When you took a step back and looked carefully, you didn’t quite see an off-road bike. Yamaha put fork boots on the front end, changed the lights to give them a more retro, custom look. The Bolt had a fairly sensible, straight handlebar, but the SCR got an even more dirt bike-like bar. The street tires were swapped out for a set of civilized knobbies (still more asphalt-oriented than dirt-capable). Yamaha also ditched the Bolt’s cast rims, in favor of a set of spoked wheels-again, a period-correct look that would theoretically benefit your bike’s offroadability. This would allow you to easily slide your weight back and forth, if you were riding off-pavement, or to at least look like you had a bike capable of such, if you weren’t. Instead of the Bolt’s his-and-hers pads, the SCR950 got a straight bench-style seat. The engine was the same, and most of the chassis, but the subframe was new, and the rear wheel grew to a 17-inch rim, from a 16-inch rim. It was too bad, because as soon as I saw the SCR950, I thought it was a much more practical machine than the Bolt. When Yamaha introduced the SCR950 in 2017, I lived too far away from the press fleets to get a ride on that bike.
As the machine we had was a pre-production unit, Yamaha wasn’t very happy when we told readers what happened to the bike (deservedly, perhaps), and we never really put the miles on it that we wanted. We had the Bolt R model, with supposedly updated piggybacks, and I still managed to blow out a shock while riding it as the “Performance Bobber” that it was marketed as. We did have one major complaint: The suspension sucked. I rode it at its 2013 Canadian launch in Ottawa, and the mag I worked with later used it as a long-term loaner for that summer. I doubt the Bolt seriously screwed up the MoCo’s sales, but I will say that I liked the original bike. Yamaha obviously wanted some of the Harley-Davidson Sportster’s market.
YAMAHA SCRAMBLER TV
Yamaha Canada actually marketed this thing with a TV commercial. Depending who you ask, this was either genius marketing for the target demographic, or the cringiest thing since BMW’s infamous R1200C extended infomercial… In its place, Yamaha gave us a stripped-down “Urban Performance Bobber,” complete with a hip advertising campaign. Gone was the stodgy, Boomers-Please-Buy-This styling. That bike, when Yamaha introduced it in 2013, was actually based on Yamaha’s long-running V-Star 950 platform, with some updates for Da Yoof of Today, as Ali G might say. The SCR950 was based on a pre-existing machine when it debuted, the Yamaha Bolt.
From 2017 through 2021, Yamaha gave us the SCR950, a kinda-sorta retro off-roader. One name you don’t usually bring up is Yamaha, but the Tuning Fork Brand did try a foray into this space in the late 2010s. Lightweight, stealth, and rugged, the Two-Up is the very definition of a bike built to be an around-town everyday rider, while also being fully capable tearing up some trail on the weekends or lunch break, if your so lucky.When you think of modern scramblers, you think of Triumph, or maybe Honda. In short, whether you ride bikes or not, this little single is one worth drooling over. The airbox was of course swapped out for a pod filter, too. Other updates include a new suspension, aftermarket pipes and muffler for a healthy growl, a new subframe and coordinating EasyRider seat. An all-black paint scheme was applied to all but the vintage Husqvarna fuel tank, which was given a lovely ivory identity by Dutchy Motorcycle paint.
Nicknamed Two-Up, the nimble Yamaha features a number of custom upgrades, most notably of which would be the double headlamp and taillight setup. After a serious stint on the Deus Weight Loss diet (adios unnecessary plastic bits and bobs) the bike emerged leaner, meaner, and more badass than ever before. This time around a vintage Yamaha TW 225 held the honorable position of donor bike. Everyone’s favorite surf shop slash fashion brand slash barber shop slash custom motorcycle operation, Deus Ex Machina, put their wide ranging talents to work on another badass build.
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