DER KOSMISCHE REITER

Being a Climbing Arborist, (a man that gets paid to climb trees and chop bits off; awesome) Heiner Trapp, from Austria knows a fair bit about maintaing a two stroke engine and keeping one tuned. Having a gnarly Husqvarna chainsaw bog down on you mid cut, outstretched and hanging over a power line is nobody’s idea of fun.

Heiner is no stranger to custom bikes, having been introduced to a CX500 by a neighbour when he was just 12 years old before starting his riding life with a Kreidler RMC, in full chrome trim. Google it, I had to; If I could have had a tank like that at 16 there would have been a world shortage of Autosol. A couple of years later and nearly grown up Heiner upgraded to a Yamaha RD, the stuff of dreams and now legend. Without the money to modify back then, this legend needed revisiting.

Whilst felling trees on some old guys farm Heiner noticed an old “puke green” RD/ RZ350 YPVS, lurking in the corner of a stable. He simply had to have it, so struck a deal, carted the jalopy home and set about a design; it was to be the fast, lightweight custom he’d dreamt about as a skint teenager.

With some assistance from Austrian customiser, Bernhard Naumann, Heiner set up Tree Work Csutom to build “der Kosmische Reiter” or in less foreign, The Cosmic Rider

Bernhard was commissioned with fabricating the aluminium tank and tail section, which look mighty with the tan leather strap and Monza cap. Another bike that looks fast, stood still in the studio. The pictures here with the darker tan seat are from a previous shoot, Cosmic Rider now wears the lighter and more handsome suede version.

The engine was completely stripped and all cases and exterior faces vapour blasted and powder coated. Wössner pistons were fitted to a race spec crank, using Emil Schwarz bearings; these people have umlauts and Zs in their names so must be very fast indeed. Normal sounding Jim Lomas made the exhaust, but a quick Google suggests he is far from normal. An racer and exhaust manufacturer with a knowledge of two stroke and how to coax ponies from Yamaha twins and singles. The ECU is by Celltronic which plays its part in the 70hp dyne result.

The custom fairing provides somewhere to hide from speed robbing fresh air, if the front wheel will actually stay in contact with the road that is. Anyone who’s tried to pass a TüV in Germany or any other foreign version of th UK’s MOT will attest that EU laws are stringent and bonkers but somehow this thing is fully road legal in Austria. Heiner must have a contract doing the trees at the Department of Transport or something.

There’s something a little bit Paul Smart Ducati about the overall look of this bike with the fairing on. Dutch, fancy a go on this one and make yourself feel young again?

Youth revisited and smiles all round, Heiner is settling into a more sedate build for number two, a BMW R50 1955. Let’s see how that one turns out.

via The Bike Shed