Dirty Trick

DIRTY TRICK

Pimp-Daddy KTM Thumper

HOW DO YOU TRICK OUT a plain-Jane dirtbike? Look no farther than Andre and Ricardo Barbosa's totally tarted-up 2003 KTM 450 for one very definitive answer.

Living stateside for the last 25 years, the Brazilian-born brothers have their fingers on the pulse of the SoCal motorcycling scene. Andre was street-stunting his Suzuki GSX-R1100 behind their Three Brothers Racing shop in Costa Mesa before that was cool, all the while being “in” with the Crusty Demons of Dirt freestyle-moto crew, slaving over the mangled bikes you see coming up short in all those videos.

“We have fun with it and then make money-it’s the only way,” says Andre, coming to us live from the Perris Supermoto track via the two-way.

These self-proclaimed motorcycle addicts, who own a couple of KTM dealerships (www.threebrothers racing.com) have pimped

out everyone else’s bikes, so now it was time for their little honey. Once the 450 SX was stripped, they got to polishing-hubs, swingarm, engine cases, shock body. Orange powdercoat hit the rims, shock spring, handlebar, even the rear axle nut. Built to bark, the motor was modded from its intake tract (DSP Power Now carburetor bell) to top end (oversized intake and exhaust valves flung by a KTM racing cam, all hanging in a ported head) to piston (a KTM Powerparts high-comp item), pummeled gasses finally spit out through an Akropovic titanium exhaust system.

Factory R&D tripleclamps hold fully revalved forks, with the shock getting the same treatment plus a Factory R&D oversized bladder. The sliders and the shock shaft are titanium-nitride-treated to make them slippery, always a good thing. Wave rotors, the front oversized, give the brakes some serious bling-bling.

And what righteously pimped-out ride would be complete without a gold chain, yo?! By DID, of course... -Jimmy Lewis\