Cherry’s Company Royal Enfield Super Meteor 650 outfit
Words: Mike Ryan
Photos: Hiromitsu Yasui
Can a sidecar outfit be a cruiser? Kaichiroh Kurosu, the man behind Cherry’s Company, thinks so. When Royal Enfield presented Kurosu-san with a new Super Meteor 650 in late 2023, he completely transformed the bike in typical Cherry’s Company style, but also took his love for cruisers into new territory by adding a third wheel.
The outfit featured, what Cherry’s Company call ‘Challenger’, is the fifth creation from the Tokyo metal masters to feature with JUST BIKES, but far from their fifth creation overall. Kurosu-san, a former Harley-Davidson service technician, founded Cherry’s Company back in 2000, with dozens of one-off builds completed since. Private clients accounted for his initial work, mainly based on Harley-Davidsons, but once his star began to rise in the custom scene, more and more corporate commissions landed at his compact workshop in the Nerima-ku ward of north-west Tokyo.
JUST BIKES readers first got a taste of Cherry in 2014 with the BMW R nineT-based ‘Highway Fighter’ (JUST BIKES #307) – a build that was so popular, it led to a short run of replicas. A turbocharged Harley Street 750 ‘Turbo Street Fighter' followed in 2017 (JUST BIKES #359), with a nameless, but truly unique creation based on a BMW R 1200 GS released in the same year but featured with us in 2019 (JUST BIKES #368).
Most recently, in 2023 (JUST BIKES #425), we featured ‘Midnight Dancer,’ a BMW HP2 Sport build for which Cherry’s Company developed a new carbon fibre moulding process to bring to fruition.
The Super Meteor 650 featured is the first Royal Enfield to be tackled by Cherry’s Company, which meant a new challenge, but also new opportunities.
Sidecar Dreams, Royal Enfield Reality
In terms of bespoke and special builds, it’s fair to say that sidecars have never got much love, with perhaps one custom outfit for every 50 café racer or bobber creations – and that’s being generous. This isn’t an indictment on sidecars by any means, just an indication that, like the broader motorcycle market, sidecars are a niche.
“People who ride custom motorcycles would not want a sidecar, and people who ride sidecars would not order one from a custom builder,” Kurosu-san declared, pretty much hitting the nail on the head as to why sidecar outfits are so underrepresented in the custom bike scene.
“I have always wanted to build a sidecar, but never had a chance to do it,” he added.
That chance came in March, 2023, when Royal Enfield approached Cherry’s Company to build a custom based on their Super Meteor 650 cruiser.
“I was free to do whatever I wanted, except for keeping the concept of a cruiser. So, I thought I could build a sidecar – a sidecar is also a great cruiser!”
That Super Meteor 650 base meant Cherry’s Company had Royal Enfield’s biggest cruiser to work with. From the same family as the Interceptor 650 and Continental GT 650, the Super Meteor 650 is identified by semi-pullback handlebars and forward controls, a low seat and valanced rear mudguard. Some variants add a touring seat, pillion backrest and windscreen. Classic styling is in keeping with other models in the Royal Enfield range, but the Super Meteor 650 lathers on more chrome, while offering a variety of single and two-tone colour schemes.
The Super Meteor 650 is powered by a 648cc parallel twin that produces 35kW at 7250rpm and 52.3Nm at 5650rpm, with a six-speed transmission. A tubular steel backbone frame and suspension that consists of a 43mm Showa USD fork with 120mm travel and dual rear shocks with 101mm travel are standard.
The factory wheels are cruiser-typical – 19-inch at the front and 16-inch at the rear – but alloys, not wire spoke. Braking comes from a single 320mm front disc and 300mm rear disc, both with two-piston floating calipers. Whether the bike that Cherry’s Company received in Japan had the dual-channel ABS that’s mandatory for the Australian market is unknown, but most of the factory braking system, along with the wheels, suspension and tinware, would be removed for the build, with only the engine and transmission left mostly untouched.
Turning a Challenge into Challenger
A first-time sidecar project and first time working on a Royal Enfield would test the skills of Cherry’s Company. “That’s why I named this model ‘Challenger’,” Kurosu-san explained. “I had worked on sidecars when I worked in a Harley-Davidson dealership, but this is the first time I have built a sidecar as a custom.”
Apparently, Royal Enfield had been inspired to reach out to Cherry’s Company after seeing the Shovelhead-based, drag bike-inspired ‘Lefty Bond’ that won Best of Show at the 2013 Yokohama Hot Rod Custom Show. That build would influence the design direction of Challenger.
Stripping the Super Meteor 650 down to just its engine and frame, Kurosu-san raised and lowered the bike on a jack. Initial plans to fabricate an entirely new frame were abandoned when he found an aesthetically pleasing ‘through line’ when the bike was at its lowest and the swingarm was horizontal.
While most of the frame was retained, factory gusseting around the steering head was removed and replaced with a fabricated truss. To accommodate a wider rear wheel, engine mounts were modified to allow the 648cc twin to sit 5mm to the left (in order for the chain drive to run uninterrupted), with the steering head offset to the right.
A byproduct of the engine repositioning meant the swingarm pivot and rear suspension mounts had to change, too. That meant more fabrication work, but the difference is subtle to the point that you have to see Challenger alongside a factory Super Meteor 650 to spot the differences.
A bespoke subframe does away with a lot of fripperies required on a production bike, like indicator and licence plate mounting points, but also serves an important function in being one of the anchor points for the sidecar frame.
Earles and Konis
Being a sidecar outfit, converting the front suspension to an Earles-type leading link seemed a natural choice. This configuration minimises lateral movement when cornering with a sidecar and eradicates the ‘dive’ you get under braking with telescopic forks, too.
BMW were the biggest adopters of Earles forks, but they could be found on British bikes and Harleys, too. While improvements in telescopic fork damping and design saw Earles forks mostly phased out by the 1970s, they’ve remained popular with sidecar outfits. For evidence of that, Ural still use a similar leading link front end on most of their model range.
Earles forks from an older bike could have been repurposed to suit Challenger, but these large units looked out of step with the slim Royal Enfield chassis.
“I wanted to take advantage of that chassis configuration, so I built the Earles forks for this project,” Kurosu-san explained. “Compared to Earles forks for Harley-Davidson, this fork is much narrower.
“In addition to making the Earles fork itself smaller, I designed it to have minimal clearance to the frame, tyres, and other parts.”
Obviously, building front suspension from scratch provided some challenges - including fabricating new triple trees and remaking one section three times to get it right - ensuring this project lived up to its name! But it was all part of the process: “As work progressed, new discoveries were made, and each time I changed a detail or reworked a part.”
One example of this is that some Koni springs sourced for the project proved to be too large for the slim covers that had been fabricated, so narrower units were found, with the bonus being that these also offered an increased spring rate. To suit riding with and without a sidecar, an eccentric adjuster to alter the trail was incorporated into the bespoke Earles fork front end.
Rear suspension was taken from a Harley-Davidson Sportster and mildly modified to suit, but most of this concerned the aforementioned bracket changes.
Dutch Angle
As with the Earles front end, available sidecar frames and bodies could have been good enough to use with some basic modification, but as you’ve probably worked out by now, ‘good enough’ just isn’t good enough for Cherry’s Company!
To ensure the sidecar matched the vision Kurosu-san had in his head, along with the slimline aesthetic already established by the rest of the bike, the sidecar frame was built from scratch.
Despite being conscious of not making the finished package too wide, the first frame proved to be just that, so the next version was 10cm narrower.
That narrow frame meant the sidecar body would need to be compact, too. Cue more fabrication!
“Sidecar bodies for Harley-Davidson are usually over 1,800mm in length,” Kurosu explained. “If that sidecar body was to fit a Super Meteor 650, it would be too large. Therefore, I designed the sidecar body to be less than 1,700mm, but still with enough space for an adult person to ride.”
For the shape of the sidecar body, Kurosu-san took inspiration from Dutch clogs, with their flowing shape and tapered, turned-up front. Take a look at the finished article and you can definitely see a traditional ‘klomp’ in the design!
Demonstrating his multi-skilling, Kurosu-san made Challenger’s sidecar body by bonding sheets of Styrofoam together, then cutting and carving to get the right shape. This was then overlaid with fibreglass to create the finished shell. The aluminium seat base inside was also scratch built.
Suspension on the sidecar wheel combines the leaf spring from a kei truck with a compact coilover shock absorber from a motorcycle. Camber adjustment was built into this to improve traction, handling and tyre life.
Big Wheels, Big Brakes
Despite the likes of Ural offering sidecars in the new millennium, outfits are considered an “old” genre. This fact, allied with the Super Meteor 650’s existing retro aesthetic, meant alloy wheels wouldn’t suit this project.
“I wanted to create a ‘vintage car’ feel throughout the entire body,” Kurosu-san explained. That led him to source 60-spoke wire wheels – 21-inch at the front, 18-inch at the rear and on the sidecar – matched to bepoke hubs, with Avon Cobra tyres fitted all round.
There's no drive to the sidecar wheel (the light weight of the body and frame makes it unnecessary), but there is a brake, which in combination with dual rear brakes on the bike, meant Challenger could forego a front brake. Royal Enfield master cylinders have been retained front and rear, with a mix of componentry elsewhere – a GMA caliper on the generic offside disc, Performance Machine caliper on the nearside Brembo disc, and a Performance Machine caliper on the sidecar wheel’s W&W mini disc.
Reconfiguring the braking system to suit means the front brake lever now operates a caliper on the offside rear disc, while the brake pedal operates the nearside disc and the disc on the sidecar. A parking brake replaces the clutch lever and grips the offside disc when applied, hence the two calipers on this disc.
For all the work done in individualising the frame, suspension, wheels and braking, Challenger’s drivetrain was left virtually untouched. Internals for the 648cc parallel twin remain stock, as do the exhaust headers, but bespoke silencers have been fitted, along with a Mooneyes air filter and one-off airbox.
The transmission was left standard, too, but with the clutch lever repurposed for the parking brake, Challenger was converted to hand shift, with the gear pedal reconfigured to operate the clutch. The long ‘S’ lever visible on the bike’s nearside allows the rider to row through the gears.
Fresh Metal, Bold Finish
Turning to Challenger’s bodywork, Cherry’s Company scratch built the fuel tank from steel, with its shape flowing into a seat unit that's handmade from aluminium. The aluminium headlight nacelle was also scratch built in-house, as were the side covers. In fact, the only “bought in” bit of tinware was the sidecar’s mudguard, which was sourced from Guts Chrome in Japan.
Levers are mildly modified factory units, with the pegs and pedals unchanged, aside from bespoke brackets. Switchgear was left unchanged, too, as was the instrument pod, but incorporating this into the bespoke headlight nacelle – in the style of Royal Enfield’s long running ‘casquette’ - saw the factory Tripper navigation pod deleted. An aftermarket headlight is fronted by a one-off, resin cast lens, with the teardrop shape of this reflected in an auxiliary light on the sidecar wheel’s mudguard.
Challenger’s saddle was one of the few outsourced parts of this build, produced by Cherry’s Company collaborator, Skunk, who trimmed the sidecar’s seat in the same ribbed leather.
Paint saw a three-way collaboration between Nigou from Cherry’s Company, Tetsu from Hopping Shower and Heiji from Redneck Customs. Black scallops at the leading and tailing edge of the bare metal bodywork have been edged in black, gold and red, with a similar treatment applied to the headlight nacelle and sidecovers. Further suiting this bike’s retro aesthetic - and showing Kurosu-san’s history with Harleys - the ignition has been relocated to the nearside side cover.
Gold leaf ‘RE’ identification on the fuel tank (by Tetsu) mimics graphics seen on veteran motorcycles, with similar branding on the rear of the sidecar. Aside from this, and some red and gold pinstriping, the sidecar received an all-over black finish. A button-down tonneau cover that was made specifically for the sidecar can be rolled and fastened at the rear when not in use.
A Lot to Like
After more than five months’ work, and almost as much time spent planning the build beforehand, Challenger made its debut at the 2023 Yokohama Hot Rod Custom Show. Other shows in Japan followed in 2024, after which the one-off outfit went overseas, appearing at The Bike Shed Show, Malle Mile Festival and Goodwood Festival of Speed in the UK, as well as Wheels and Waves in France.
With a lot of time committed to correcting ‘mistakes’ and re-fabricating parts along the way, Challenger certainly lived up to its name. It was all worth it, though, so asking Kurosu-san what he’s most proud of on such a comprehensive build as this is one of those ‘favourite child’ questions.
“I think the loop frame, the new main frame, the steel fuel tank, the aluminium seat cowl, and the large forward headlight nacelle line are the highlights of the Challenger.”
Given there’s so much to like about this build, we can’t blame him for not isolating his answer!
The question posed at the top of this article remains – is this outfit a cruiser? There are sure to be plenty of answers in the affirmative and negative, but appreciating the time, effort and expertise that went into this project is certainly something both sides of the debate can agree on.
Thanks to Tadashi Kohno for assistance in compiling this article.
