Is the Royal Enfield Bullet you bought during your wild, younger days gathering rust in your garage now? You could get it modified into a head-turning, funky piece of machinery once again. Bike modification is not confined to only using snazzier lights or putting alloy wheels. It is about giving your Bullets, Yamahas or Suzukis a difficult look by changing the design of the bike. Imagine a new-look bike with an extra silencer, bigger and wider tyres, an elongated handle bar with a downward bend, a new shock absorber, hand stitched leather seats, chrome fuel tanks, longer leg guard, improved air filters, performance exhausts and other changes.
In case you don’t want a complete modification, you can go for a partial one as well. In a partial modification, only certain parts are changed. For instance, increasing the wheelbase increase the grip on the road but that also decrease the average fuel consumption of the bike. In a ‘full modification’, the bike is totally transformed to give it the look specified by the customer. So if it’s a Harley Davidson lookalike you want-you will get exactly that! Modification a bike may cost more than its original price but what you get in return is a stunner with loads of attitude.
The bikes that usually come in for modification include Royal Enfield Bullets, Yamaha Enticers, Bajaj Avengers, Yamaha Eliminators, Bajaj Pulsars, Hero Honds Karizmas, Suzuki Fieros, besides, of course, older modles of many international bikes. Generally, it takes about 30 days for the workshop to give your old machine a new look. Manmeet Rattan, owner of Dream Riders, one of Delhi’s best-known bike shops says: “People generally come to us when the bike is old and they want to give it a new look. They want us to change the tyres, put disc brakes, a bigger fuel tank, aluminium handle bars, designer gear and racing handles. Recently, we put car radial tyres in a bullet that gave it a ‘chopper’ look and at the same time made it safer for the biker.”
We want to the workshop to see closely how the modification work was done. A look at some of the finished products gave us a fair idea about the amount of work and creativity that went into each modification. We saw a 2004 model 535cc Royal Enfield Bullet that had been transformed into a beauty. Barring the engine and classic of the bike, everything else had been modified to give it a lean, hungry look. And to top it all, it had a self-tart function and a five-speed gearbox. Transforming your old bike into something like the Royal Enfield Bullet that is described above, comes at a price. On average, a full modification can set you back by between Rs.1.5 to Rs.5 lakh, depending on the kind of changes you desire. There’s no upper limit, since the price depends on the kind of accessories you plan to install. All these modified bikes come with a 6 months warranty.
