But I received a call from the Supreme showman, Prince Najar. He was responsible for all the custom aspects at the IMS motorcycle show series for a decade and now he’s involved in the AMD show series. His partner, Bob Kay took over the IMS Show and I smell a conspiracy. Jeff organized custom elements for Sturgis shows, SmokeOuts and recently Harley Museum Ride In Shows custom portion.
He’s also involved with the magnificent Marilyn Stemp of the Buffalo Chip for the Flying Piston Charity Builders’ Breakfast. So, when the Supreme Prince called me a month before the rally and said, “Make a totally unique sculpture for our charity auction or die trying.”
I was so relieved he didn’t ask me to build a bike I said, “Yes, oh supreme one.”
He had already hung up and didn’t write it down. I started thinking, pondering, and collecting scrap. I don’t throw anything away, especially metal things. Something always works for a bracket or an art project. I had a notion for a winged thing and years ago I made a wing using old deck nails as welding rod. I grabbed the can, thinking I had it made. Low and behold the can was almost empty.
I avoid trips to Home Depot. They burn too much daylight, but I was forced to make a move. I discovered some rod and bought a couple of massive boxes of cheap 16-penny nails, which I never used. I need to return them.
I went to work creating the Guardian of the Wheel. I started on the wings first. Making a flat two-dimensional piece is a breeze compared to a three-dimensional art project. I had to make two wings identical. I pulled illustrations of dragons and art deco pieces.
I also had a couple of cans of corner segments from a local welding shop. I’ve had these hanging around for over a decade, but they came in super handy from time to time. With the wings roughed out, I started on the base by welding segments together and trying to bend them. That didn’t work too well. They wouldn’t bend without popping spot-welds.
When I’m up to something crazy like this, I stay flexible. I don’t know where’s it’s going or where it might end up, including in the dumpster out back. My feeble mind is working all the time, looking for options, opportunities and scheduling. I knew brass would be used, but you can’t mix brass with steel in some respects. If you weld and braze and then try to bend it, it will break. It becomes brittle; even though brass is softer than steel, it’s more porous.
I had to finish welding before I started to apply the brass. I also had a stringent deadline to ship it to Sturgis to arrive before the rally and be on hand for the Flying Piston Charity Builders’ Breakfast. Once I thought I had a plan and got started, I devoted time everyday to welding.
I blasted away for hours and something seemed to form under the mess of segments and MIG welding beads. I started to notice porous spots in some of the welds, and I looked hard for solutions. My metal segments were consistently clean mild steel, no paint or major rust. I cleaned the areas to be welded with a wire brush. I still ran into issues once in a while and didn’t like it. I cleaned the brass hood over the tip and moved the wire closer to the metal. Didn’t seem to work.
I needed to check the gas pressure and keep it at 30 psi. I also needed to drop the shop door when the wind kicked up. And I discovered from a local welding shop clerk that the current in the building could contain less power during specific hours of the day, depending on the local drag on the system. My beads improved.
I stuck with my daily welding routine until on a weekend close to the deadline, my MIG wire ran out and the gas tank crept close to empty. I couldn’t believe I ran out of wire. I had a massive 10-pound spool. I dug around and found another spool of wire. It was flux-coated wire and didn’t need the Argon gas mix–beautiful. I hooked it up and started to blow sparks. What a mess. It was like working with old stick rods, not nearly as clean. Crap flew everywhere.
I ran into a couple of other drawbacks. I set my Samsung phone a couple of feet away on a chunk of wood. I didn’t notice until too late. I peppered the tempered glass face with molten slag. The touch aspect to the face of the phone went to hell, modern technology. Also, my stainless steel watch face and frame caught enough flying slag to roughen the surface.
I shifted to working on the wheel and in this case followed Dr. Hamster’s 40-spoke J&P wheel pattern. I shifted to acetylene and oxygen brazing. I calculated the wheel circumference, figured spoke spacing and went to work. This was an educational process and will apply it to my belt buckles in the future.
On Monday, I pulled up to the local welding shop bright and early. I needed more brass 1/8-inch flux-coated and plain rod. I needed more steel rod for gas welding, but forgot to buy some. I researched the MIG spool wire and discovered I was using the right shit. I bought another spool and had my tank refilled. I quizzed the shop-welding expert about some of my encounters. He helped with fruitful suggestions.
I asked the welding shop guys about removing flux from brass rod and they suggested head and a wire brush. I experimented and discovered WD-40 does the trick if you let it soak. Then hit it with a wire brush.
I went back to work. Originally I started with an Art Deco approach, keeping the dragon aspect in the back of my mind as an option. As it turned out the dragon aspect took over, but I would still like to create a smooth faced art deco-winged girl, but it would take a totally different approach. It might also take much longer.
I liked making the dragon dipping slightly to the side as if making a move to protect the wheel. Attitude is everything and I would have liked to incorporate more attitude into this puppy, but I was burnin’ daylight and needed to keep moving. Sure, he’s an angry bastard, but I could do better.
The brass screws came from the hull of a wooden sailboat and I cut a batch and started to braze them around the jaw line, after I coated the area in brass as if his gums.
I reached out to Marilyn, the Queen of the Flying Piston, to inquire about the charity I was supporting.
“Join cutting edge U.S. custom builders and industry celebs for the Flying Piston Builders Breakfast, to benefit veterans suffering from PTSD and provide Technical Education,” she said. “It’s Motorcycle Missions run by Krystal Hess.”
http://www.motorcycle-missions.org/
It’s a 501 ©3.
Motorcycle Missions, a 501(c)3 non-profit corporation, helps veterans and first responders who deal with PTS(D) and suicidal ideation find hope and healing through motorcycles.
When dealing with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), the need for purpose, camaraderie, and adrenaline is of the utmost importance. So MM strives to instill a passion for riding and building motorcycles, that will help PTSD sufferers enjoy a happy, healthy, and balanced lifestyle after trauma.
“The event, organized by The Flying Piston, takes place Sunday, August 5th on the upper deck of the Big Engine Bar in the free-access CrossRoads at the Buffalo Chip. It’s open to the public.
Builders include Rick Fairless, Paul Yaffe, Jody Perewitz, Pat Patterson, Kirk Taylor, Bryan Fuller and Donnie Smith. David Roy of Voodoo Vintage and the Motorcycle Missions crew also chopped a tiny Strider, and Loaded Gun’s Kevin Dunworth and his twin six-year-old daughters customized their Strider to be donated, too.
Builder Breakfast tickets are on sale now for $20 each at http://www.theflyingpiston.com/ or goo.gl/gzILrl Proceeds benefit Motorcycle Missions, a non-profit that encourages U.S. military veterans suffering from PTSD to pursue motorcycling as a career.
Day after day, I carved out time to weld. I immediately started to burn my arms and had to shift to black long sleeve t-shirts in the blistering California July heat. Welding is very Zen. You’re trapped in a cocoon of sparks and red-hot metal. Your focus is centered on the bead and only the bead.
But there’s something about an entrancing bead. It calls to you to succeed while forming chunks of blistering hot metals together in just the right sequence. My father taught me to weld. He said it was all about the bead, and it was all stick welding at the time. Finishing a successful bead was way more important than your personal safety or comfort. I caught fire at 21 in the oil fields while welding. My dad said, “Stick with the bead or die trying.”
I finally needed to make a decision about the wheel, where to place it. I also wanted to even the texture of the beast with some kind of media blasting. I went to Harbor Freight and bought a soda blaster and a bag of medium grade soda, which cost about half of what the blaster cost. I made a mess with this bastard, but was able to even out the texture and blow most of the flux off the brass.
Everyone in the Bikernet™ shop was quizzed about the wheel placement. Most didn’t want the wheel hidden between the wings. I looked at several options, including smaller wheels on the side of the dragon’s head. “Save the wheel for something else,” Jeremiah said. But ultimately I liked how the wheel fit at the back of the guardian’s neck, and so it was.
Finally, after some more blasting, I shot the Guardian with compressed air and Satin clear Rustoleum. It weighed 41 pounds when I packed it for shipment to the town of Buffalo Chip, just east of Sturgis. May the guardian help veterans far and wide (I’m a three-tour Vietnam veteran) and support the order of the Flying Pistons forever.
–Bandit
