IMPROVING or PERSONALISING a bike is never over as far as I`m concerned and as for the streetfighter scene being over just type `streetfighter` into an Ebay search and see how many pages you`ll get?
Biking snobbery is something I deplore personally, these muppets that even put period rubber brake hoses on their concours rebuilds, WTF, are they not going to ride the thing?
I can admire standard, and good ownership, cleaning skills etc but mods shake my tree, engineering results, the radical, the vision, the skill and TIME put in.
Chris`s NWS framed 870 is testament to what CAN be done and it`s still very much a TRX.
I remember a very interesting conversation I had with a 77 year old Vincent (series C) rider at Box Hill in 2008.
This old fella could quote part numbers, tolerances, run-out, shim thicknesses and the like, his Vincent was an extension of him and unlike his son on a Firestorm this old guy was interesting.
Told me all about his many crank builds over the years, he`s been the owner from new, the engineering solutions he has devised to help even out some of vincents design flaws.
So, a standard series C would not be the bike he would want but his Vincent was most certainly the only bike he ever wants to own. Plus he`s even put something in place to have it given to a museum when it outlives him.
I could have talked to that old fella all day but he was itching to get back in the saddle after his cuppa so I wished him many more happy miles on his old girl and let him get on with it.