Lord Drake Kustoms builds a wild Triumph Scrambler…
The Triumph T100 Bonneville is one of the most popular modern platforms for customization. It’s easy to see why. The retro lines hark back to the Triumph roadsters of the 1960s, which have been raced, ridden, and customized for decades. The “new” Bonneville has plenty of modern amenities and safety features, but it retains the charm and gusto of its predecessors. Says Simon Relph of Motorcycle News, who spent a year living with a Bonneville:
“It’s not particularly fast, it’s definitely not light and it’s not the best handling bike in the world, but what it lacks in these areas it gains in character.” —MCN
Of course, if you ask Fran Manen of Lord Drake Kustoms (LDK), he’ll tell you this bike isn’t a Triumph T100 Bonneville, but a Triumph “Mardanis” — the third in a series of custom bikes dedicated to El Lobo Rey, the “Wolf King” Ibn Mardanis of Murcia, southeastern Spain.
The owner wanted a fun-oriented scrambler for daily use, and he trusted Fran completely with the customization.
“As always, the owner of ‘Mardanis’ gave Fran total freedom to carry out the work, to the point that he didn’t know a single detail of how the modified motorcycle was going to come out until the day he saw it completely finished!”
Below, the LDK team gives us the full story on the build.
Triumph Scrambler: In the Builder’s Words
The modification / transformation of a Triumph Bonneville into a scrambler or cafe racer is something that Lord Drake Kustoms has been doing for more than a decade in our two workshops based in Malaga (Spain) and Miami (USA). But this Triumph Bonneville T100 modified and converted into a scrambler isn’t a Triumph whatever…just a “Mardanis”. It’s the third unit in a series of motorcycles dedicated to King Wolf Ibn Mardanis of Murcia. (The first motorcycle in this series was a BMW R1200S and the second a Vespa.)
The owner of this Triumph didn’t want a cafe racer — he wanted a fun, light, modified motorcycle that he could use daily on the streets, roads and lanes…hence the choice of a Triumph Bonneville T100, which is one of our favorite bikes to transform for Francisco Ali Manen (LDK’s owner). As always, the owner of “Mardanis” gave Fran total freedom to carry out the work, to the point that he didn’t know a single detail of how the modified motorcycle was going to come out until the day he saw it completely finished!
Many workshops in Spain make Triumph cafe racers or scramblers following common patterns, but this unit had to be different. Starting at the front, the first thing was to remove the entire factory front end of the bike and install an inverted fork accompanied with a handcrafted front fender, a new 19-inch spoked rim, a larger diameter brake disc, and a Brembo brake caliper. All of this was finished off with a Vrod-style headlight, Motogadget M-blaze disc turn signals, Motogadget Pro odometers, Roland Sands Design handlebar risers, and an enduro-style handlebar with shorter, adjustable levers.
At the rear, everything was removed, the subframe was trimmed and modified, a small rear fender with an LED pilot was fabricated, a custom seat was made, and a new license plate bracket with a side catch.
Continental off-road tires were installed, new shock absorbers with air reservoirs, an orange chain, and other details such as the crankcase cover, engine protectors, side covers, oil covers, carburetors, pinion covers, and other endless details — among which the impressive 2-into-1 exhaust pipe stands out.
Regarding the paint, the colors and graphics were easy to choose…like the other two custom bikes in the “Mardanis” series, it had to follow the same pattern: matte black and orange. The airbrushing of these bikes consists of the word “Mardanis” and the number “55” in orange, and this time it was done on the fuel tank accompanied by details in graphite gray and LDK graphics — of course, all with the matte finish.
Lord Drake Kustoms is going to make a limited series of 10 units, in which the only thing that we’ll change will be the theme of colors and graphics.
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