The Suzuki DRZ400 has established itself over the years as being a reliable donor for building street trackers or desert sleds. With good ground clearance, decent suspension and enough power for most, it makes for a fun little all-rounder. This one was originally purchased for off-road trail riding, but after a few years the owner, Tim, decided he wanted something a bit more road-ready, so he started this DRZ400 Street Tracker project. Tim enlisted the skills of Purpose Built Moto with a firm direction in mind, and together they created this urban fun machine.

First on the list was ripping off all the plastics and re-building the wheels. Using a set of 19” excel rims, re-laced to the stock hubs then wrapped in a set of Shinko tracker tyres. That set the mood for the project and next steps were fitting a new classic style tank, and a radiator conversion.

“I had a tank at the shop that happened to work perfectly,” says Tom from PBM. “So I gave that to Tim for mock up in his home garage while he played with the radiator conversion.” The DRZ uses an ATV radiator mounted to the frame, with a few custom fabricated brackets welded on and a set of new hoses. With all the plastics removed Tim fitted up a new Honeycomb filter that grips onto the stock intake manifold.

After the radiator conversion was sorted, the DRZ400 was wheeled into the PBM workshop for the next stage of surgery. “We had a long list of jobs for this one… biggest of all was the custom subframe and exhaust. Doing away with the entire rear frame meant we had complete freedom on the seat section. The most difficult part was dealing with the a symmetrical lower mounting points on the Suzuki’s frame. With a few carefully placed bends and some specially fabricated mounting lugs, if I didn’t mention the subframe wasn’t symmetrical you probably wouldn’t notice.”

Built from 19mm Chromoly tubing and including some removable pillion peg mounts simplicity was the key to this one, and having enough seat room that Timmy could throw a Tinder match on the back and go for a run up the beach if the opportunity arose.

Tim requested a flat brat style seat, with a simple tail light, fender and tail tidy set up. Using a small cut from a universal aluminium fender, our Orbit LED tail light and a set of E-marked Dome LED turn signals. The DRZ tail is minimal, functional and suits the bike perfectly. Jamason from Timeless kept with this theme and turned out an all alcantara seat with some subtle red and yellow details.

With that done the suspension was lowered, and stiffened for a better ride on the street. The DRZ doesn’t sit as low as most Street Tracker type builds, but this was a choice from Tim to keep the bike enjoyable and comfortable to ride.

Mounting of the tank was simple, a few custom fabricated brackets, linked to the frame via some rubber insulating mounts. Using a similar method to their Signature series Ducati build to make sure the vibration from this big single wouldn’t worry the new steel tank. Finished in a gloss black with candy fade red/yellow pinstriping and a bold silver Suzuki logo all painted in by Justin at Popbang Classics.

The MX pro-taper bars have been retained from the DRZ400 trackers dirt days, and tidied up with new grips. Lighting on the front end is a 5.75” Flashpoint X-type headlight, a new release from the PBM lighting range complimented with Dome LED turn signals.

Finishing the front end was a little bit of tricky fab work. As with all dirt bikes, the DRZ was born with a high mounted plastic front fender. This meant there was no provision for a low mounted fender. Using a pair of steering damper fork clamps, and their very own Purpose Built Moto Universal fender mounting kit they were able to fabricate up a super clean front fender, neatly fitted onto the new 19” wheels with a minimal of fuss.

Like most PBM builds the final touch on the bike was the custom exhaust, a simple underslung stainless steel header linked to their 41mm or 1 5/8” torpedo muffler and the job was done. The DRZ400 street tracker now barks a smooth and deep note.

The project had a smaller and quicker turnaround for the PBM team as Tim shared some of the workload, meaning they could get him out on the road and tearing up those sunny Gold Coast streets as soon as possible.

Make sure you jump on and check out the Youtube video below to see the complete build list and the first test ride after the build was finished.

[ Purpose Built Moto | Instagram | Youtube | Photography by Nine Fiver Media ]