This Modified Yamaha T-Max 500cc Maxi Scooter Looks Ultra Futuristic

It’s hard to believe this creation actually started its life as a big and burly maxi-scooter

Maxi-scooters offer the comfort and practicality of a conventional scooter and the performance of a motorcycle. The Yamaha T-Max is one of the most popular 500cc maxi-scooters in the European market. It is big, burly and packed with a host of modern technology. But some might feel there’s a lot of scope to weed out the bulkiness and make the scooter a sleek and futuristic city runabout. That’s exactly what Unikat Motorworks 1/1, a Polish custom house has done.

Going by the pictures, it is difficult to believe that this started its life as a 2009 Yamaha T-Max XP500. The first thing that’s apparent in the pictures is how sleek it looks. In fact, Unikat has removed all the unnecessary body panels and reduced the kerb weight by a massive 30kg, from 221kg kerb to 191kg. In the process, the custom house also removed quite a bit of the rear aluminium subframe and modified it to accommodate the new seat design. Working around this alone took a lot of time. It was particularly challenging because the new design of the smaller subframe had to accommodate a custom fuel tank and the engine along with its cooling system. 

Yes, the Yamaha T-Max features a liquid-cooled twin-cylinder 499cc engine, which churns out 43.5PS and 45Nm. The stock engine was also tweaked for a little boost in performance thanks to a free-flow exhaust system and air filter from Italian aftermarket brand Malossi. The rear bodywork is covered using mesh panels with custom branding. The sleek LED tail lamp, meaty exposed rear tyre, and the side-mounted licence plate holder neatly complement the overall sleek looks rather nicely. In fact, the only thing that’s stock in this scooter are the gold-finished alloy wheels.

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The fuel tank cap sits flush inside a circular cut-out of the seat. The premium leather seat is complemented by leather quilting on the inside of the apron too. Unikat has wrapped the custom handlebars with colour-coded leather grips while the windshield is a modified version of the BMW C400 maxi-scooter. The minimalist instrument cluster Motogadget features a Motogadget keyless ignition system. Rounding off the design up front is a sleek LED headlamp from German brand Highsider.

The scooter is draped in charcoal black colour with a satin finish. It took Unikat over five months to complete this project but the result is well worth every second of painstaking hard work that’s evident in this custom scooter.