Is that a 650? I almost bought one, chopped exactly like that. I mean it could be the same bike. The problem with it was the guy had built it for his girlfriend and I refused to put it on the trailer unless I could paint it first. There was no way in hell I was bringing home a "pink" bike. (to be fair... it was red pearl flake over white with red pinstriping... But that's still pink)
I had a two XS 650s, one chopped. Also a number of engines and a hard tail frame. I used to build "custom" XSs at the shop I worked at. The XS650 was the first 4 cycle bike Yamaha made. Both pistons rise, fall, and spark together but the valves are 180 out so that only one cylinder fires at a time. They sold about half a million of those things. Here's one with an after market flat track kit.
Interesting, I still have mine, a special. Still all stock, except the air filters; nobody's phugged it up, it can still go fast, take bumps, and carry a pillion. Even light off-road. I can see why they'd make a good flat tracker... I've had the rear come out on me with mild throttle in lean.
i saw somthing on tv. i don't know where there's anything about it on the net. i'm sure there must be, just no idea where to start looking, anyway, you know those kids toy trikes with the huge front wheel that you sit behind instead of on top of, with little tiny wheels on the ground behind it, usually made of plastic, someone got the idea to put big superpower cyclemotors in something shaped and looks like them somehow. well if anybody ever comes across a link to that crazy sh-t, just something i thought of this thread when i saw that.
They aren't known for handling. Too much flex in the swing arm. If you notice that flat tracker has a different swing arm, not stock.
I haven't ridden mine for a long time, 15-20 years. That was my first bike that wasn't an Enduro but it didn't seem all that horrible on the street at the time. I could thread it through the turns pretty well after all. I got used to the rear behavior, it wasn't that different from dirt riding. The first time caught me off guard but it was savable. What bugged me at the time was I couldn't go much over ninety because at about 95 it would go into head shake. I'm used to much higher performance street bikes now so I expect it would feel clunky in comparison. But I had some good rides on it.
I wanted one of these... I ended up with one of these... I stripped all the "un-necessary" parts off of it, put knobbies on it and rode it in the dirt. Trails and the "slag dumps". The slag was what was left after making coke out of coal for the steel mills. Now they are saying the dumps are highly toxic and people are getting cancer. I had chunks of that stuff stuck in my arms after a tumble down the side of one of those. It was basic hillclimb stuff, almost vertical. One thing about my bike, it was so bad nobody else could ride it... I had no problems. The frame was bent from some massive air time a few times... Tighten up the chain and I'm good... lol
Yeah, I think the top speed is only 102 mph anyway. My first XS was the first street bike I had also. What was nice about my chopped one was the handling. It was superb compared to the stock one. The seat was only 20 some inches off the ground and the frame had only 4" of clearance so the center of gravity was very low, the rear shocks were rock hard so there was no flex and it rode like a hard tail. The swing arm was extended 2" and the front raked so it tracked really well and had a long wheelbase. Then it was much lighter as I threw away all the safety stuff and wiring it came with jetted the carbs, had quick dump exhausts with just enough back pressure so that it would run, so it was much faster. Here's a picture of chopped and stock. I was going to repaint it. A painted version is on my media page. Dang, should have kept it!
Looks like a YZ? That's the bike that did in my Ossa. The Ossa's suspension wasn't as good. We used to ride culm piles, slag dumps, strip mines, pipelines, flood planes, mountain trails, stream beds, you name it. There was an old strip mine somewhere everyone went to, dirt bikes, Jeeps, and dune buggies, seemed like it was miles long. Got separated from my buddies one time and took off trying to find them. I finally doubled back and ran into them. They said they tracked me by following the longest skid marks they could find.