BMW’s been pushing its R18 pretty hard the past couple of years, so you might have forgotten about the R nineT. Not Wayne Buys, owner/operator at FabMan Customs in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. While BMW hands out R18s to custom builders worldwide, spreading bike build material around like a politician spreads campaign promises, Buys instead reached for the R nineT for this unique creation, with all-aluminum bodywork.
The bike has standard R nineT suspension and motor, but the controls and other parts saw considerable tweaking. Photo: FabMan Customs
The base machine is a R nineT, which has been in BMW’s lineup since 2014. When it was introduced, it was BMW’s first foray into the retro market, ever. BMW had previously made some models long enough for them to go from new to vintage over their lifespan (see also: R100 series). But, this was the company’s first attempt to consciously build something that looked old-fashioned. Sort of.
In reality, the R nineT was more of a standard roadster than anything. The air/oil-cooled 1170cc flat twin making about 110 rear-wheel horsepower at 7,610 rpm and 74.3 pound-feet of torque at 6,090 rpm; not a monster, by any means, but roughly in the space that the Ducati Monster traditionally held. But unlike the Duc, which sold on its off-the-shelf styling, the R nineT was instead marketed as a customizer’s bike, something you’d buy to tweak to your own liking. There was a wide catalog of bolt-on bits, and later BMW also sold scrambler, cafe racer and even vintage desert bike versions of the machine, in case you couldn’t be fussed to do the work yourself.
Like the R18 later, many custom shops did take to the R nineT, as you can see in the images here.
A futuristic look for a retro bike. Photo: FabMan Customs
Well obviously, lots of aluminum bodywork, and that bodywork was the result of a long apprenticeship. Buys says he has always modified bikes he owns, but wanted to take things to the next level after he was inspired by a machine from Kaichiroh Kurosu. He didn’t have the equipment or the skill, or even the donor bike to do exactly what he wanted—but he still want to work banging out new bodywork for a BMW R1200S.
“Without the use of an English wheel, my only option was to hammer the aluminum out on a tree trunk and planish by hand,” Buys says. “Trial and error was the order of the day as I set out to unravel this black art of metal shaping. A steep learning curve indeed, with every misformed panel a new lesson learned.” Under constuction! Photo: FabMan Customs AllPhoto: FabMan Customs That ductwork is functional, providing much-needed cooling. Photo: FabMan Customs It looks like a bike from the future, from the imagination of someone in the past. Photo: FabMan Customs Street legal-ish, with tidy, trim lighting and even a license plate bracket. Photo: FabMan Customs
Under constuction! Photo: FabMan Customs
Sounds like hard work indeed. When you see the end result here, it’s impressive, when you consider how the project started and what tools he used. Even if the bike’s styling doesn’t catch your fancy, there’s no doubt that most of us could bang away on a tree trunk forever, and never achieve those results.
From the lessons learned there, Buys’ reputation grew, and he’s been doing custom work full-time for a decade. He built his own English wheel and has built a few custom bikes of his own, and spent more time modifying fenders, gas tanks and other bits for other people’s projects. He’s particularly busy with stainless exhausts for cars as well as bikes.
And, he does everything old-school: I do not use CAD or do any hand drawings; I just form ideas in my head of what I want to incorporate. For me the journey of the build is equally as rewarding as the final product. Though the hand cannot match the intricacies produced by a CNC machine, given free rein, I will always chose to jump on a band saw or milling machine to rough out parts and dress up with a file and grinder. I strive to justify the word BUILD, by hand making as many parts myself as the budget would allow.
I do not use CAD or do any hand drawings; I just form ideas in my head of what I want to incorporate. For me the journey of the build is equally as rewarding as the final product. Though the hand cannot match the intricacies produced by a CNC machine, given free rein, I will always chose to jump on a band saw or milling machine to rough out parts and dress up with a file and grinder. I strive to justify the word BUILD, by hand making as many parts myself as the budget would allow.
On the bike seen here, the bodywork grabs your attention immediately—a customer came with a donor R nineT and wanted an aircraft-inspired machine, which is where the vintage aviation look comes from. But Buys says it’s what’s under the alu fairings that really took the hard work. Here’s a list of all the changes, which might sound smallish on their own, but together, they added up to eight months’ work: The hydraulic master cylinders are mounted under the tank, controlled via cables by reverse levers. Clutch, brake, throttle cable and wiring were all hidden in the bars. The handlebars are essentially like an extended set of clip on’s. They are hand made from aluminium, and clamp around the forks, right above the bottom triple clamp. They are hollow, so as to run throttle, break cables and wiring. Rear brake master cylinder was modified to function inboard of the fairing. Light modifications to frame to slim up the cross bar where the shock bolts onto. Foot rest tabs removed and new ones attached for a more rear set positioning. A separate aluminium gas tank was fabricated. The top shell drops over the gas cap, and is held in place with a lock nut before the gas cap goes on. Under the seat it has a bolt securing it to the gas tank. The foot pegs pinch the belly pan and then there are two visible screws that secure the top right next to the throttle bodies. There are four bolts securing the belly pan from below. There are two hidden screws under the front cover. All the different panels interlock. To achieve the bottom silhouette, the exhaust is contained in front of the engine, exiting on the bottom on either side. For engine cooling purpose the hot air is vented through multiple holes on the bottom and one in front of the rear wheel. There are also vents on top of the tank to prevent hot air from pooling inside the fairing, which adds up to double the outlet vs. inlet area. Oil cooler was moved to rear of left foot peg, enclosed in an inlet scoop. A 5” fan is added and ducted to vent out the bottom in order to aid in cooling. All electrical components are enshrouded and fed cold air from around headlight, via a ducted fan, keeping a positive pressure and preventing hot air entering.
The hydraulic master cylinders are mounted under the tank, controlled via cables by reverse levers. Clutch, brake, throttle cable and wiring were all hidden in the bars. The handlebars are essentially like an extended set of clip on’s. They are hand made from aluminium, and clamp around the forks, right above the bottom triple clamp. They are hollow, so as to run throttle, break cables and wiring. Rear brake master cylinder was modified to function inboard of the fairing. Light modifications to frame to slim up the cross bar where the shock bolts onto. Foot rest tabs removed and new ones attached for a more rear set positioning. A separate aluminium gas tank was fabricated. The top shell drops over the gas cap, and is held in place with a lock nut before the gas cap goes on. Under the seat it has a bolt securing it to the gas tank. The foot pegs pinch the belly pan and then there are two visible screws that secure the top right next to the throttle bodies. There are four bolts securing the belly pan from below. There are two hidden screws under the front cover. All the different panels interlock. To achieve the bottom silhouette, the exhaust is contained in front of the engine, exiting on the bottom on either side.
For engine cooling purpose the hot air is vented through multiple holes on the bottom and one in front of the rear wheel. There are also vents on top of the tank to prevent hot air from pooling inside the fairing, which adds up to double the outlet vs. inlet area. Oil cooler was moved to rear of left foot peg, enclosed in an inlet scoop. A 5” fan is added and ducted to vent out the bottom in order to aid in cooling. All electrical components are enshrouded and fed cold air from around headlight, via a ducted fan, keeping a positive pressure and preventing hot air entering.
The motor and suspension are standard R nineT equipment, and Buys hard to source out the paintwork, as he couldn’t get the perfect finish he wanted. Looks like it worked out for him in the end, as the bike has been profiled in several custom mags and other bike publications over the past few weeks!
Unfortunately, the customer who commissioned the build in the first place wasn’t able to complete the deal, so now Buys has the bike for sale. If you’re interested, he says the price tag is $30,000; we presume that’s USD, but you can reach him at +27 82 386 8084 or [email protected] if you’ve got the cash and you want to talk turkey.
You can also see FabMan’s creations here on Facebook.