Photo: Roland Sands Design
For the Wheels & Waves custom bike culture festival in Biarritz, France, Roland Sands Design prepared a special Indian Scout that would capture the very essence of bespoke motorcycle making. It may not be the first choice when it comes to crossing an entire continent on a trip to your fav destination, but it surely is a captivating piece of machinery.
It took RSD quite some time to complete this stunning Scout, and that is because of two main reasons. First of all, as you can see for yourselves, the engine is pretty much the only thing that was retained from the initial motorcycle.
And no, it's not in stock trim, because Roland cleaned up the cooling system and crafted new radiators to integrate better with the final looks of the bike. Instead of a large unit, the Scout now has two smaller ones separated by the downtube and neatly framed by black sheet metal accents.
The liquid-cooled powerplant now sits in an all-new custom girder frame made from Chromoly tube, with a matching fork and a strong vintage vibe. The suspensions were, of course, changed, with the Scout's mellow fork and dual rear shocks now replaced with Ohlins units.
The girder fork relies on a single shock absorber, while the rear was also modified to run on a single offset TTX shock mounted horizontally on the left side in a very Ducati Panigale-ish manner.
Airtrix took car of the vintage Indian Red livery and accented it with gold leaf inserts. The rear fender integrates flaps on either side and they remind us of race number plates. A custom leather seat was also on the list, as well as new handlebars with bespoke grips and a dual-lens front plate. Even though the stock brakes of the Scout are not bad at all, RSD replaced the calipers with Performance Machine units for a consistent custom look.
The exhaust line is also made in house and ends with an RSD Track silencer. No longer a cruiser, this machine manages to remain an Indian, nevertheless, albeit a peculiar and not exactly comfortable one.
And no, it's not in stock trim, because Roland cleaned up the cooling system and crafted new radiators to integrate better with the final looks of the bike. Instead of a large unit, the Scout now has two smaller ones separated by the downtube and neatly framed by black sheet metal accents.
The liquid-cooled powerplant now sits in an all-new custom girder frame made from Chromoly tube, with a matching fork and a strong vintage vibe. The suspensions were, of course, changed, with the Scout's mellow fork and dual rear shocks now replaced with Ohlins units.
The girder fork relies on a single shock absorber, while the rear was also modified to run on a single offset TTX shock mounted horizontally on the left side in a very Ducati Panigale-ish manner.
Airtrix took car of the vintage Indian Red livery and accented it with gold leaf inserts. The rear fender integrates flaps on either side and they remind us of race number plates. A custom leather seat was also on the list, as well as new handlebars with bespoke grips and a dual-lens front plate. Even though the stock brakes of the Scout are not bad at all, RSD replaced the calipers with Performance Machine units for a consistent custom look.
The exhaust line is also made in house and ends with an RSD Track silencer. No longer a cruiser, this machine manages to remain an Indian, nevertheless, albeit a peculiar and not exactly comfortable one.
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