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FEATURE I HAXCH MOTO YAMAHA XZR900
num wheels. The engine is stock, with
a remapped ECU and that oh-so-'90s
straight-through, high-mount exhaust.
"I wasn't bothered about the brand
or it being anything particular with
the pipe," Bell says. "I just wanted a
450mm long oval in stainless. It came
polished, so I just brushed it. It was
more about getting the oval 450mm
long. That was all I needed. There's no
fancy branding on it. I can't remember
where it came from, to be honest."
The final piece of the Thunderbolt
puzzle, whose name comes as a
continuation of Yamaha's YZF600
Thundercat and YZF1000 Thunderace
of the 1990s, came with the appoint-
ment of UK custom shop Image De-
sign Custom, who were responsible
for the beautiful purple, white and
turquoise colorway.
"It was about three weeks with
those guys," Bell says. "They did an
incredible job. I designed and drew
it all in Photoshop, and then went
over there. They did the prep and the
base coat, and I went over there with
the bike and we lined it all out and
mocked the design on the bike. These
guys really know their stuff and have
some big riders they do custom work
for, like Tim Gajser, Romain Febvre
and Jason O'Halloran."
As you'd expect for such a detailed
and prolonged process, the response
to Thunderbolt from the custom-bike
community has been incredible.
"I couldn't have asked for a better
launch," Bell said. "It's funny, after
something like that, a year and a
half of building something, and then
launching it, there's a bit of a come
-
down after. Back to reality, back to do-
ing a bit of metalwork and other jobs
and basically cover the cost of the
build. It's a funny mix of satisfaction
that it went really well versus kind of
getting back to normal and trying to
figure out the next step, really.
"The build wasn't a replica of any
one particular bike, but there are
design elements from many of the
(Top) Seriously,
how good is that
paint?! The eye-
catching details are
everywhere. (Above
left) British brands
Maxton and HEL both
chipped in to make
the Thunderbolt a
reality. (Above) XZR
001 will hopefully
be the first of many
custom builds for
Haxch Moto.
