Modern sport bikes are hands-down my favorite kind of motorcycle, but I’ve never been a fan of the heavily-customized Japanese liter bike-builds with custom paint, massive rear wheels, and single-sided swing-arm kits. This style makes a little more sense to me on already non-agile models – like the ZX-14R or Busa – than it does on a GSXR1K, but in my mind you’re still essentially taking a high-performance machine and spending untold amounts of cash to impede its performance. This thoroughly customized CBR 1000RR is a different story however – it still greatly sacrifices handling in exchange for aesthetics and the bike’s ability to go in a straight-line really f****** fast – but the level of attention to detail and the quality of the build’s construction make it a unique and noteworthy custom in a wildly over-saturated category of custom bikes.
This impressive 2008 Honda CBR 1000RR build was created as a show bike by Florida’s Gooichi Motorsports and it debuted at Daytona bike week in 2011. It has since garnered a deserved amount of attention in the custom sport bike scene, claiming coverage in half-a-dozen magazines from all across the globe including Germany, France, Finland, UK, and the US. Supposedly more than $50K was dropped into this CBR, with more than $3K in purple titanium hardware, a three-pound carbon lithium-ion battery (ml9c) from Braille costing over a grand, and a Greggs custom single-sided swing-arm – from an ’07 600RR – holding one of two bespoke wheels that Ridewright machined specially for this Honda. This absolutely flawless, never-dropped, single-owner example is more than half-a-decade-old but remains in show-bike condition, with 3,000-miles on the odo but not a ding or scratch to be found anywhere on it.
This CBR goes above and beyond your typical air-brushed fat-tire build with an extensive array of one-off parts and aftermarket components going into this world-class ground-up custom. It took Morris and the rest of the Gooichi Motorsports squad a total of seven attempts to get the custom paint scheme just right, but the final custom paint digs – sprayed the night before its debut – look amazing, sporting gunmetal metal flake stripes, a custom airbrushed Stayfast Graphics piece on the tank, and a wonderfully subtle “ghosted” GM (Gooichi Motors) stencil design adorning the white portions of this build. “We tried mixing and matching the colors in all sorts of different combos and none really clicked until the very last version,” stated Sam Morris, the owner of Gooichi Motorsports and this custom Honda.
Other cosmetic mods include a Probolts Full Monty purple bolt kit and Purple Haze Titanium bolts throughout, custom white and purple stainless braided brake lines, and a myriad of custom purple anodized knickknacks. Countless minor components were all brought together to complete this build, like Greggs Custom mirror block off/turn signals, and rear-sets, D3 grips, bar-ends, sprocket kit, and clip-ons, all from Driven Industries. Plus a one-off Saddlemen seat, ASV levers, Slingshot gas-cap, and a Roadlok Caliper lock.
In addition to custom lowering links, this CBR build also utilizes a front and rear air ride and instant lift kits from AirFX. BrakeTech Iron race rotors were also used, as was a Power Comander 3 paired with a top-shelf Talyormade carbon fiber exhaust (and carbon under-tail). Taylormade is based in Los Angeles and has been my favorite exhaust manufacturer for a few years now. I plan on getting one for my ’07 GSXR 600 at some point. The use of powder coating on the engine-cases, rims, swing-arm and frame further the ultra-clean one-off look this bike possesses in spades. The two-wheeler has been scrutinized down to the inch and it’s immediately apparent in the end-result.
Morris ironically purchased the ’08 Honda with the intentions of keeping it bone-stock so he would have a scoot he could actually ride, as he already owned a few customs that were in constant states of modification. “That only lasted a week,” Morris explained, “Not long after buying the CBR 1000RR, I added a vinyl wrap and a 240 rear-wheel inside the stock swing-arm which marked the beginning of the end.” The wrap and rear-wheel lead to Morris bringing the bike around to shows and bike nights which in turn lead to an even stronger desire to further customize the CBR.
“After informally tossing some ideas around with a few aftermarket companies I realized that the 2011 Indy Dealer Expo and Daytona were just around the corner and decided it was now or never to go all out on the build.” And boy did he ever. Though the entire build is the epitome of “factory-clean”, Morris actually had to do a decent amount of custom fab work in order to get everything to neatly fit. The main ethos behind the build was to produce something world-class yet unique while still maintaining a “less is more” approach. “Three-piece wheels with bolts around the edges are common on performance cars and since I hadn’t seen anything like that on a bike, I contacted Ride Wright to see if they could cut something up,” said Morris. Days later and Ride Wright churned out a pair of one-off, multi-piece wheels bolted together via purple titanium hardware from ProBolt.
Surprisingly, the Gooichi crew didn’t finish the build until the night before its first show debut, but you’d never know that from looking at their final product. On paper I should hate this bike – the white and purple livery, the wide rear-tire kit, the air-brush piece on the tank – I like this build in spite of those elements, not because of them. This motorcycle speaks to the level of importance fit and finish can have on build. I’m admittedly a sucker for single-sided swing-arms, but from where I’m standing this build scores well over 9,000.
You can find this heavily-customized Gooichi Motorsports-built 2008 CBR 1000RR for sale here on Craigslist in Sunrise, Florida with a price of $25,000, as well as on the Gooichi Motorsports’ website.