Ok,it’s DK!
DK Motorcycles has been shipping bikes and parts in for decades – and thank goodness for that!
D&K Motorcycles – as it once was – was a powerhouse of a parallel and grey importer, back in the day. I’m talking about 25 or so years ago. Back then they could (and probably still do) boast that they had the biggest second-hand showroom of used bikes in Europe. About a decade or so ago, I popped along to visit their spares department – and it’s still mega today!
Pete Amson is an industry legend. As ‘Used Spares Manager’ he has been with DK Motorcycles for almost 30 years and is the main man with the old classic parts. The parts carried by DK include double cradle GSX-R, Kawasaki E-box frames, early 1990s Fireblade frames and Hayabusa ally beam
frames, as well as the polished, sculptured Aprilia RSV1000R Mille frames. Pete and DK always think ahead… In 2021 we have the new Suzuki Hayabusa coming out – even in 2010 DK was shrewdly hanging up the original exhausts for when the bike became a ‘classic’. Well, it is now!
With the D&K/DK rollercoaster over the last few decades with bringing in parallel and grey imports as well as other stuff, it’s clear that parts and spares were going to be important, but first, a history lesson…
D&K Motorcycles is what DK used to be called. Founded by father and son businessmen Derek and Kevin Neesan, originally the business centred around a Yamaha dealership in the Staffordshire village of Tean. A move to larger premises in Cheddleton, near Leeds, saw the dealership move into the breaking and selling of motorcycle parts. Father and son soon began importing bikes from both the USA and Japan and moved to its current base at Swift House, Liverpool Road, NewcastleUnder-lyme – pretty much slap-bang in the centre of the country for spares. Oh, and realising the need for spares or high-quality pattern parts, DK used its wonderful museum of bikes to help make is own range of aftermarket exhausts – the Delkevic range. Yes, it’s a win-win for us.
Pete says: “Back in the early 1990s Kevin brought in 10,000 bikes from Minnesota: all classic 1970s/1980s bikes. Perhaps at the time there was no interest in them, but we knew there would be at some point. He knew and we still believe that it’s worthwhile thinking ahead in this business. We knew that one day Hayabusas would be modern classics, due to their status as the fastest production bike when they were released at the end of the 1990s, so we kept lots of standard pipes waiting. We did the same with the ZZ-R1100 Kawasaki – it became one of our most popular items.”
Of course, there’s always the most anal amongst us and Pete knows them well. “I think the classic Kawasaki brigade are the ‘worst’ for it and they have to have the right part. By that I mean they’ll ask me for the code number on the wheel rim... does it say Takasago on it? A few more questions and maybe they will refuse to use the wheel as it’s a month younger than the actual bike they’re putting it on. It will be a perfectly good wheel, but when they take the bike to shows they will be set upon by their peers for having the ‘wrong’ part on the bike.”
Engines are also part and parcel of the DK Spares experience… Lots of VMAX motors, lightweight two-stroke Yamahas, XS650S, CB750S, even the odd BMW Boxer twin have been seen up on the shelves: row upon row, rack after rack of motive muscle, all lying dormant, waiting for an owner.
With the internet has come DK’S ebay operation. Pete says: “Some parts that we know are rare we will find, clean up and sell. Pete hands me a clean, chrome mudguard from a Suzuki GS. “If that was from a UK bike, it would have not been salvageable,” explains Pete. “With the climate in the US we could clean it up, save it and sell it.” In prep for the ebay treatment were some T500 Suzuki forks and XV750 Yamaha exhausts. All will be polished and cleaned ready for their new owners: almost as good as new.
As I leave DK, I can’t help thinking how our industry needs people like Pete and businesses like DK Spares: full of knowledge, full of enthusiasm and prepared to take the plunge to bring spares back from all across the world to help us out!