BMW R80 ‘’The Cannonball’’ – Ironwood Custom Motorcycles

Ah, time for another BMW! One of the greatest vintage bikes around. They drive great, sound great, hell! They even look pretty darn good originally! Increasing amounts of people find those reasons for picking up an old BMW and create great looking customs. We found another one of those gems and are happy to share it with you!

This BMW R80 has been built by Arjan van den Boom. Together with Nick de Ruijter they run a custom shop next to their daytime-jobs, which is called: Ironwood Custom Motorcycles. We asked them about the amount of time they spent on their venture: ‘’Honestly, we’re thinking about it 24/7. Luckily the building itself doesn’t take that much time but still we spent about two days a week on the process.’’ Busy bees they are indeed!

These guys got style, which you don’t only see in their appearance and workshop. The bikes they built are looking very thorough as well. There are 4 projects in the make but we are here for ‘The Cannonball’, a BMW R80 with an amazing color painted on the tank and headlight detail. During the photo session the color changes from chocolate-brown to bright gold in the changing appearance of the sun.

Arjan and Nick have known each other for quite a while but their love for motorcycles and old products has brought them together to do what they do now: Creating beautiful one-off vintage motorcycles that not only look good, but sound great too! They both started off motorcycling on race bikes. Arjan on the race track and Nick commuted every day to work on a Yamaha R1. Both found out that a factory bike simply isn’t the same as a one-off cafe racer, which made them decide to build a motorcycle together. Their first project was sold very quickly, which kept their spirits high to build some more. The snowball-effect started and now they are building bikes for themselves, to sell or commission-based.

The love for old stuff and the love for products themselves made sure they build kick-ass bikes now. Their roles in their team-efforts work out pretty good too.

Nick: ‘’It was quite a good move to work together. Arjan for example loves gadgets and modern features too, while I want to keep a motorcycle as pure as possible. By discussing this I think we maintain a nice balance between purism and technology.’’

This balance is perfectly visible on ‘The Cannonball’ as well. The bike looks quite raw and pure at one hand, but a digital speedometer, a bar-end mirror and K&N air filters take care of some comfort and performance as well.

Even though there are a lot of BMW customs, Ironwood knows how to give their builds a unique twist. The small 16’’ rear wheel, covered in a fat 5.00 tire, the headlight detail which has the same colour as the fuel tank, and the milled Aluminium top clamp give the bike a special twist. The fenders are a little different as well and give the bike a mildly modern touch, which fits it perfectly. And then again, this mighty color!

The projects they are working on are looking rather promising as well. There is a BMW scrambler waiting, a CX500 with an interesting color and a CB550 which all are waiting on their next dose of Ironwood love. We are looking forward to the results of these efforts en expect to hear a lot more of these great guys!

If you want to learn more about Ironwood Custom Motorcycles, take a look on their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/iwcmotorcycles?fref=ts

This article was written by Classic Life Cycles, guest bloggers for CRU. Classic Life Cycles is a Dutch online Café Racer/Custom bike magazine. We interview Dutch custom bike builders, take some photos and share their story with you!

Follow this link if you would like to read this article in Dutch.