Older readers will remember when limited-run custom superbikes like the Harris Magnum and Spondon specials were a common sight in the pages of bike magazines like Performance Bikes and SuperBike. Now, a UK engineering firm is planning to bring a bit of that culture back with a gorgeous new frame kit, hand-made to suit the legendary Suzuki GSX-R1000 K5/6.
Dubbed the HVK Performance P1, the kit is the brainchild of Dave Harviek, who’s an experienced custom bike builder based in Nottingham. “I’ve always been a fan of specials. In 1993, after a trip to Harris Performance in Hertford to order a Harribox frame for an EXUP, Lester Harris took me down into the basement and showed me the beginnings of the Magnum 5 prototype. I fell in love with the trellis frame straight away and ordered what turned out to be the first customer Mag5 frame, running with the 893cc gen 1 Blade motor.
“I set up HVK Performance in 2020 to build one-off bikes for both road and track and decided that I would build another special. By this time, Harris Performance and Spondon were both gone, so I decided the best way was to build my own frame.”
The P1 uses a stock GSX-R1000 K5/6 powertrain and is also a modular design, so the frame can be used with a standard Suzuki chassis kit and upgraded as you go along, rather than replacing the swingarm, wheels, brakes, forks, and bodywork. Harviek has developed his own designs for the fuel tank and bodywork, using the stock airbox and ram-air intakes, a custom seat unit, a bespoke titanium exhaust, and a paint design by Kar Lee.
He’s now taking orders for the P1 kit. The frame kit will consist of frame, sub-frame, and tank. Then all that’s needed from the standard bike is the engine, FI, airbox, loom, swingarm and linkage. Everything else can be used or upgraded as per taste and budget.
Production will start this year, but due to machining costs, frames will be made in batches of five.
Contact Dave Harviek at 07837 688324, [email protected], or via Instagram/Facebook (@hvkperformance).