Mutt Motorcycles Fat Sabbath | The Chunky ‘Retro’ 125

With the Café Racer and Scrambler scene showing little sign of slowing down, the emergence of new ‘brands’ in recent years mean that anyone looking for a 125cc machine can cast their search net further than the usual suspects of Honda, Suzuki, Yamaha or KTM… Following a simple model of ‘buying in a Chinese bike, tidying and rebadging it’ there are a multitude of up-and-coming new ‘marques’ to choose from - and all for a lot less money than those of the bigger manufacturers. The problem is that they usually come with a lot less quality too. However, Mutt Motorcycles from Birmingham - born out of successful custom shop Boneshaker Choppers - have taken a slightly different approach; by using a clever mix of Chinese manufacturing for parts coupled with a well-known and reasonably respected base GN125 engine from household name Suzuki. And a healthy dose of modern-retro, British custom style!

The latest offering from the firm is the wonderfully named Fat Sabbath.

Fat by name and designed to feel fatter and bigger than most other 125cc machines in nature, the Fat Sabbath still uses that Suzuki engine but mates it with a set of chunky, knobbly tyres, a chubby short-pipe and short, stubby mudguards on the front and rear.

All blacked out with a mesh-grill over the headlight and a diamond-embroidered black seat, the look of the motorcycle screams fat scrambler and is a far cry from the bog-standard or overly-designed angles of the 125cc machines from the likes of Honda or KTM.

At just short of £3,500 it’s a little cheaper than much of its competition too - thanks in part to that Chinese componentry, but with its build being finished at home in the manufacturing heart of Britain it’s a bike that looks far more finished and composed than its price suggests.

With a 12 litre tank and a top speed of around 70 mph, it’s pitched perfectly at the discerning commuter or weekend runabout crowd. So if ever you were thinking about jumping onto some motorcycle cool… Now could well be the time to find yourself an open-face lid and to turn up the legs of your selvedge denim.