„13” Suzuki GN 400 flat tracker by Ventus Garage
Often the flat bikes are beautiful but not elegant, they aim more to be fun than finish and invence the guys of Ventus Garage wanted to create a little jewel and they did it by putting to good use the experience they have accumulated in the previous works
The time has come. After building already two projects based on GN400 this time we decided to nail it and use all our knowledge and experience about this model. From our point of view Suzuki GN400 is very overlooked bike on custom scene. It has everything you want from a decent base bike. It has big size single engine that sounds beautifully. It is simple in its construction, it has nice lines off its frame and we could go with it for the whole night but long story short Ventus Garage team loves using GN400.
It is our thirteen bike that rolls out from our workshop and for some this number is bad luck but for us it was always lucky so we decided to name it “13”. With flat track bikes there is nothing more important than performance but in Ventus Garage the look is on top of the list as well. Who said that those two cannot go together. That gets us to the biggest modification in our “13” which is a full swap of front upside down forks and spoked wheels from Aprilia. USD are obvious upgrade in the performance of the bike but getting the same size spoked wheels is the thing that we love in the look of our “13”.
Wheels were painted in a unique grey matt about which will have to say more later. Spokes where chromed and to get a proper grip on the track we’ve got Dunlop K180 tires. Front brake is with bigger 280mm disk and back drum brake had to be replaced whit heaps more effective disk brake. What was not easy because we had to install whole braking system with hydraulic Nissin master cylinder and modify the brake leaver.
After fitting the triple clamps from Aprilia we mounted on it the 5 ½ headlight. Accel handlebar with Renthal grips and new master cylinder are the one that are continuing the flat track style when central unit from Motogadget model Motoscope Tiny gives us the stylish look that Ventus Garage loves.
We had a lot of work with the engine that was stripped down to be glass blasted to get the awesome natural gray color of the metal. During that process we inspected the engine and we had to honed the cylinder and reconditioned the cylinder head. We’ve put it all together with new piston rings, cam chain and gaskets.
When it comes to proper delivery off fuel to the refreshed engine the choice was obvious and well known for us. We’ve installed brand new fully mechanical Mikuni carburetor with pod filter. Many thanks to our buddy Bartek that has helped us a lot with the engine and mechanical parts.
With such intake the exhaust had to be decent as well so we left that to the professional in that subject > Devils Garage. This dude made unbelievable job building stainless steel exhaust from scratch followed by our design.
With the frame the biggest modification was the back loop which had to be a base for the fiberglass duck tale and in the same time fits a led taillight. We’ve put lot of effort to get the frame to the perfection by sanding back all the imperfection from the factory like rough welds which were all properly covered by powder coat paint in graphite matt.
As we knew from the beginning what effect we want to achieve we knew that original tank will not work with it. After heaps of misses and even buying a tank from Bultaco we found a solution laying in our garage from last couple years. It is a tank from Yamaha XS400 that we think fits perfectly to the style of the bike.
So that it wasn’t too easy we had exactly the same problem with duck tale and because we couldn’t find any solution on the market we had to build it from scratch matching it perfectly to the tank and lines of the bike. Perfectly trimmed seat was done by Lucky who used highest quality leather from Bentley and ancaltar. Getting to the end of the building process we needed a stylish and elegant colour for our ‘13’ and it couldn’t be more unique than using a paint from BMW with a fancy name - Frozen Grey Metallic Matte.
Photo session from Hevre club by Marcin Malicki – www.marcinmalicki.pl
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