Tl From Hell
TL FROM HELL
American FLYERS
Sportbike as chopper
SEEKING A DIVERSION
from building race engines for the likes of Attack Performance and Yoshimura, Grant Matsushima dreamed up what may be the most improbable of custom bikes: a Suzuki TL 1000R-motored hardtail chopper.
Question is, what possessed Matsushima to rip up—and largely discard a perfectly good repli-racer? Easy. That engine.
In contrast to a stock, 65horse power H a r 1 ey - Da v i d son V-Twin the customary starter engine of choice for such projects the high-revving, liquid-cooled, eight-valve double-cam TL-R makes a whopping 120 hp right out of the crate, no alterations needed. And it will do so all day long for years.
Of course, Matsushima knew this. What he didn’t know was if the 90-degree
V-Twin with all its cooling and fuel-injection plumbing would fit into the frame he’d bought sight unseen from a Harley hop-up catalog.
It didn’t. “Choosing the frame was a gamble,” Matsushima admits. But he found a way, hacking off this and stretching that until everything had a home. A machinist friend helped fabricate the motor mounts and handled the welding.
The radiator was salvaged from a Suzuki Intruder, and TL-R velocity stacks hide trimmed-to-fit Uni filters. Light headwork and a Dynojet Power Commander complete the engine upgrades. “1 haven’t dyno’ed it,” Matsushima says, “but it will definitely haze the tire if you get on the gas!”
The rest of the bike is a hodgepodge of new and used parts, all bought on the cheap. The entire front
end legs, triple-clamps and brake-came from a DR-Z400, while the wheels are off-the-shelf Bandit 400 and TL-R items. The Mustang gas tank and its flat-black rattle-can paint job fell within budget, as did the LePera saddle, changed out post-photo shoot for a more supportive Drag Specialties item. “The seat looked good,” explains Matsushima, “but every time I got on the gas, I ended up on the rear fender!” Capper is the mini-Yoshimura Tri-Oval carbon-fiber muflier pipped from Kevin Schwantz’s supermoto racer.
“The hardest part was trying to make it look clean,” Matsushima says. “I wasn’t going for the Arlen Ness look, where everything is covered up. 1 wanted everything out in the open, a real old-school chopper.”
Until recently,
Matsushima’s creation was his commuter, which is pretty shocking considering the guy was brought up on comparatively cushy sportbikes. “I didn’t think a rigid would be that rigid!” he jokes.
“But as a light-to-light bike, it’s good.”
In the end, the chopperbuilding experience has been more fulfilling than Matsushima expected. “I was burned out on sportbikes,” he says. “I did this for myself. It’s the most fun thing I’ve ridden in a long time, and people seem to like it.” Well enough, in fact, that Matsushima is hard at work on a small production run of MPT Street Rods (www.mptracing.com).
“We’re looking at a base price of $20,000-registored and ready to go,” he says.
Heads-up, TL-R owners, Matsushima wants your
motors.
Matthew Miles
