Some motorcycles are a flash in the proverbial pan, abandoned after a couple of years on the market. Others linger in showrooms for years, until stocks are depleted or the tooling costs are paid for.
Then you get the bikes that sell steadily, year after year. The Ural has been produced since 1942, with minor updates every few years. The Royal Enfield Bullet entered production in 1948. Then you get the Japanese workhorses, like the Kawasaki KLR650 (b. 1987) and the Honda XR650L, which has been rolling off the assembly line since 1992.
This businesslike street tracker shows the enduring appeal of the XR, and comes from Texas-based ‘JuanVerde’ (identity withheld by request). The builder may be pseudonymous, but his talent cannot be hidden—he’s already built several sharp-looking customs, and this XR650L is his second crack at the model.…