1982 Yamaha Virago XV750 Custom Cafe Racer Greg Hageman Inspired

I built the bike because I love the uniqueness of the bike Yamaha made the Scirocco from 81 to 83 with a monoshock and I was looking for the monoshock look and this bike happened to have a good a good foundation I like narrow bike so having a monoshock that's from the 80s and also having a v-twin from the 80s I thought it made it unique to cafe hi my name is Stanley tank from Aliso Viejo California and this is my 1982 yamaha virago I built this bike out of inspiration by a gentleman named Greg Hanuman he was originally out in Florida he built Yamaha XV 750 a couple of years ago it was an orange bike and I love the bike when I saw it online so I ended up looking for parts for for about a year actually purchased the rear hub on eBay before I bought the bike so I found the bike that was supposed to be a basket case and clean it up so that it looks like this today that bike took me about four months to build on and off during my free time during the week I had this bike for a couple months and I was built as I was building it I was trying to figure out a name for and I looked at my wife one day and I asked her what should I name it and she told me her nickname which is sea bass for Caroline so I named it sea bass it's a limited edition because it's one of one I put it on the tank so that every time I get on it it'll remind me of her sea bass limited edition the the front end is fairly stocked as far as two forks everything was rebuilt and they have upgraded progressive Springs just to keep everything in check the front hub is off of a 1978 Yamaha XS 650 and the front hoop the rear hoop and that spokes were made by B cannons out in California the tire size is 120 90 by 18 I love the cafe / brat / dirt tracker look so I wanted a wider front wheel with the controls I wanted everything as vintage and original looking as possible so the controls are reproduction controls and the front master cylinder I made sure that we got the right diameter piston so that we can so that the bike will stop correctly that's also a reproduction I've used this before on my previous builds my trusty a swell speedo and everything else is fairly stock again that was the look that I was going for my my mirrors I like I don't like mirrors that stick up so I wanted to fluid profile so I ended up using these trusty eBay a lot of people ask me where I got my my headlight I'm not a big fan of turn signals that stick out so I ended up finding this cool piece on eBay the turn signals are actually LEDs and they're integrated and the headlight they it's a nice little nice little addition where you don't have anything stick it out it's all one piece so again it's nice and fluid so the engine wasn't in very nice condition when I first got it I ended up taking some things apart cleaning the carts and making the motor nice and pretty I polished most of these parts myself with the hands it took me a long time for the most part the engine is stock the carburetors are also stocked but I ordered new kits to clean everything up inside there jetted so that it has an open air filter and also a two to one exhaust made by Mack in Temecula California the exhaust cone was from Kona engineering in Los Alamitos California I changed a couple things around this is an adjuster for the rear shock it it gets softer and it gets harder depending on how you adjust it I wanted a pretty comfortable riding position so I ended up putting rear sets on these and these are universal my purchase these at a hardware store and I cut everything down to size I found the right helm gents so everything would work nice and nice and fluid another question that I get a lot about the rear hub is is where to find it again I got it on eBay took me about a year to find it before actually purchased a bike one of the hardest things to do the conversion is that this bike is a shaft drive and with the hub there's only one Virago and I believe it's an 86 Virago SS that came with spoked wheels so this is the only hub with spokes that would fit this bike easily there's another bike out there where you can do a conversion but it's a little bit too much work the front and the rear hoop are again from Buchanan's the spokes are custom made from Buchanan's the hub originally sits a little too far off to one side so I had be cannons custom offset it so that it sits back about 10 millimeters to the other side other than that it holds a straight line and right so with the rear subframe I actually purchased this from Gregg Hanuman he made a few prototypes and I was fortunate enough to have one of his it has a little box here that holds a little battery and the subframe is made pretty solid and I can actually fit two people on this but this seat is a mono seat I purchased this seat from moto Lenna I they're a company on Thailand that makes seats for for Yamaha specifically the SR 500 Gregg Hanuman made the subframe and he made well his sufferings matches this seat so that's one of the one of the reasons why I bought it again I like the the dirt tracker look and this kind of kind of mimics it the rear taillight is from dime city cycles it's an LED tail light that works wonderfully it's nice and bright at night so that people can't see one of the questions that I get very often is where the tank is from the tank is from a 65 Benelli it's off of a 260 I had the tank painted by smoky paints by smoky out in San Clemente California he did a phenomenal job at my request I'm a big Porsche fan and these are all Porsche colors so this is a classic ivory white with British racing green strikes on the way down with with sea bass that I that I named that is actually an old classic Porsche font I had a hard time finding at our time finding emblems from a modern bike or something that was big enough that would fit the original holes so I actually had a member from do the tongue comm custom make them for me thanks man I've been a big ass cow is original apparently they're really hard to find so I'm actually looking for another one just in case I forget at a gas station or some the front end again is fairly stock I wanted a floating rotor instead of using the original rotor so I purchased this online from Mike's access he sells a lot of Yamaha parts the front caliper is fairly stock it just has organic pads in there with the stainless steel lines I actually had these custom-made from a gentleman from a Honda form I've used him for my previous projects and he's a he does phenomenal work and he's not very expensive with the front with the front hub I had to use a Yamaha XS 650 front speedo so that I could attach it to my a swell speedo everything is for the most part electronic but it looks apart and the spacing happened to be to be correct another thing is a lot of people ask me where I found the front fork brace and this is the front fork brace is actually made for a Kawasaki KZ 800 it happened to have the correct spacing and the correct diameter for each individual fork so I hope that information is used to all the various benefits

Channel: The Moto Channel

Views: 2,499,835

Rating: 4.9125938 out of 5

Keywords: The Moto Channel, Bruce MacKown, Yamaha Virago, Cafe Racer, XV750, Stanley Tang, GoPro Hero 3+, Greg Hageman, Benelli, Mojave

Id: DrjrCrKwJp8

Length: 11min 29sec (689 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 06 2013

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

Weird... i usually don't like the virago's "no frame look" and i don't usually like cafe racers... but combine them and this looks pretty nifty.

[u/Whitworth]

Is this the bike that Greg Hageman recently posted saying it was the closest copy to one of his bikes?

[u/Eckmatarum]

I love the way this bike looks.

[u/brit_hoon]

It looks great, and he's done a fine job. I'd be scared of those turn signals, though. Turn signals on a bike are hard enough to see normally. I don't think I could tell which way he was signaling with those.

[u/waxthedolphin]

Can someone explain to me the significance of the rear drum? Does this thing have rear drum brakes?

[u/[deleted]]

Hey can anyone be so kind as to show me a headlight similar to the one he has? i have a 99 r6 and my headlight stopped working so right now its naked with no headlight. thanks!

[u/MotoChase]

Such a beautiful creation