{"id":29055,"date":"2012-11-22T09:42:32","date_gmt":"2012-11-22T09:42:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.influx.co.uk\/wordpress\/?p=29055"},"modified":"2022-06-22T12:12:09","modified_gmt":"2022-06-22T11:12:09","slug":"the-spencer-evo-devilish-detail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.adrianflux.co.uk\/influx\/features\/the-spencer-evo-devilish-detail\/","title":{"rendered":"The Spencer Evo: Devilish Detail"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Spencer Evo has a hold on me. In a decade-and-a-half of travelling the motorcycle world looking at one-offs, specials and race machinery, it is the one motorcycle that has made the biggest impression on my life. It is the one that took years of carefully honed contentment and did a fourth gear burnout on its face. It is the perfect mix of glamour and attainability. It\u2019s not Casey\u2019s Desmosedici, yet, in my eyes, it\u2019s as well built. I\u2019m never going to own a factory MotoGP bike (and couldn\u2019t keep its complex electronics working if I did), but I could imagine creating something like this. This machine has been built from the ground up. There are barely two components on the whole bike that have ever sat together before in their entire lives. That adds up to 2000 problems to solve.<\/p>\n

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\nThe beauty of the Evo lies in its uncompromising mechanicity<\/em><\/p>\n

The frame and swingarm were made to order by GIA in Nottinghamshire. It\u2019s hand-bent, 7030 aerospace-grade aluminium alloy. Each joint was scrupulously cleaned before being TIG welded, by a man who has been making high-performance, alloy motorcycle frames for over 20 years. Every weld is a little example of perfection. I don\u2019t believe in describing cars and bikes as works of art. They\u2019re not. To me, they\u2019re better than that, they are machines with a purpose. I\u2019m not anti-art. I\u2019m just very pro-machine. And while this machine isn\u2019t art, those welds have a hyper-organic beauty only carefully melted metal can possess. The chassis has been anodised black, so all that beauty almost disappears. That\u2019s the sign of a man who is building bikes for himself, not to enable him to splash in a shallow pool of public admiration.<\/p>\n

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\nHigh angled exhaust set-up not to everyone’s taste but is phallically appealing…<\/em><\/p>\n

The Spencer Evo is drenched in craftsmanship. Every nut, bolt and screw is titanium, including the swingarm pivot bolt and wheel spindles. The titanium fasteners alone cost well over \u00a31000. Yet this isn\u2019t a race bike, just the focus of an obsessive character. The shocks were made to order by Works Performance in California, while the carburettors are hideously expensive Yoshimura Mikuni TMR-MJNs personally imported from Japan. They run without filters.<\/p>\n

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\nYoshimura-Mikuni special edition TMR-MJN carbs with fancy two-piece bellmouths. Try getting some to the UK for less than \u00a33500.<\/em><\/p>\n

The bodywork, and the special\u2019s name, is designed to evoke images of the 1980-81 AMA Racing season \u2013 when Superbike racing went stratospheric. A time when budgets for this production bike racing class were close to unlimited. There was only so much you could do to a Honda CB900, Kawasaki Z1000 or Suzuki GS1000, and stay within the rules. There was a hell of a lot more you could do if you regarded those rules with all the disdain as sabre-tooth tiger could muster if presented with a Pizza Hut salad.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> Full titanium Racefit exhaust system. Feather light.<\/em><\/p>\n

The AMA seasons from 1980-83 helped launched the road racing careers of Eddie Lawson, Wayne Rainey and Freddie Spencer. The three of them would win a total of nine 500 GP world championships (and one 250 title). It was a special time, when engine\u2019s out-performed chassis, and tyres were so hard they made sparks. Steve set out to build an evolution of the bike Spencer raced 30 years ago. This is not a replica. It is more of a manga interpretation. If Spencer rode Peter Parker, Steve built Spiderman.<\/p>\n

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\nMoTeC dash cost more than a good secondhand Fireblade.<\/em><\/p>\n

And, because it isn\u2019t a replica, but an interpretation, there was no wrong way to do it. So if he wanted to fit a Suzuki engine, no one was going to stop him. So he did. The engine is an 1157cc air and oil-cooled inline four from a GSF1200 Bandit. It\u2019s extremely closely related to GSX-R1100s that date back to 1985. Needless to say, it\u2019s not standard, but it hasn\u2019t been excessively tuned.<\/p>\n

The wheels are magnesium, and made in England by Dymag. The brakes are rare British Spondon one-piece calipers, long before the mainstream made them, Spondon discs and MotoGP spec master cylinders. The wiring loom is RAF jet aircraft-spec\u2026<\/p>\n

I could go, because not one single corner has been cut.<\/p>\n\n\t\t