Like the Honda CX500, the Yamaha Virago is one of those ?sow?s ear? bikes: it?s a challenge to make a silk purse out of it. Plenty of custom builders have taken the bait, and a few have succeeded.
This Virago from Kerkus in Malaysia is an oddball example, but there?s a reason for it. ?The owner is a chef and runs a restaurant,? says shop founder Azahar. ?He had an accident on this bike a few years back. He came to us wanting to transform it ?Kerkus-style??but he also wanted us to design it so that his wife can sit on the back. That?s hard!?

Azahar and his co-founder Raveen have traditionally focused on single seater, café racer builds. But with the pandemic hitting hard in Southeast Asia, they were not in a position to turn down work.
The Virago was Yamaha?s first V-twin chopper-style bike, and originally sported monoshock suspension before switching to conventional dual shocks. This one is a 1995 model, which came with an air-cooled 75-degree V-twin engine?pumping out 61 hp, and a solid 62 ft lb of torque at a leisurely 3,000 rpm.
This particular machine had been parked up for a few years, so Azahar and Raveen serviced the engine and managed to get it running again. The stock air filter was damaged in the accident, so Kerkus took what remained of it and re-fashioned a new cover.
Then they rebuilt the seized brakes, refurbished the suspension, and dropped the forks an inch to level out the stance.

Then it was time to fire up the grinders. The rear frame from the...