Modded Honda NX650 Dominator Is One of Raddest Custom Scrambles You’ll See All Day

With the huge number of NX650-based projects out there, it’s getting increasingly harder for one single build to really stand out. However, the custom head-turner pictured above won’t be having any issues in that regard, because it’s absolutely breathtaking from every angle! It was put together by Stefan Lantschner, who operates as Koolt Creations down in sunny Barcelona and is a self-confessed sucker for retro rides.

He’s particularly keen on light single-cylinder machines and their simple constructions, so the Dominator platform was a perfect match for his bike-modding practices. The quality of Stefan’s work may lead you to believe he’s a professional builder, but that’s not the case for the time being, at least. He is actually a videographer who likes to tinker with motorcycles in his spare time, which makes us wonder what he’d be getting up to if he went into customization full-time.

This NX650 scrambler was built for Alberto, a good friend of Stefan’s residing in Verona, Italy. Originally, it was meant to be a pretty straightforward ordeal, involving the addition of a new gas tank, headlight, and seat. That sounds simple enough, for sure, but things quickly snowballed once the transformation process got underway. Looking at the outcome, it’s not hard to see why Alberto decided to go all-in.

Sir Lantschner started by taking everything apart and performing a bit of structural surgery, which meant amputating the stock subframe in favor of a bespoke unit. The looped rear skeleton was fabricated in-house using tubular steel and seamlessly welded onto the Dominator’s main framework. Next, Stefan made fresh fuel tank mounts, before sending the entire frame to a local collaborator for sand-blasting and powder-coating.

Upon its return, he retrofitted a Honda CG125’s gas tank where the stock unit had once been, along with a tailor-made saddle a bit further back. The seat was put together using black leather upholstery and yellow stitching for contrast, all flanked by a pair of bespoke side panels fashioned with an English wheel. At the back, you’ll see a bare-bones license plate bracket home to an LED taillight and accompanying turn signals.

On the opposite end, Koolt’s reworked Dominator comes equipped with a small, yet effective front fender, which is secured in place via custom mounting hardware. There’s a retro-style aftermarket headlight installed a bit higher up, along with a snazzy nose fairing made from scratch. In the motorcycle’s cockpit area, we’re greeted by a cross-braced Renthal handlebar, fresh switches, and ProTaper grips.

The NX650’s brakes and suspension were thoroughly refurbished but otherwise left unchanged, while its wheels have been powder-coated gold and wrapped in dual-purpose rubber on both ends. With some help from a friend named Salva, Stefan performed a complete overhaul of the bike’s electronics. A CDI module lies below the seat, hidden well out of sight by the custom side covers we’ve mentioned earlier.

Other electrical bits and pieces are stashed beneath the fuel tank, and the whole shebang was really starting to look the way Stefan wanted. Moving on to the powertrain department, he and Alberto were quite satisfied with the Dominator’s 644cc thumper in its original form. The engine’s internal workings were therefore left untouched, but so was the stock airbox feeding its carb (interestingly enough). Nevertheless, Koolt Creations did perform a carburetor rebuild for good measure.

At the opposite end of the combustion cycle, you’ll find the factory exhaust headers hooked up to a custom two-into-one collector pipe. The latter was developed by Christoffer Martensson and topped with a repurposed Honda CRF muffler. For the last piece of the puzzle, Stefan Lantschner turned his attention to the paintwork, which is what really makes the entire build come together cohesively.

A tried-and-true mixture of black and gold was his weapon of choice, but there are also some white graphics and several unpainted metal bits providing cosmetic diversity. With the paint job taken care of, the scrambled NX650 was complete and ready to make its way back to Alberto. Stefan admits this project was a bit of a backburner, as it's been commissioned when a previous Yamaha XT600 build was still ongoing.

Despite this, we reckon it was most certainly worth the wait! There’s nothing too wild about it from a mechanical standpoint, but the visual side of things is genuinely breathtaking to say the least. Needless to say, the mastermind over at Koolt is just as skilled at wrenching and parts fabrication as he is at filming – heck, perhaps even more so. It will be worth keeping an eye on what he comes up with in the future.