I’m surprised we don’t see more KTMs on the custom scene. Maybe it’s because the Austrian bikes offer great performance straight out of the box, and a love-it-or-hate-it style that’s hard to tweak.
Roland Sands is a fan of the brand, and also one of the few customizers brave enough to tear down a KTM. In this case, it’s an Enduro 690 given a dash of tracker style. This is Sands’ second tilt at the 690; regular readers will remember his café’d version from a few months ago.
What’s so special about the 690? “It’s a great street-able single,” says Sands. “There’s enough torque to put a smile on your face, but it’s tame enough to inspire confidence when pushing towards the edge.”
The KTM tracker is lithe and angular, with an almost insect-like grace. It’s a pretty heavy-duty build, with a new subframe and swingarm custom-fabricated in airfoil-shaped tubing that matches the existing frame of the bike.
The bodywork is also hand-formed, this time in aluminum, with sublime paint from Airtrix. The exhaust system, with ten sections of pipe neatly bent and welded together, terminates in a stubby, low-slung muffler.
The bike rolls on RSD’s own Del Mar wheels in ‘Contrast Ops’ finish—a classic dirt track-inspired design. (It’s also the lightest wheel in the RSD catalog.) The Goodyear/Dunlop flat track rubber is equally eye-catching, and a Performance Machine brake system hauls the whole shebang to a stop.
With warm grey-brown powder on the frame and anodizing from show bike specialists Sport Chrome, the KTM tracker looks a million dollars. Hit the RSD website for more shots—and a video showing the making (and attempted breaking) of the bike.
