze colour scheme and the engine was also given a lick of paint to complete the retro style. A custom tail unit and leather seat was added along with custom front and rear light units. A custom fuel tank adds to the vintage style, and matching indicators, handle bars, brakes and foot pegs give a genuine café racer feel. A custom old school speedometer was added and a custom, wrapped exhaust provides a cool burbling soundtrack.

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