You may remember the XR1660 from Mule Motorcycles we mentioned a few years ago. There have been a couple visible changes since then, different pipes are the most obvious, but it still has Richard’s unique take on the street tracker style. Well it looks like the boys over at Cycle World have taken it for a ride and posted a video. Looks good, sounds good and it’s complete with flat track style foot dragging turns, though you might not want to make a habit of that on the street. 100 cubic inches of V-Twin street tracker make for a fun Sunday morning ride, don’t you think?
Link: Mule Motorcycles
Video below:
Nicolas says
wow … respect
What’s the black flexible pipe that runs from the rear cylinder (or battery box ?) to above the muffler ?
Mark says
Crankcase breather?
Zipper says
Looks like a fun bike. Like the gas tank, a departure from the XR/Trackmaster tanks.The only improvemet I can see is a real XR750 engine. Too bad HD can’t build a bike like this. The HD XR 1200 is a blivit. ..Z
Greybeard says
Richard would be an EXTREMELY wealthy man if he put credit card scanners on his bikes and parked ’em so we could go for a half hour hoon.
I’d be so far into MasterCard my grand kids would get calls from bill collectors!
leston says
sweet bike. i wish video streaming worked on my work computer. stupid internet filter
Nortley says
That Flying Merkel tank looks good on a sportster.
Wave says
That looks amazing! The video really brings it to life so much better than what the pictures can convey.
Rich says
Looks great!
JustThunkin says
no No NO! I want a fat-azz chunk of iron that will not carve anything more than wind, a chug-a-chug motor with antique single carb feeding an ass-o-nine 90 degree intake manifold and lives up to the Big-Mac-before-beer guzzling gut in a 3/4 leather jacket image that costs twice as much per HP than any other bike because of because of Bling-coat and dealer markup for the honor of walking into the showroom. This is just not right.
One bad, really really bad piece of well done heavy metal!!
Richard says
Super nice bike. But did you guys check out their website and the price for one of those things. Ouch! I Wish I could afford one.
mule says
Just thought I’d comment on “Their” website. When this bike hopefully appears in Cycle World a lot of the story will be revealed. Here’s a couple clues I happen to know about this bike. It consumed 7 years of off and on build time. The motor is huge and the design parameters were very small. The owner was extremely patient and 99% of the parts on this bike were dreamed up, designed, made, remade and had to fit and function perfectly. This was all done in a two car garage (mostly) and much of the bike has never existed before. At least not in this chassis and this combo of parts/configuration. This customer was charged $20.00 per hour and the last year was not charged for at all. It was a mind-numbing design exercise. The more time and money invested, the better it had to work and look. Factories probably spnd hundreds of thousands of dollars for a standard prototype model build up. This was a fraction of that!
In the world of Streettacker type bikes, every one is custom and hand built. There are no “Kits” or instruction books or even people to call and ask questions to/of. Most Sreettrackers you see are one in a build series of ONE.
Inflation? When Mule started building these in about 1993, costs for each component added up to about 60% of what it costs now. Remember, these bikes are built one piece, one component, one build at a time. When Honda or whoever builds 12,000 of a particular model, they have the advantage of what’s referred to as ecomomy of scale. They call up Showa and buy 12K sets of forks. When Mule or other small builders buy a set of forks, they may get a decent discount from a friendly dealer or they head off to EBAY just like you would. Custom builders charge a lot because they have to pay a lot to get all the stuff that they hope will look all smooth and seamless when it’s done and that it will make you happy!
Bob says
Richard,
Another great bike. A general question about streettrackers. What do you recommend for tires? It looks like Maxxis stopped making DT tires. What’s still available, what’s street legal?
mule says
Dunlops are the last game in town (on earth) for 19″ DT tires and/or the “Streettracker” look people are after. What I always recommend to customers, yet I get few takers, is to mount 18″ rims and then good quality, fat, easily available 18″ street rubber. Buy a $65.00 tire grooving iron and go to town on the tread pattern. You can turn a near slick into a DT tire in about an hour’s work. Plus if you’re the creative type, it’s pretty much fun!
Sportster Mike says
VERY VERY NICE BIKE
Looks like it will be nice to ride here in England on the twisty B roads – although the foot down Supermoto style will get me pulled over by the old Bill.
@ Mule
Take your point on the cost of the bike and time and effort so now have just brought a Euro Lottery ticket (£107 million superdraw) so if I win it I’ll order one !!
Incidentally love your garage with the XS650 motors all in a row… jealous? moir? yes a bit..
beezaric says
At last a fair looking Harley but still steers like a Harley (foot on the ground around the bends)
mule says
I’ve watched the video several times as you would expect and I have no idea why the rider (Mark Cernicky) puts his foot down. All I can think of is, he wanted to get the bike really sideways in the corner, which this bike will easily do and he wanted to be prepared for the predicament he would soon be in. When the bike DIDN’T go sideways, there he was with his foot out. What’s a photographer/videographer to do? Run it!
Phoebe says
A couple of the comments here makes me wonder if people actually read the text or looked at the video…
Anyway, another gorgeous, well executed and functional bike from Mule. Well done. =)
Oldtimer says
Methinks a couple of them would like to ride it……but alas, the fear of being booted out of their exclusionary elitist circle of friends will forever prevent it!
todd says
Beautiful. There’s some real talent there. I’m afraid a bike like this would make me feel like a total wuss. I can’t seem to get the most out of what I already have, this bike would be a total waste on someone like me. Phew; now I don’t need to worry about coming up with the money to have Mule build one for me…
-todd
todd says
Oh yeah, almost forgot. Since The Kneeslider is a place where we pick apart other people’s bikes I would only change two things: Slightly lower bars and a small front fender. Ooh wait; let me add turn signals, mirrors and a minimal-but-effective chain guard. Then it would be perfect.
-todd
mule says
I agree on the bars. I always run the lowest bend on my flattrack bikes, but this customer is a big guy (230-ish) and fairly tall. The bike was built for him only. The bike from begining to the end of the project underwent many changes and refinements. Many done by the owner. When he recieved the bike, it was only natural that he would ride it a bit and then tweak it a bit. The bike spent 3 months on the dyno getting the “Prototype”, one-off motor up to max HP and reliability. Think that was cheap? NOT!
Tom Lyons says
Love it!
hoyt says
Once again, music getting in the way of the real music on a moto vid
Cool bike