Talk Back #131 July 2013

“English” Don Cornwallis 

3/30/60- 5/13/13

It truly sucks that I have to write this. I’ve known Don was under a death sentence with a bad liver for a few years now. In my view another victim of government health care where bureaucracy picks and chooses who lives and who dies according either their bottom line or disapproval of a particular lifestyle. And Don had a particular lifestyle that’s for sure.

Back in the old Iron Horse in the nineties, I would read about what Don was up to, what he did with Psycho Cycles, what he was doing with SD Cycles in New York City and I thought to myself “That is the life for me, building bikes, raising hell and generally living life to its fullest”. The stories continued into THBC when it was formed after the demise of Iron Horse in 1998, by then it was the “Bayonet Brothers”, Don and Indian Larry living larger than life and, to use his expression; “kicking new holes in the world”.

With all that in mind, I jumped at the chance to attend a weekend party out at Flynch’s place on the Indiana/Kentucky border that Don was going to attend also. Don was three years younger than I and he looked it back then. He and Andy Hoffer were doing the New York City fish out of water act on the farm and I have great memories of that visit. It was also life changing for me. I told Don that he was doing what I wanted to do and he took the time to talk me out of it. “This isn’t what you want” he told me, “This is a hard life with more lows than highs and people are lining up to either screw you or replace you. It’s a constant state of hustle.” We continued the conversation and he totally convinced me I should take a different tack in the motorcycle world. For that I will always be grateful.

If the last name “Cornwallis” sounds familiar, it should. Charles Cornwallis (1738-1805) was 1st Marquess and 2nd Earl Cornwallis. Best known in this country for his defeat at Yorktown, the last important campaign in the revolutionary war. General Cornwallis was a pretty good General and the British didn’t penalize him for the loss.In fact he accomplished more as the British Governer-General of India and as the Viceroy of Ireland. By all accounts, a pretty successful dude.

So this was the family Don was born into. Teenage boys often rebel against their parents, but Don turned it into an art form. Don’s father was an Earl, but Don’s behavior was a factor in the Earl cutting Don out of the will. Don got himself into a fair amount of trouble running with a ‘crew’ around London, he thought it prudent to get the hell out of there and go and to follow in his ancestor’s footsteps and attack the colonies! Initially as a drummer in a rockabilly band.

One thing led to another and in 1989 he and Steg set up Psycho Cycles and the rest is history. Well, almost... If it hadn’t been for Don and his constant pushing, the setting up of the Bayonet Brothers with Indian Larry in 1996, I’m not sure the world would even know who Indian Larry was. I’m not saying Larry’s talent wouldn’t have shone through eventually, but Don for sure raised the profile of the NYC choppers scene. Bikes that Don built captured the essence of the time, culminating in the world famous (because he made sure it was) “Babylon Taxi”, the black and yellow checker paint and gobs of attitude were instantly memorable.

After the demise of Princeton Publishing (and with it Iron Horse) the focus was no longer on NYC quite so much.Yeah, Don and Larry and Paul Cox were still knocking out some great stuff, since they were no longer right down the street from a magazine, it was down to Don to keep up appearances by writing and photographing great bikes for The Horse. Had Don stuck around long enough to be caught up with all that “Biker Build Off” hoopla, I’m convinced he would likely have been a household name, he came to life when you pointed a camera at him.

Don went back to the UK, I don’t quite remember the circumstances that led to that decision, but I knew he was working on a kickass Triumph Trident café racer that he named the “Slimy Limey”. He finished the bike but then had a bad wreck on it. He was laid up for a considerable amount of time after that and was lucky to have survived. It was about the time Don had been recuperating for a while that both his parents began to need help. Don looked after his parents until they died, some of you will be able to relate to the long struggle, physically, emotionally and monetarily that this long, drawn out process can be. Don was still not physically well himself, he developed the liver problem that would ultimately take him from us, but he stayed with mother and father until the end, all the while knowing he was still out of the will, with little to no help from his siblings. When Don found out he was not going to get any help with his liver, he decided his best chance was to return to the USA and try and raise enough funds to finance a liver transplant himself. 

His plan was to rebuild the Babylon Taxi and then auction it to raise hopefully enough money for the procedure. When he announced his intentions, people started offering parts and Steg, who had moved Psycho Cycles to the North West offered to help out with the building, it would be like old times. 

When Don arrived at Steg’s, the problems with using donated parts began to surface. The Shovelhead engine soon developed problems and eventually Don moved to Indianapolis to try and get everything together so it all worked. He ended up replacing the engine with an Ultima Shovel while he sent the original off to be rebuilt by renowned hot rod engine guy Tony Mohr. I ran into Don in Indianapolis last year at an event. I was a little shocked by how much he’d aged, but I suppose it had been ten years. I probably didn’t look too much younger myself. Later that summer, Don was set up at the Smoke Out XIII. The heat was brutal and it took its toll on Don, I was worried then that he didn’t look at all well. That was followed by Don being rear-ended while riding the Taxi II in Indianapolis. He broke a few bones and of course the cops blamed him for the wreck. Shortly afterwards, he moved out to Arizona and set about getting the Taxi back on the road. He pushed himself too far this time.

Don was the real deal. He was instrumental as well as influential on the chopper scene and leaves a host of media for everyone to see. Check out TheEnglishdon on YouTube, there’s a bunch of his work right there. He was loyal and generous to a fault and I was proud to call him my friend. I, for one, will miss him.

Talk Back #130 June 2013

1939

OK, quick quiz, three things happened in 1939 that would have a huge impact on the custom bike world. The Triumph Speed Twin was introduced in 1938, so that’s not one... The Knuckle came out in 1936 so that’s not one either. Poland was invaded by Nazi Germany and England was drawn into World War Two, but in this case that’s not relevant.

Give up? OK, the answer is that three people were born this year, people who would influence custom bike building from the sixties onward. I, of course, refer to Sugar Bear, Ron Finch and Arlen Ness. This is as diverse a group as you could come up with but I don’t think you can discount their contributions over the years.

Admittedly, Arlen Ness has strayed away from what a lot of us consider aesthetically pleasing since the mid eighties. Ron Finch’s customs over years are definitely... unique. Sugar Bear has refined his style over the years, but remains probably the closest of the trio as far as sticking to the original concept.

Mr. Ness has undoubtably had the most financial success. Starting out as many do working out of a garage, painting motorcycles in San Leandro California. He began producing parts for custom bikes that he was able to showcase by ‘recycling’ the same 1947 Knucklehead over and over because finances wouldn’t stretch to a different bike. His early work was radical for the time and very influential. According to Irish Rich on our online forum recently when we were discussing the 1973 iteration of the Ness Knuckle: “As far as his style, he was right up there in the forefront of the Bay Area style of bike, and for ‘73, that bike was pretty much state of the art for that area.”

Personally, after the 57 Chevy-ish “Ness-Stalgia” little of his work has appealed to me. Especially his work with Victory and those rocket-ship looking baggers, but that doesn’t diminish the impact he has made over the years.

Ron Finch also made a name for himself making custom parts for choppers. Starting in 1965 with Finch’s Custom Styled Cycles in a building that was only a thirty minute ride from our Global Headquarters here in Michigan. In 1972 they moved to the Finch Castle in Auburn Hills and it became a showplace for Ron’s unique vision. I never did see the original shop, but the building was legendary for its decor. It’s a Home Depot now, but Ron started on new digs about twelve years ago and continues to add on to it on a regular basis. We did a little feature on it in issue #120. Ron Finch is just a different kind of guy, his mind doesn’t work the way anyone else would expect and at the same time he always has a smile and will take to time to chat. Pictures of him from the 70s and recent shots are eerily similar. If it wasn’t for the grey hair now, you’d think he had his own “Dorian Gray” portrait in the attic... or maybe he just looked like he was in his seventies forty years ago.. I dunno. He’s a great guy though and his parts are still bought and sold on a regular basis, even though he doesn’t actually make them any more. You can still see his springers and carriage tail lights etc. floating around on eBay and such.

Sugar Bear gets a lot of ink in this magazine, but it wasn’t always so. Sugar Bear was building kickass bikes that were actually meant to be ridden, but he never got the recognition he deserved in the motorcycle press of the day because of the dominant ‘whites-only’ attitude that prevailed for the first twenty five years he was in business. While most other springer manufacturers were content to not worry about the effects of rake and trail when fitting long front ends, Sugar Bear devised a system of different rockers that corrected trail for any given rake. Most of you probably associate him with the big #4 rockers that his long front ends usually have, but the Baker Drivetrain Panhead has the #1 rockers, my Triumph chopper has the #2 rockers and Sugar Bear’s most beautiful creation “Gorjus” has the #3 rockers. If anyone has a reason to be bitter about his treatment by the press, it’s him. Thankfully, he’s not, he recalls his mentor Benny Hardy telling him that he’d better just do this for the love of it all, because there would never be ‘mainstream’ recognition. Luckily on that point, Benny was wrong. People are still lining up for one of Sugar Bear’s springers. I believe he’s the only one of the three that still hand builds parts the public can buy.

They are all going to hit 75 this year, they deserve to be able to slow down a little but that doesn’t mean they will and their drive is what generated the influence they’ve had over the years. There have been many others of course, but I think you’ll agree these three are real stand-outs.

Talk Back #129 May 2013

My First Harley

I’m sure many of you have interesting stories about the first Harley Davidson you ever bought and this is mine. The one major difference here is that I just did it. Most longtime readers know that my main ride for the last decade or so has been my faithful Shovelhead but although I built that bike with a greater percentage of Harley parts than the factory uses these days, it was registered as an ‘assembled’ bike in 1998, not an HD.

Over the years following the first registration, the Shovel became less and less an HD by percentage of parts. The original 1981 cases had to be replaced with S&S cases, the original Panhead FatBobs were replaced by an aftermarket King Sportster tank, the original Superglide rear fender was replaced when Fabricator Kevin chopped half the original Panhead frame off to hardtail it and so on. Now, I’m not going to sit here and try to tell you that a Harley Davidson is only a real Harley Davidson if it still has all the factory parts... far from it. I’m just trying to illustrate that my Shovel was not registered as such and over the years has became less so. The flywheels remain 1981 HD however.

So... I’ve bought my first Harley Davidson.

I’m sure some of you that remember my editorial a couple of issues back, referring to the ‘lure of the new bike’ might jump to the conclusion that a brand new rubber mount Twin Cam now sits in my garage, or noting that elsewhere in this issue concerning the installation of a Baker TTP primary on my Shovel which now includes the provision to bolt in a starter, would indicate that because I am going to be 56 this year, I’ve given up on the kickstart equipped motorcycle. Well, nothing could be further from the truth.

My first Harley Davidson is a recent score off Craigslist, a motorcycle that started off life as a 1953 FL. Of course it’s been screwed with by everyone that had a dull screwdriver over the last sixty years, but I’ve finally got the base for my seventies style longbike I’ve been dreaming about.

The claim was, of course, that the engine had been rebuilt (aren’t they all?), however the front engine mount is broken, so I’m going to have Dan Roedel pull the engine down to check it out and I’ll have the cases repaired then. It has a polished four speed that seems sluggish when rotated, Dan is going to look at that at the same time. May just be ye olde oil in there. The back wheel looks great. It’s for sure OEM and mechanical. If I can find a way to use it, I will. In fact I’d like to use as little new stuff wherever possible on this build. The big exception with be the Sugar Bear springer I’m going to use, which will necessitate Fab Kevin hacking up the Wishbone frame somewhat. The bike came with a long Wide Glide with the OEM front brake and hub laced to a 21” front wheel. I wish I could use that front wheel, but the hub with the brake installed is just too wide for the Sugar Bear rockers. The oil tank has several dents, so I may have to replace it. I’ll be looking around for a cool king and queen seat and other 70s goodies. There’s a genuine British SU carb installed (loosely), but I’m disturbed  by how far it sticks out.

Although I’m pretty excited about this project, I have to remind myself that it’s going to take a while. Kevin is backed up with stuff for the forseeable future, but once the frame and engine is done I’m going to attempt most of the other stuff myself. Realistically I’m not going to make too much headway with this until later in the year. Never fear, as soon as I make substantial progress, I’ll be documenting it here in The Horse! I can’t wait!

Talk Back #127 February 2013

Goon Control.

There’s been an awful lot of speculation in the media lately about the supposed increase in violent gun-related crime. I thought this issue I’d take a stab at why I think this kind of thing occurs.

It’s the price you pay for having the third largest populated country with this amount of freedom. There’s 315 million people in the USA who are free and can do pretty much whatever they want (comparatively speaking). There’s everything from mildly pissed off people to the mentally ill to truly evil people out there. The vast majority of us will never encounter these people. USA is #12 on the list of countries with the most gun deaths per capita. Switzerland is only four below us. Right now, the media will want to go nationwide with crimes that in early December were just part of day to day living. 

10, 228 people were killed by alcohol related automobile deaths in 2010. Do we need prohibition back? Ban all cars? Prohibition did not work because alcohol consumption was ingrained in the society at the time. And still is. If all ten thousand were to die on the same day, there would be an enormous hue and cry and more stringent laws passed the NEXT DAY. But people will still drink and drive. Using the same logic as they apply to gun control, you would expect people popping up on MSNBC within moments proclaiming that ‘nobody needs a car that can do more than 70 mph” and introduce legislation to limit available horsepower in new cars and motorcycles. Totally ignoring, of course, the personal responsibility of the drunk drivers.

I’ve seen an estimate of 270 million privately owned firearms in the USA. These are all internet numbers from Wiki and other sources, but the number doesn’t surprise me. Sounds like a lot, but that’s less than one for every person. Add to that, the pesky 2nd amendment and it becomes clear that any new restrictive laws would ONLY affect the law abiding person. Criminals, by definition, ignore the law. There are way too many guns around for laws to have any effect… short of a house to house search and seizure, which would end up… messy.

It’s sad the tragedy at Sandy Hook is being used as a springboard to further political gain. The talking heads on television love to sit there and point at other countries with totally different populations, logistics and constitutions for the purposes of saying “see, it works here”, offering up simplistic solutions that make people feel that they are doing something because they care, because they are brighter than the rest of the population and are ready to savagely attack anyone who points out their folly. Does anyone believe this wouldn’t have happened if the Clinton-era so-called ‘assault weapon ban’ had still been in place? Or even the new yet-to-be-revealed laws? The AR-15 in question ‘looks’ military when in reality it functions just the same as any other widely available semi-automatic hunting rifle. Semi-Automatic seems to be widely misunderstood, it seems that the anti-gunners can’t get it into their head that all these do is fire one round at a time like a lever or bolt-action rifle. They are better described as ‘auto-loading’ guns. 

Although it happens fairly often, the media never reports the good that can come from carrying a weapon. Many people have avoided being robbed/raped or killed because they were able to defend themselves. Most criminals like easy targets, staring down the barrel of a gun convinces them to look elsewhere.

If you need more evidence that just having new laws will not work, check out the ‘war on drugs’ once. Many are illegal for many reasons, some of those reasons make sense, a lot don’t. Still, they are illegal. Does that mean they are now impossible to buy?

Meanwhile the government mandates things like airbags ‘for our own good’ (and insurance company contributions) when there have been many injuries and even deaths because of airbags.

What’s the answer? There really isn’t one. As I started this off, 315 million people with whatever percentage of crazy bastards that comes with. No amount of laws or pious pontificating by politicians or 24 hour news cycles showing every picture, talking to every parent is going to make any difference whatsoever.

On a personal level, I have a Concealed Pistol License and I carry my pistol every day. It’s no big deal, many citizens exercise that right. I don’t think it makes me a more of a macho man or some kind of a Billy Bad-Ass. I have a family, I have children and a wife. It is my responsibility to protect them to the best of my ability. That includes protecting myself, if we’re out and some nutcase decides he wants to make some sick name for himself by shooting innocent bystanders at the mall or wherever, I (and probably several others) will be able to do something about it, something other than just cowering in a corner and hoping for the best.

If we need to do something, it should be more awareness. Awareness of mentally ill people. Awareness of thugs that want to take what you have. Awareness that even through all this, the freedom that allows this to happen is also what makes this the best country in the world.

Talk Back #126

The lure of the new bike.

I turned fifty five this year. No big deal I guess, I can order from the senior menu at Denny’s now, my beard is almost totally white and catching a glimpse of my reflection in mirrors scares the shit out of me. As a child, I always had lung problems. Bronchitis was a constant companion and really didn’t improve a whole lot as I aged. I’m at the point now where it’s pretty much all downhill from here. Yeah, I could improve things with a better diet and more exercise and such, but that’s not going to help with the creaky joints, arthritic hands and the daily fight to get enough air into my lungs.

I’ll be honest here, I’ve always been a little derisive of people who ‘sell out’ their choppers and buy some stocker bagger later in life so they can keep riding in comfort. I suppose that makes me hypocritical because lately I have been considering a (gasp) new bike. I’ll admit there have been times, when I’ve had to kick the Shovel 100 times to get it going, that I sometimes think I’d be better off just having a modern bike that I could just hit the button and go. I know the Shovel only fails to start like that when there’s a problem somewhere, bad gas, fouled plug, dirty points etc. When I get it back to the house I can usually figure it out and get it back to one or two kick status. As most of you know, I do have a ‘stock’ bike that I can use for carrying a passenger when the need arises, my trusty 1982 Triumph T140ES. So my newest bike is thirty years old and naturally, the Lucas electrics on it are giving me the usual problems. The clutch has been finicky lately and it has a tendency to overheat if I keep it at 70 for longer than 15 minutes.All fixable stuff of course, it’s just a matter of finding the time. I had Brian of Manx Motors replace the alternator, so hopefully it’ll keep charging the Antigravity battery properly now.

When I test ride new bikes, I always take into account whether I could live with one of them in my garage. Usually, it’s easy to dismiss them because I always already had bikes to fill the role. 

I think even the most ardent chopper jockey has times when they think maybe it would be nice to have a modern bike at their disposal, usually during a period when the other rides all have problems. Let’s face it, if you have multiple bikes, it’s really difficult to keep them all in tip-top condition. This one needs tires, this one needs bearings somewhere, this one needs a trip to the junkyard...

Back in the day, when i had one bike, it was simpler. You can concentrate on one and keep it up. You even get time to clean it once in a while, but I seem to have a problem in this respect... I can’t give up my project bikes.

I guess it all comes down to the “Bar Hopper” thing. The perception that choppers are only good from hopping from bar to bar on sunny weekends. This is the same as the old “Café Racer” tag, bikes that were race-styled but only good from racing from one transport café to another. If you accept this premise, then it’s perfectly OK to have a late model bagger sitting in the garage next to your chopper. One for fun and the other for ‘serious’ riding. Hammer and I have pretty much proven (as has many others) that you can use your chopper for long distance riding and still have a great time doing so. 

Really, once you reach my age (or thereabouts) you start feeling like you don’t have to prove anything to anybody, so why not have have a new Harley-Davidson FLHAEIOU and sometimes Y to just jump on and run to the store in comfort? Passion, that’s why. It’ll be a cold day in hell that I buy a new bagger (or even slightly used) because I can’t handle riding my chopper any longer. The day that happens they will be real close to shoveling dirt on my face anyway.

But back to the point, I could see myself picking up a new bike, either a 1200 Sportster, a basic Dyna or a Triumph twin to have that element of über reliability at my disposal. If all the chops go down at once (and it’s happened) there would be a backup plan that I wouldn’t be embarrassed to be seen on. Not that I really care what others think of me, but I put it in the same category as being seen with a “Sons of Anarchy” colors shirt.

You know what I mean!

Talk Back #125 December 2012

Winter project time!

This being the December issue of The Horse, Project Season is well under way here in the frozen north of the USA. The mandatory downtime dictated by the ice-covered roads is traditionally the time when we make those improvements we’ve been thinking about all riding season. If not improvements, then maybe repairs of problems that weren’t serious enough to stop riding, but certainly was enough of a concern to limit distances or cause many prayers in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere!

There are also those hardy souls who are beginning their Amateur Chop Off bikes (hopefully I’ll have it all sorted out by the time you read this). Only a few short months before wide-eyed idealism gets T-boned by grim reality of trying to build a bike with a deadline. It looks so easy on TV. I mentioned earlier in the year I was building my own ACO-type project just so I could get a taste of it. The bike was not done when we had to leave for the Smoke Out, but I could have trailered it there and it would have made the ten miles on the mandatory ride to the Rock. The charging system was not working and it took me a few weeks after we got back to sort that out. The bike would have made the run on a freshly charged battery.

This year, I’m not sure which way to go.

The Shovelhead is running great, tires are good, brakes work fine etc. The only thing I’d like to do is replace the primary drive with the Baker TTP setup. Well, that and completely rework the bike to accept a thirty-over Sugar Bear front end and a sissy bar with king and queen seat... but I have several problems to overcome, not least of which is the potential destruction of the VIN sticker, which is the only number on the frame, placed there by the State of Michigan in 1998 when I finally got it registered. That and the amount of money such a conversion would cost.

I have a 1968 Triumph 500 that already has a rigid frame, I’ve slowly been working on bits and pieces. The inside of the engine and trans looked like it had been at the bottom of a septic tank since 1970. It’s such a shame because things like the bottom end has never been apart, the rod bearings were standard size, the actual crank journals didn’t look bad at all. I had Brian, out at Manx Motors have the crank reground for me. The sludge trap was surprisingly clear, indicating there wasn’t many miles on the engine at all. I have a way-cool Lowbrow peanut take for it and I have my eye on a Factory Metal Works stainless exhaust. What I don’t have, is wheels or a nice front end. 

The main problem I’m having, is trying to get myself to work on it. I originally bought the project to put together for Nurse Nut to ride. The 500 is fairly light and pretty forgiving. When I got the Hondamatic and decided to go that way instead, the 500 was put on hold. Nurse Nut LOVES the Hondamatic and so it makes me doubt she would ever ride the 500 when it’s finally completed. So, I guess I could ride it, yeah? Well, yeah I could, but I have a pair of running Triumph 750s right now, the 500 will feel like an oversized moped to me. This is the main reason I gave my oldest daughter the Triumph 250 project a few years ago. These bikes are pretty cool, but not my favorite. I COULD put it together as a Stampede bike, although the rules allow Brit 650s, so it would be silly to go for the more underpowered version. I really don’t know if my ass could take doing the Stampede anyway. I don’t mind riding long distance, but my biggest trouble is usually ass pain after about the third day of 600 mile sprints. Maybe if I lost 80 pounds...

Project financing is always a problem. I could budget this part for this month and that part for next month and such, but stuff like three kid’s birthdays, all the Christmas stuff and the usual unexpected car/furnace/replicator blowing up and requiring half the mortgage money to fix will no doubt conspire to foil my plans.

The biggest problem is drive. I don’t really have the drive necessary to buckle down and get the 500 finished, although I will be working on it as time and finances allow. I’d like to work on the duplex framed pre unit in the corner. But that’s looking like big bucks.

What I could really get into, is building a cool longbike, Sugar Bear front end, S&S Panhead with Baker primary and transmission. The drive is there for that one, but the finances are not, I’m guessing that’s something I share with a lot of the readers.

I know, I should just stop whining and get on with it and I probably will.

Good luck to all of you with your winter projects.

Issue #122 September 2012

Danger, Will Robinson!

I shouldn’t have to mention that motorcycling, generally speaking is a dangerous thing. And really, that has always been part of the attraction, flying down the road at silly speeds wearing tennis shoes, blue jeans and a T shirt on some cobbled together contraption built by some crazy guy in his shed, nothing feels as good and at the same time, you KNOW what will happen if that nut you forgot to red loctite backs off at just the wrong time... and it isn’t going to be pretty.

There is, of course another completely separate segment of motorcycling that believe in ATGATT. This annoying acronym stands for “All the gear, all the time”. 120º out? Only going to 7-11 1.5 miles away? No excuse, the multi-buckle boots, the armored knee leather pants, the armored elbow and shoulder leather jacket and the full face helmet MUST be worn.

Now those guys have perfectly sound logic and reasoning as to why they do this, they want to have the best chance of surviving a wreck as possible, they have the facts and figures to back up their arguments and will always point to the guys racing bikes for a living that fall off at 200 mph and then get up and stroll nonchalantly back to the pits for an iced tea.

So, why do I not ascribe to that theory? I have family and loved ones to whom it would be devastating if I were to splatter my unprotected body across the interstate. I’m sure some of you readers would miss me for maybe an issue. Maybe it’s pure laziness, I would probably rather jump into the air conditioned truck on a hot day than climb into all that gear. I LOVE the freedom of just putting on the shades, kick and GO! I don’t think I’ve put the helmet on in Michigan since they repealed it earlier this year. I don’t think I have some secret desire to live the rest of my days with a feeding tube in my mouth and family members arguing about who gets to pull the plug.

Clearly, the best protection is afforded by the full face helmet. But I’ve never liked them, the distortion of the shield, the affect on peripheral vision, the dulling of the ambient sounds around you, the weight on your neck, the ‘oven’ effect when stuck in traffic, hell even the lack of smell annoys me, and don’t get me started on the fun of sneezing while you have those things on. In reality, even when there was a helmet law in Michigan (and all the other states we have run in), I only wore a ‘novelty’ beanie helmet anyway, just for the appearance of legality so I wouldn’t be hassled by the ‘man’. Any sort of comfort one may have taken from the protection of such a cheap device would be at best wishful thinking.

The reality (as I see it) is that the ATGATT guy probably wouldn’t be any better off than me if a minivan ran into him, but I feel I have a better chance of hearing, seeing and reacting faster without all that stuff on.

This brings me to the point that prompted me to write this editorial in the first place... it had become a LOT more dangerous out there in the last couple of years. I am, of course, referring to the cellphone impaired driver. Now, I know lots of people that can drive perfectly fine while talking on the phone, but you do see a lot of drivers out there that cannot. After a while, you get used to looking for them with their hand to their ear, careening the minivan through the parking lot as if they were a Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia. As annoying and dangerous is this is, most of us have adapted to it. What is getting worse, however, are the damned texters.

If you’re cruising in traffic at all, scan the drivers side mirror on vehicles, if you see the tell-tale look down.. look up quick.. look back down... look up real quick being repeated over and over, you know this drive had no idea of what’s going on around him. I saw a hidden camera report that showed teenagers checked their texts every 30 seconds and had no second thought about replying while driving. I have no great words of wisdom about how to solve this one. It’s already illegal in a lot of places, but that’s not going to stop most people and we know it. I know people who think it’s perfectly fine to endanger the lives of others while texting or updating facebook because they ‘can handle it’. Well bullshit!

Listen, I’m no safety nazi, I don’t give a crap if you wear seatbelts or not, only run a questionable back brake or think that shorts and motorcycles are a great mix, if you’re texting/surfing/updating FB etc. while driving, you’re a damn menace, right up there with the repeat drunk driver and probably deserve it when you run into the back of the parked big rig.

So watch for them, we need to limit injuries to when we are doing stupid shit on the bikes, let’s get back to when we were our own worst enemy!

Talk Back 120

 Recently, I’ve been daydreaming about building myself a real, ‘dream’ chopper. Yeah, I know everyone does it, except for those guys that already have theirs. Anyhow, I had visions of a 24 over Sugar Bear springer, rigid frame (of course), a King And Queen seat and the ‘usual’ drivetrain. I say ‘usual’ because I automatically assume a Shovelhead mated to a Baker 6 in a 4 and an Evil belt drive primary. Then it occurs to me, that the Shovelhead I have now, is only a frame stretch and front end away (pretty much) from that very setup.
So that prompted me to try and change things up a little, not that there’s anything wrong with the set up I’m using now, far from it but it seems like there should be more than one or two details separating bikes in your garage, otherwise, why bother? I like the idea of running a Panhead engine... other than the problems that such engines tend to have, namely the rocker shaft blocks, the 180º inlet and the many years of stress that preceded my acquiring such an engine. There is the S&S P-motor of course, plus there are other ‘copies’ floating around.
Looking at available primaries, I continue to dislike the stock primary from 1965 through 2012. The older ‘tin’ primaries are cool, but they are like all tin primaries; they leak. Then I remembered the Baker TTP (Tin Type Primary) setup, similar to the one on the cover of issue 109. I watched the prototypes being worked on during a visit to Baker, and I’ve liked the idea of the tin ‘look’, but still having a leak free rigid connection and a cool way of running a primary chain and wet clutch.
I was tossing this around when I wasn’t slaving over a hot keyboard knocking out another killer issue of The Horse when out of the blue, James Simonelli at Baker called me and asked if I was interested in giving their 4 speed/TTP testbed Shovel a ride! Hell, yeah!
Baker is about 90 miles from The Horse World Headquarters, basically head north on I-75 to Flint, get off on 69 and then it’s about 30 miles to East Lansing. As soon as James called me, the weather turned to crap, but the first decent day, I jumped in the truck and boogied over to Baker to grab the Shovel. James gassed it up for me and gave me the tour of where the petcock/key/starter button was and said ‘see ya’.

It’s tough to give a riding review without paying attention to the chassis, wheels, brakes or engine, but for the purposes of this piece, they are pretty irrelevant. Having said that, the 74” Shovel in this bike is SWEET. It’s one that James set up, but it’s really nothing special. It has a Keihin carb and hydraulic lifters and Cycle Shack muffled pipes, but it was really easy to start. When kicking, it would start halfway through one of my usual kicks. It was really easy to ‘straddle kick’ and it would light every time, but as I said, that has nothing to do with drivetrain. The kicker? Well, it’s a Baker, and that means it works!
The electric start setup does work really well, first thing in the morning was pretty much the only time I got to listen to it turn over more than once, it’s a more modern piece for sure, not nearly as asthmatic as the old AMF setups. I found myself liking the four speed more than I thought I would. I had a ‘real’ four speed before I got my 6 in a 4 Baker and I wasn’t over the moon with the way the gearing was spaced out. The Baker four, however, has the ratios nicely spaced (1st 2:50, 2nd 1:70, 3rd 1:25, 4th 1:1) and I could see being happy with this transmission. Of course, I’d have to get the N1 drum and jockey shift it, but it would work just fine. Physically, the Four Speed looks very much like the OEM part, other than the “Baker” on the back of the case, nothing jumps out. This transmission is also available with a real ‘Jockey Top”, should you be so inclined. The TTP was pretty much how I thought it would be, quiet, efficient and not in the way. Some HDs have the primary cover pretty much against your leg when you’re stopped with both feet down, the TTP gives you lots of room. Of course the stock bike may not even go into neutral at the stop light, but that’s no problem with the Baker setup, straight into neutral from first at a complete stop with a hot engine and driveline.
So, was it earth-shatteringly great? Was it a shining jewel that attracted onlookers wherever it was parked? Nope, it was a very good, efficient setup that worked very well. Unlike the components it replaced, it didn’t shift harshly, didn’t leak, didn’t bind up when hot and it worked every time. Not only that, it comes with the peace of mind that it’s all made in the USA and backed up by the Baker promise that will allow you and your old Shovel (or whatever pseudo mix of alternator engine you wish) to roll down the highway trouble free for many, many miles.
The polished kick only TTP is for sure on my wish list for my longbike, I could do a LOT worse that couple it with the four speed also.

Black History Month

Talk Back 118

OK, on the face of it, you may well ask what the hell does Black History Month have to do with Choppers? I know the majority of you probably roll your eyes every time you see that phrase, maybe even question what the reaction would be to a ‘white’ history month, although it could be argued, that 99% of the history books are Euro-centric.
Anyway, I got an invite from Harley-Davidson to attend a tour they were putting on for journalists, to get attention for their Black History Month exhibit in the Harley Davidson museum.
If you’ve never been out to the museum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, I can highly recommend a look around the many exhibits there. For some reason, in the early 1900s, they decided to start keeping one of every bike they produced, and every different model year after that. The result is a staggering collection of pristine vintage bikes that are 100% accurate, as most of them have never been restored. If that 1936 Knuckle isn’t the way you think it should be... you are wrong.
The other journalists attending were not even motorcycle press, they wrote for ethnic magazines, such as Ebony, and other African-American publications I (for some reason) have never heard of. So, I was like the token white guy of the group (although there was another, a writer for “Urban Baggers” out of Spearfish SD), but I got along well with them all, and I was a useful resource, since they had very little knowledge about motorcycles in general.
The first day was torturous, we were ferried out to a dealership and ‘treated’ to the sales spiel, most of which I allowed to slip by until he proclaimed that EVERYONE, sooner or later, ended up on a bagger. Nope, not this guy. They let us play on a bike on the dyno, so I at least had some fun pegging the speedo on it.
The next day was the museum tour, which is always cool, it’s worth going just to check out the statue by Jeff Decker outside the building. Randy Smith’s .45 Magnum us still there too, the real HD board trackers are super cool. Sugar Bear was there with his killer Panhead “Gorjus”, and no matter how you spell it, that bike is unbelievable, and pretty much still as he built it in 1969.
The BHM exhibit featured a drag bike built by “PeeWee”, one of the “Defiant Ones” MC out of LA. What was even cooler was that he was at the museum, as well as his grandson. It’s always cool to meet the ‘real deal’ from back in the day, I don’t care what color you are, a lifelong passion for bikes makes you OK in my book. The other part of the exhibit covered the first African-American owner of an HD dealership. William Johnson ran one from 1964-1970. Interesting when you consider that during segregation, black people were discouraged from buying new HDs.
Day three was easily the best for me, we were bussed to Menominee Falls where the Pilgrim Road factory sits. It is here that all the engines and transmissions (except for the V-Rod) are built. It’s not just an assembly plant, raw castings are shipped in and machined into useable parts and then put together. It’s an interesting mix between robots and people, and fascinating to see the whole process from raw castings, to completed powertrains. A couple of things jumped out at me, such as the mainshaft castings for the six speed big twins. All the gears are cast along with the shaft, the splines and gear teeth are all cut into it and the ends get heat treated for strength. Cool stuff, but what if a gear chips a tooth? Yep, gotta replace the whole damn thing! I guess I didn’t realize the crankshafts were pressed together like that either, there’s no way to replace the crankpin on a Twin Cam engine, hell, you can’t replace a rod! The flywheels, shafts and rods are all crammed together in one operation that will require junking the whole thing should one part fail. They don’t even balance the flywheels any more, they do make sure they are tracking straight at least.
I didn’t see any, but I guess they still make the Evo engine there, although they told me that the Evo remanufacturing program is carried out at S&S these days... which has a hint of irony about it. All in all, I liked the tour and realized a whole lot more of the entire drivetrain is made in the USA that I would have thought.
In the afternoon, the other journalists went home, and I had lunch with Sugar Bear and the museum curator. It’s always good to get the behind the scenes stories to these things. Afterwards, we went over to the corporate offices at Juneau Ave to visit a friend of Sugar Bear’s and to get a sort of mini tour of the office building. We were walking by the CEO’s office (Keith Wandell) and he saw us and called us in. For the next hour, we had an informal chat that was quite interesting. This is the first time I’ve actually met the CEO of any large corporation, so I had no basis for comparison I guess, but he was a very sharp man with a keen sense of the ‘big picture’ without the self-importance you would assign to someone like that if you just heard about him offhand.
The next morning I flew out of the frigid Wisconsin air back to the frigid Michigan air just in time to wrap this issue up before heading off to the Indianapolis V-Twin show, a full report of which you can expect next issue!

Issue #117 MARCH 2012

The true hardcore chopper jockey likes to think he is immune from fashionable trends, unaffected by the latest ‘cool’ style, untouched by the ephemeral stylings of the West Coast cliques... but is he?

The reality being, if everyone was unaffected by trends, choppers would have never progressed past the 1960’s styling of Benny Hardy’s Easy Rider bikes, although even that is an arbitrary point in time. You could argue that the original “strippers” (which was what they called them at the time) were the only bona fide ‘choppers’ and all that extended front end stuff was just part of a fad.

This argument was brought to light recently on our online forum “Back Talk”, over at thehorsebc.com. I was bringing up the fact that I’m tired of seeing the exhaust ‘wrap’ on every other bike these days. There was a picture of a nicely done Shovelhead with nice paint and polished metal, but with a pair of shorty wrapped pipes. It just took away from the rest of the bike in my opinion. Let’s face it, eight times out of ten, that wrap is either hiding nasty welds or crappy chrome. I’ve done it myself, several of my Shovelhead exhausts have been pieced together from scrap pieces and then wrapped to make it look ‘professional’... sorta. I know some builders make perfectly fine exhausts and then wrap them because that’s the ‘look’ they are going for. The point is; this wrapping of the exhausts only popped up a few years ago, and lingers on today, much to my chagrin.

But trends do come and go, we’ve been guilty here at The Horse for helping propagate them. Feature bikes with 230 rear tires for instance. Suddenly, fat tires were sexy, the 200 and then the 230... people like Billy Lane were on the cutting edge building cool bikes utilizing them, and we were featuring them. I don’t think we ever featured a bike with a wider tire than 230... I may be wrong, a lot of strange stuff got through in the dark days before the reorganization here at The Horse during issue #68, but once they started the 280 and then 300 wide... it was just too much and soured the whole concept for many, including me. I’m sure many of you remember the Exile project I had with the 230 rear and 200 front. I did like that bike, I’ll admit. I even wrapped the perfectly good Exile pipes on that one.
There was a hot moment when red rims coupled with whitewall tires were all the rage, it didn’t last very long, but they still pop up every now and then.

The list is endless, big metalflake, “Period Correct”, mid controls instead of forwards, apes, Z bars etc. etc.

This leaves me with the dilemma of choosing which bikes to put in the magazine. Am I qualified to be the arbiter of what is now ‘in’ compared to what is ‘out’? Probably not, but I have to do it just the same. Most of you don’t have to worry about such things and that’s the way it should be. I try and get a mix of home built bikes as well as some pro built stuff to inspire the home builders. Face it, if there is a bike in the mag with something innovative and cool, the likelihood is that someone will copy it for their own build, and that is how these ‘trends’ get started. Although there is precious little new these days, a look around Sugar Bear’s museum of photographs is evidence to that. Stuff you would have sworn was dreamed up in the seventies had already been done in the fifties, the early L.A. scene was WAY ahead of the rest of the country. Everything from upswept fishtails to twisted springer legs was done by the innovative African-American bikers way back then. We owe them a lot... perhaps everything. The stuff they did was subsequently copied and spread around the country and the influence can be seen today.


So yeah, you may think the ‘trends’ don’t affect you, but they do. And that’s probably not all bad, the new trends may not be for you, but something may come along that appeals to you someday. Even if most of this stuff is not ‘new’ per se, it at least keeps everything rotating so the whole scene doesn’t just stagnate. For now, we can sit back and smirk at the bagger crowd, who are being sucked into the whole ‘swoopy’ thing with ever increasing front wheel sizes, always good for a laugh!

#116 February 2012 Perspective

I sometimes sit here and think about writing these editorials, and it reminds me that my life isn’t in any way special or interesting. I mean, I read George’s accounts of his struggles as a starving artist, and he’s out there living the life, and I don’t know if I could handle living like that. I see people at events, such as the Smoke Out and in Daytona and Sturgis, that seem to be there just to get attention. I have no idea if these people have real jobs or what, but they are all over the place and show up in every pictorial of events everywhere. They are probably good people and are either independently wealthy or just work real hard between events. Everyone’s lifestyle is different, there isn’t really one monolithic “biker” lifestyle that we all have to adhere to as if it’s the Pirate Code or something. Most of us are somewhere between a weekend warrior and the Sons of Anarchy, and most of us move up and down the scale as life happens.
For instance, in 1983 I was homeless in Austin, Texas. I had a wife, a seven month old baby daughter and a 1971 Ford Torino.. period. This was the beginning of December, and an unusually cold snap froze the “freeze” plugs out of the engine block. We were stranded. I got jobs as a day laborer so I could get a room at the Live Roach motel every night, and used the hand towels for diapers etc. At the time, nothing was farther from my mind than trying to find a bike to ride. The immediate emergency took precedence. That doesn’t mean that I didn’t look lustfully at some new Shovelhead riding by the job site. It just meant is was out of reach at the time. I’d say the lowest point of my life was that Christmas, having to share a motel room with three others because there wasn’t enough work over the holidays to pay for it ourselves.
It took a while to drag myself out of that one. We ended up back in Michigan, and I got the truck driving job that finally provided enough income to start thinking about picking up a bike. A friend of a friend had a 1969 TR6R Triumph Tiger for sale, and he wanted $400 for it. It was complete, but needed work. Sounded like a bargain to me, so I sent the money to the house (I was still on the road) and asked the wife to pay for it. Well, suffice to say the money never made it to the owner of the bike. Apparently a new dancing dress was more important, and since I don’t dance, maybe you can see where that was headed. Anyway, after the divorce, I picked up the 1971 Triumph Tiger, the engine from which drives my chopper to this day, and I started probating for the local M.C. These guys were far from the SOA mold, but we certainly met and partied with clubs that were a LOT more serious about the whole thing than we. I learned a lot about brotherhood and respect during those years, and despite the constant politics, had some really good times. We were never affiliated with any of the national clubs, although there was always the rumors abounding that we may be “persuaded” to pick sides one day. Myself, I could never see why they would want to bother.
Wife #2 occurred during that period, and wife #3 soon after. I found a local driving job that allowed me to have a life, be involved with my three daughters’ lives and get back into building bikes, including reading the old Iron Horse and sending in the occasional picture and a letter, hoping they would be published. I began building the Shovelhead that would eventually appear on the cover of #115, and in 1998, after a few disappointing issues of IH after Snow left, the May 1998 issue began the resurrection when Hammer took over as editor. This was cool stuff, and this was happening right here in Michigan! Scott “Genghis” Wong mentioned he had started an Internet message board, and after some effort (there was no “Google” then), I managed to find it. Here I became acquainted with Hammer and some of the other players from the magazine. They set up the “Back Talk” message board soon after, so I was prepared when Princeton Publishing (The IH parent) went into bankruptcy. The struggles to launch THBC dragged on for a while. Hammer seemed certain that it was going to happen, but others not so much. Through all of this, I was pretty much an observer. I had met Hammer and some of the others at a swap meet in Grand Rapids, but as usual, I had no marketable skills to offer. A couple of issues in, however, the guy doing the website went AWOL for quite a while. This was the opportunity I was waiting for. They posted on Back Talk that they needed someone who knew HTML to update the website, and I immediately volunteered! Let me tell you, I had no more HTML experience than the next person, but I saw it as a foothold in the magazine, to be a part of the thing that had been a part of me for so long. I did a bunch of research on website building and began to update the site as needed. It looked pretty crappy at times, but they put up with it, and I managed to worm my way into writing the occasional article as well as the online stuff.
My relationship with the magazine remained like this until the original Smoke Out in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. The camaraderie present at that first “event” was outstanding (it still is), and I ended up riding back as far as Cincinnati with Hammer, me on my Shovel and him on the 113” ‘Major Threat.” After only seven or eight years of loyalty later, I was awarded the job of editor here at The Horse. I’m not trying to downplay how special this job is. I’ve been a pretty happy guy ever since I started here, I’m just saying that my day-to-day existence isn’t worthy of basing an editorial on, ten times a year. The job is special... I’m not. I’m just a regular guy who goes to work every day, worries about the bills, struggles to understand my 14 year old daughter who thinks the world is against her, is happy about my marriage to Nurse Nut and stresses about the finances to put the project bikes together. Life is alternately good, great and suckass, usually all in the same day, but it beats the hell out of being homeless. Hopefully, I will never find myself in that position again, but at least I know I can beat it.

Cover Story #115 My Shovelhead

In reality, there’s not much I can write about this bike that I haven’t already covered in these pages since I got the bike on the road in 1998. The original Iron Horse was my source of inspiration at the time, so I began looking for parts around 1993. I started off with a questionably numbered FXR frame and an un-numbered set of 1981 crankcases. How can a 1981 set of cases have no numbers you say? Well, as I learned to my cost, no matter the cock and bull story supplied, it’s unlikely to be true. I acquired an early 60’s four speed frame and abandoned the search for the not-so-easy to find FXR parts. I traded the frame for an S&S Super G and I used the money I earned in the evenings playing in a bar band to finance components one at a time, some from friends, such as the heads for $250 and a four speed transmission for $250. The cylinders I got from two different catalogs, probably Chinese crap but I knew no better at the time. Scouring the swap meets was half the fun, and eventually I had enough engine parts to put together. The cases came with a crankshaft and rods and oil pump, which I had disassembled (anyone can take shit apart) and had the cases blasted to get that nasty wrinkle black stuff off. I took my pile of pieces to a ‘pro’ (the fact he worked out of his shed should have gave me pause, in retrospect). I wanted him to set the bottom end up, I was fairly confident I could handle the cam, cam cover and top end by myself. A couple of weeks later, I picked it up, looked pretty good. Until, that is, I had the engine on the bench and was rotating the crank with the rods and noticed glass beads from the blasting process oozing out of an oilway! So I took it to a more successful engine builder and he put the cases in a sonic cleaner for a week, told me the crank pin and rods were shot and a few other things had to be done. These are the kind of setbacks that could make one abandon projects, but I soldiered on in the hopes of one day having a rideable Shovelhead. My buddy Andy has a nice sized pole barn set up as a workshop, so I took my bits over there and worked most weekends on trying to put together something resembling a bike. I finished the mock up and sent the frame out for powder coat and hauled the rest of the stuff home. After final assembly, I rolled it outside to the curb and kicked it for the first time. To my surprise, it started right up! It sounded like crap, and oil was squirting from every possible source but I managed to run it around the block once before shutting it down. Then I loaded it into the pickup and hauled it out to the guy that rebuilt the bottom end correctly and had him button it up and tune it. After I got it home, I took it to the courthouse grounds a couple of blocks away and did a photoshoot for the article that would eventually appear in Iron Horse #163, the November 1998 issue.
Ironically, the feature came out in the magazine at the same time the bike was sitting in an impound yard for having covered up numbers from a stolen bike. The hidden numbers were discovered when I was having the inspection done for the ‘assembled bike’ title, they poured acid on the case and there they were! Apparently the original bike was stolen in 1981 in Indiana. I got super lucky because the insurance company that paid off the bike, no longer had the records from that period, and they signed off on them and I was able to take the bike home and the State Police showed up and stamped new numbers on it.
I built it the way I did because I only had stock bikes nearby to go on, and I thought it would be a good place to start. It wasn’t long before the turn signals came off (they never worked anyway), I shitcanned the electric starter and front fender. I picked up a cast front wheel from a swap meet and pretty much rode it like that for a few years.
The first radical rework involved bolting the rear fender to the swing arm, installing the ‘king’ Sportster tank, switching to a dog-chain pull foot clutch and jockey shift, and a Chopper Enterprises springer front end. I also made a two into one exhaust with a Supertrapp can and split the rocker boxes. Additionally I added a Baker six-in-a-four overdrive transmission. I really liked the bike in this configuration, but the engine was getting a little low on compression. I figured I’d just do a top end job and call it good. I grabbed a pair of KB pistons, and had the jugs bored to their spec. Well, something was wrong, it ran fine, but as it got hot, the engine started to ‘drag’. A block from the house I slowed and pulled in the clutch and the engine stopped... suddenly. After a couple of minutes, I was able to slowly kick it through, but I pushed it home anyway and got hold of Dan Roedel to ask him to take a look at it for me. I ended up taking him the engine and he soon gave me some bad news, the pressed in race in the cases was loose and pretty much unfixable. I managed to grab a new set of cases from S&S, some through-the-pushrod oiling lifters and roller rockers from JIMS, a magneto from Joe Hunt and Dan put together the best running Shovel I have ever rode.
The last major refit was having Fabricator Kevin hardtail the frame. He made the stainless steel oil tank, fabbed the exhaust and rear fender. He reworked the gas tank so the filler was at the top and the petcock was at the lowest point. He also dreamed up the hydraulic clutch pedal. I can’t say enough about how great this man’s work is and what a nice guy he is to boot!
This bike will probably always be in a state of flux, since getting back from the 5000 mile trip to Death Valley and the Long Road, I replaced the tires and powdercoated the wheels. I’m thinking of replacing the bars next. I’d LOVE to put another Sugar Bear springer on this, but I also want to build a 25 over long bike, so I’ll have to figure out what I want.

Looking at the original picture from IH #163, the only parts surviving from that version are the cylinders, heads, pushrod tubes and covers, crankshaft and flywheels and the front frame loop.

This is the one bike I will never sell.. well, this and my 1971 Triumph chop.
Big thanks to all who have helped me get it this far.

Tech sheet

GENERAL
Fabrication: Fabricator Kevin
Year and Make: 1998 Shovel
Assembly by: Owner/Fab Kevin
Time: 13 years

ENGINE
Year: 1981/1974/2005
Model: Shovel
Rebuilder: Dan Roedel
Ignition: Hunt Magneto
Displacement: 80 inches
Lower end: Stock
Balancing: Dan R
Pistons: S&S
Cases: S&S
Heads: HD 1974
Cams: Andrews A
Lifters: JIMS
Carb: S&S Super E
Air cleaner: Goodson
Pipes: Fabricator Kevin

TRANSMISSION
Model: Baker six in a four
Year: 2005
Shifting: Jockey
Clutch: Hydraulic
Primary Drive: Evil Engineering

PAINTING
Painter: Bodies by Bob
Color: Black
Type: Shiny

FRAME
Year: 196?
Builder: HD
Type: Four speed FL
Rake: Stock
Stretch: Stock
Other: Fab Kevin Hardtail

ACCESSORIES
Bars: Drag
Risers: 10”
Headlight: Dented Paughco
Taillight: Fab Kevin
Front Pegs: Swap meet billet/Fab Kevin Hydro Clutch
Mid Pegs: Fabricator Kevin
Electrics: Extremely minimal
Gas Tank: Reworked aftermarket XL
Oil Tank: Fab Kevin Stainless
Oil System: S&S
Seat: Fab Kevin/Hard Luck Designs

FORKS
Type: Wide Glide

WHEELS
Front
Size: 19” 1974 HD cast
Rear
Size: 16” HD cast
Tires: Avon Venom
Brakes: Fabricator Kevin

#115 January 2012 Burning the Midnight Rice

I’ve never been opposed to chopping up Japanese bikes, but I’ve never actively done it before. I’ve said in the past that I’ve never really subscribed to the school of thought that “It doesn’t matter what you ride” because... well I just haven’t. I’ve always thought that a cool Brit chop or one utilizing an American power plant was just a superior motorcycle.
On the face of it, it’s a little strange, since my first few motorcycles were all Japanese. I started off with a 1968 Suzuki T200 two stroke twin and then ‘graduated’ to a Honda CB250K4. Of course a lot of my bike choices were limited by the motorcycle laws in the UK at the time. New riders were limited to 250cc or below, so the choices were few as far as non-Japanese bikes went. At the time, the affordable British bike was the BSA Bantam, it was a two stroke single knocking around in 125cc and 175cc form. These bikes were known to be pretty damn slow, but there was a decent cool factor with them. The other viable Brit bike was the BSA C15 250cc, but these were rare.
Once you passed the dreaded Ministry of Transport test, you were allowed to ride any size bike, so before I even passed my test (on the third attempt) I had bought a brand new Honda CB900F that I would sneak around the block every now and then. After the near death experience of locking up the brakes at 125 mph, I traded it for a BMW R90/6 and took off on a European tour that I wrote about in issue #11. I found the BMW to be a boring motorcycle and traded it for a Triumph T160 750 Trident. I loved this bike, it did everything I asked of it well, and it looked good and sounded good... I was hooked. I had to trade it when I first came to the USA, I got a 1975 Bonneville and £400, enough for a round trip ticket to Michigan at the time. After I got back to the UK in December 1981, I started making my first changes to my bike. I painted the tank and sidecovers, added a pair of 6” slugs to the forks and bolted on a pair of air horns to the front fender, the compressor was mounted on the frame downtubes and worked great until the first time it rained and they became anemic water-pistols.
The point is, here, that after this, I never owned another Japanese bike. I always had a lot of distaste toward the Yamaha XS650, as its styling was obviously aimed at the Triumph market, similarly the Japanese V-twin bikes were obviously trying to capitalize on the HD market even though the early Shadows and Viragos were styled as generic street bikes, when the Intruder came out, all bets were off.
Many people liked these bikes and that’s just fine, I never really understood it, but I don’t have to.
Fast forward to now, although the price of a running Harley has come down a lot (Shovelheads abound for 5K), the reason for all that is nobody has any money, so people are chopping whatever they can find in their price range. The aforementioned XS650 Yamaha is probably one of the most chopped bikes around these days, simply because if you look, you can find great deals on these bikes. The most popular choice for Japanese bike chopping, was always the SOHC Honda CB750. Back in the ‘day’, it seemed these were everywhere with wild front ends and molded tanks etc. These days, you can pick one up for a great price, people like Ken over at Cycle-X make some kickass parts for these bikes and there owners seem super happy with them.
So, with that in mind, I decided to look for a CB750A for Nurse Nut to ride. These have an automatic transmission (using the same torque converter as the Honda Civic), but otherwise are quite similar for the regular 750. I spotted one on eBay for $90 with a couple of days left to bid, I expected it to run up a little at the end, but I ended up picking it up for $205. My initial thought was to run a two part series showing how one of these el cheapo bikes can be chopped and on the road for under a grand. I grabbed a universal hardtail kit from TC Bros, and took the bike over to Chop Docs in Waterford, Michigan to have the back end hacked off and the tubes welded on. I don’t know what I was expecting, but during the process, the bike started looking pretty good. I’m now inclined to try and make this into a really good looking chop instead of the cheap and dirty one I originally envisioned.
I’ll still run the build here in the magazine, but the concept appears to be changing on me. Usually I have a clear-cut vision or where I want my bike builds to end up, so it’s a little weird for me to have the goal posts moving on me like this. Stay tuned to see where it goes, I, for one, have no idea.

#114 November 2011

A few issues ago (#109) I wrote about the Sugar Bear springer I was installing on my Triumph chopper, I promised a riding report at the time and so here it is.

For those of you that just picked this magazine up for the first time... welcome, and where the hell have you been? Anyway, when I built this bike, in my ignorance I utilized a DNA springer front end for various reasons, initial cost being paramount at the time. The problem (aside from the usual quality concerns and wideness) was that with the 45º rake, the trail numbers were pretty high. This manifests itself into big time fork ‘flop’ at low speeds, and high stability at high speeds, a little too much so. I mused online about correcting my trail numbers with longer rockers, to move the axle forward and decrease the trail. This prompted Sugar Bear to write to me and mention that this approach was flawed as it would increase the lever action, compress the springs, lower the front end and the DNA was crappy anyway. His answer? One of his famous springers! I immediately thought of his super long front ends with the big curved rockers, and wondered how that would look on the bike, but what I wasn’t really aware at the time, was that Sugar Bear actually has four different types of rockers, the big ones (#4) are usually used for the really long springers, Sugar Bear has made many short springers for bikes and the rocker sizes are reduced to suit.
As a matter of fact, the very issue that I referenced, #109, features a bike made by Baker Drivetrain which has a short Sugar Bear fitted with the #1 rockers.
So what is the secret behind the driveability of Sugar Bear’s front ends? I have no idea, the trail seems short, but the handling is nothing short of incredible. The most repeated phrase from those who first ride a bike with one is; “It’s like suddenly having power steering”.
So how is the Triumph now with the Sugar Bear springer? I can tell you I’ve put MANY more miles on it since the installation than the years before combined. It’s an absolute joy to ride now! Although to be honest, it has brought to light problems inherent with the riding position design. The forward footpegs are WAY too close to the ground now, even though they are the same height as before. With the DNA, it took a 10 acre field to turn this thing around, with the Sugar Bear front end, I’m dragging the heel of my shoe all the time. Had I known it was going to handle this well, I’d have put mids on this bike!
The quality of the piece is flawless and then there is the undeniable coolness added with having a part built specifically for this bike by a living legend.
If you haven’t got the impression yet that I love it, let me be clear: I love it!

The engine is running pretty good, considering I built it. It’s a one kick starter, usually. I’d like to try the Morris add-on retard lever for the ARD magneto as it does like to kick back violently sometimes. The gas tank has just started leaking, toasting the paint job, so this winter I’ll be sealing it up and sending the tank out to Liquid Illusions for a different version of the same paint job. The seat ended up with a hole in it somehow, so it’ll be recovered soon also.

These bikes are never done... if you actually ride them.

#113 October 2011 Tech Geek Luddite.

Someone was giving me grief on the online companion to the magazine “Back Talk” a few days ago about how I often go on and on about the evils of baggers with all their complexity, yet would support the notion of using GPS in a four-wheeled vehicle.

The reality is; I am quite a tech geek. I love newer, faster computers, new technologies, better, faster gizmos and pretty much if it has a picture of an apple on it… I want it. The dichotomy occurs when it comes to motorcycles. For some inexplicable reason, I want the motorcycle to be as bone and rock simple as possible. The ideal bike would be a big single cylinder, magneto-fired, minimal electrics (and everything else for that matter). The only thing better than a new bike like this, would be one as old as I could find that would still get the job done. A 50’s BSA Gold Star would be excellent!
OK, so I ride a twin, what’s up with that? I’ll admit, I like the power delivery of a twin better. Wait, so if two are good, three is better, right? I mean, the power delivery has to be better, right? What about four cylinders? Six? Here is where I run into my self-imposed braking system. I draw the line at three. Why? Well, I can tell you, it would be two, except that I had a Triumph T160 back in 1981 that I loved to death! So although I ride twins, I don’t rule out a Triumph T150/160 sometime down the road.
I currently have three bikes running. My Shovel, my 1971-based Triumph Chopper and a pretty stock-ish Triumph Bonneville from 1982. The ’82 is by far the most technologically advance bike I own. It has the factory electronic ignition (Lucas RITA) and even a starter motor and blinkers. The blinkers only ‘blink’ on one side… I don’t remember which right now because I never use them. The starter WILL work ONLY when the battery is fully charged. However, no amount of riding this bike around will fully charge the battery. It even has the factory regulator and rectifier on board. The only thing that stops me from ripping all this out and adding a magneto is the fact that the bike is almost totally stock and I can count the number of intact 82s I’ve seen on the road on one hand. This is my “sensible” bike with two seats for when such things are necessary.
Both my other bikes are magneto fired, no battery with the lights wired ‘on’ constantly. No switches, no fuses, no breakers, just a wire from the (solid state) rectifier/regulator to the headlight, the taillight and the brake switch period. Yes, for some reason I’m perfectly happy replacing the older style mechanical regulators or the zener diode with updated solid-state components. Not only that, I like LED taillights. Take it a step further, both my Chops have hydraulic clutches! This is, in part, due to my hatred of cables. I have broken many a clutch cable on a Triumph. You can say it was due to poor maintenance on my part, failure to lube, or improper routing perhaps… maybe, all I know is that it’s not much fun trying to get a running start from the stoplight, or furiously trying to find neutral just before you HAVE to stop. Admittedly the Shovel wouldn’t need a cable there anyway, since it’s a foot clutch, but I pretty much trust hydro setups, so long as you keep an eye on fluid levels, they usually work. Speaking of hydraulics, I have Japbike calipers front and rear on the Shovel, and on the front on the Triumph chop. I kept the original Lockheed caliper that came with that wheel because it seems to work well.
So I guess I do mix new tech with the old tech on my bikes, I just make sure it doesn’t add to the complexity of the whole. I can’t think of any way to do away with the throttle cables without resorting to electrickery, I don’t believe that hydraulic would be the way to go there either.
It boils down to this; if the bike stops running, there can only be three causes. Lack of fuel, lack of spark or mechanical failure somewhere. This is of course true for any motorcycle but it’s a whole lot easier to track down the lack of spark when the spark is generated from something like a magneto, which is nothing more than a DC generator, a coil and a set of points and condenser. The last thing I want on the side of the road is to deal with a wiring harness that looks like the back of my stereo in 1979. You can argue that modern motorcycles rarely break down anyway, but if there’s something that CAN be relied on, it’s that those sensors and ECMs and all that WILL eventually fail. And unless you’re the sort that trades his bike in every other year, it’ll bite you one day. I’m not saying I’ll never be left on the side of the road, the spark plug insert issue is a good example of the shit that can happen, I’m just trying to give myself a fighting chance of being able to fix it in the middle of BFE and get home.

#112 September 2011

Elsewhere in this fine publication, Hammer details the bullet points of our recently completed 5,000 mile road trip on our rigid Shovelheads. As I read what he wrote, it almost sounds like one disaster after another, but in reality it was no disaster. The story doesn’t describe the thousands of miles just blasting down the road, there’s no real way to describe that and even if there were, we’d need an entire issue to get all the details in. The problems we had with the exception of the Death Valley adventure, all seemed to happen at the end of the day’s riding. The issues that cropped up with the bikes never made us more than an hour and a half behind our self-imposed schedule. All told, we stopped right around 80 times between Detroit and New Orleans. Problem arose at the end of the day, problem was solved (sorta), back on the road the next day. We did have to take an extra day in Vegas over our planned stay there, but it wasn’t that hard to convince us. Plus, we got to see the other side of Vegas, Jeffo took us to a cool Vietnamese sandwich shop, the eats were good and everyone was dressed normally (you just get used to seeing everyone looking like they were headed to the prom in that town).
We had some discipline, we set fairly early wake-up and set-out times and stuck to that. The worst part of the trip was dragging all the stuff from the room and bungeeing it all to the bikes. I had a large leather backpack with all my clothes and stuff in (in giant ziploc bags), a separate leather roll that I kept my tennis shoes in (best part of each day was taking the boots off).
There was just something so cool about riding across the country like that, the changing scenery, the way we were treated by everyone... Bike-wise, we were like a slightly updated Wyatt and Billy, Hammers Longbike Shovel with the long Springer, Me with my shorter WideGlide rigid. Hammer reasoned that Wyatt and Billy were too old for this shit, I have admit, this trip would have been easier when we were in our 20’s, but I’m pretty damn glad we got to do it. I would venture that a lot of our readers would love to do this also, and I encourage you to get out there and do so. When we arrived in New Orleans (which I considered the ‘finish line’ of our trip) we were tired, hot, dirty and pretty shaggy looking. The next morning we were strolling around the streets of The Big Easy like it was any other weekend. Hammer and I have around 110 years between us, I like to think we could do this again and again if we had the time and the bikes held up. I can’t imagine doing this on a bagger, with its insular (minivan) feeling. When we were flying down the road on Highway 74 in Arizona, no helmet, no jackets in the middle of nothing but desert, it was exhilarating.
On the evening before the ACO ride in Rockingham, I found my clutch pack was one solid lump and the magneto had about an inch of water in it. Luckily there were some helpful souls in the parking lot of the hotel there with some tools and they were a big help in getting me going again.
Examining the Shovelhead upon our return, it’s in pretty good shape, once I cleaned off three weeks worth of grime. The headlight burned out on me, which wasn’t a surprise and I had grabbed it out of my 1961 pre unit Triumph project some months before. I had to replace the gas line in Santa Rosa, but only because I broke the inline fuel filter trying to clean it and had no way to join the remaining two pieces of line. There was the plug thread problem, detailed in Hammer’s story, as well as the front wheel thing. Apart from the hot restart problems, the bike ran absolutely great! I’m gonna need a pair of tires before I take it out of town, but I suppose that’s to be expected. I adjusted my drive chain before I left, and it was pretty much at the same adjustment when I got back, that amazed me. I put the old, stock kicker back on, I guess I need to save for a Fab Kevin Strong Arm. Some new tires and I’ll be ready to hit the road again.
The hardest thing about a trip like this, is to come back home and try and get back into the old routine. It’s tough to convince yourself that you need to go exercise, get in the shower and get to work on time, you feel like you should just be getting up, packing up and rolling down the road again.
It was great, I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.