Yamaha 1700 V-MAX Yard Built -INFRARED- by JVB 2015 — Specifications

Thirty years. That was the V-Max's age in 2015, and that anniversary deserved better than a simple press release or a limited edition repainted in red. Yamaha had the intelligence to hand the keys of the monster to Jens vom Brauck, founder of JvB-moto in Cologne, whose connection with this machine borders on destiny. In 1985, at fifteen years old, this German kid discovered the V-Max in a magazine. The beast wasn't road-legal across the Rhine — its 145 horsepower of the era deemed too dangerous for German roads. No matter: the image had been etched in. Thirty years later, he's the one reshaping it, piece by piece, under the name "INFRARED".

The engine remains that of the second-generation V-Max, the 65-degree V4 of 1679 cc producing 200 horsepower at 9,000 rpm and 166.7 Nm of torque at 6,500 rpm. These figures, it bears repeating, place the machine in a category where few dare venture. A Ducati Diavel turns out around 162 horsepower, a Kawasaki ZZR1400 tops out at 210 but on a very different architecture. The V-Max plays on mid-range torque surge — that conveyor belt sensation that pulls the tarmac beneath the rear wheel. Jens vom Brauck hasn't touched the mechanical soul, and that's the right decision. You don't fix what works.

What changes is everything else. The "INFRARED" adopts a silhouette somewhere between dragster and café racer, built around a false aluminum frame with carbon wherever the eye lands. The front headlight is buried within the 52 mm diameter forks, topped by an aluminum fender; the carbon wheel discs on 120/70-18 tires at the front and 200/50-18 at the rear give the machine the presence of a track monster. The tachometer, by Autometer, is borrowed from American dragsters: the tone is set at first glance. The 4-into-1 exhaust collector terminates in a Termignoni whose raspy voice is a reminder that the machine's 310 kg weren't built for Sunday leisurely rides.

Vom Brauck also paid careful attention to historical continuity, which is rare in the custom exercise where the past is often erased in favor of shine. The lateral air scoops echo the design of the original 1985 V-Max, and the paint draws inspiration from the Yamaha GP 500 team liveries of that same year. This is not superficial nostalgia; it is a structured, documented, coherent tribute. The custom aluminum fuel tank, tucked beneath the seat, visually lowers the center of gravity and reinforces the impression of a machine coiled in on itself, ready to launch.

The "INFRARED" will never be sold. That is both its strength and its limitation. A one-off piece exhibited in Yamaha's Yard Built collection, it crystallizes what motorcycle building can produce at its best when paired with a genuine culture of the machine. For those who dream of a production V-Max already priced at 23,000 euros, this creation will remain a distant horizon. But it proves one useful thing: this brutal, heavy, archaic-in-its-proportions V4 has not had its last word. In the hands of a builder who has known it since adolescence, the V-Max becomes something other than a muscular roadster. It becomes a statement.