Donnie Smith / American Thunder 2003 Motorcycle Show
By Bandit | | General Posts
Up here in the great northland known as Minnesota, we know it’s time to fire up the beast when the Donnie Smith/American Thunder Motorcycle Show and Swap Meet comes around. For the third year in a row it was held at the Xcel Energy Center home to the Minnesota Wild hockey team. I only mention that because my buddy Willy got the coach’s autograph/picture at the show. It wasn’t hard to pick him out, as three-piece suits tend to stand out among as bunch of beer swigging bikers.
The swap meet had its usual club representation and the dirty bins of old parts. Nothing special, I guess I wasn’t on the search of any specific component.The highlight of the day was getting an autographed poster from Dave Perewitz of his new Discovery bike. It’s a right side drive, 124-inch motor with a cool swingarm, red with Perewitz flames. It took 900 hours to build. It doesn’t look comfortable to ride, but who am I to say. He rode it from the East coast of Florida to Dallas.
I like rigids. My favorite show bike was an evil rigid, raked and stretched, rattle-can flat black with shiny black flames. Cool
The night before, Willy and I had a chance to hang out at the hospitality gathering at Whisky Junction (A local biker hangout) and ask Donnie and Dave a few questions. I got to tell you, it was pretty cool getting a chance to congratulate Dave on his recent induction into the national hall of fame, and awarded the VQ fabricated bike builder of the year. We chatted about some of the bikes he’s built for NASCAR celebrities. It turned out that his tattoo artist is mine as well. We talked about the Discovery Ride and he offered a terrific perspective. It’s not really about the competition, but furthering the biker cause. Dave, my hats of to you and all you do. I agree. By the way, Bandit, Dave was looking for you.
I spoke to Donnie Smith as well. He was excited about the success of the bike show. It has grown from 70 or so bikes entrants three years ago to about 170 today. Business was brisk for Donnie and he was pumped. He also built a sharp blue chopper for the Discovery Ride. His thoughts of the current up and coming bike builders included, ” Young builders need to have stamina. You’re not going to be millionaires tomorrow, but stick it out.” On his current projects he would only say, “a super secret project bike.” I am sure it will be sharp.
I did learn two lessons this weekend:
1. Keep a cooler in your trunk, park in the garage next to the building for 10 bucks and drink your beer in the parking lot. It paid for my parking.
2. Do not try to install ape hangers the weekend of big show. All the local shops were out of brake line fittings.
Until the next ride,Have a drink on me,–Troy (Rigid) Toensing
Bikernet correspondent Troy or Rigid.
The Horse Magazine’s 2nd Annual Smokey Mountain Smoke Out
By Crazy Horse | | General Posts
They came like thundering hordes over the mountains from Iowa, New York, Kentucky, Illinois, Michigan, New England, Georgia, Tennessee, Wisconsin, and even New Jersey. The majority of them rode hard tail choppers. They were dressed in black, wearing grim expressions. The local populace stood back in horror as they watched the picturesque Cherokee Reservation in North Carolina, taken over.
Well not really, but they had ridden a long way to party with others of their kind. The Smokey Mountain Smoke Out is not your average motorcycle event. It’s a down-to-earth, hard assed good time. It attracts an unpretentious crowd, riding a variety of hand built, totally unique scoots.
No billet barges here. No fancy $10,000 paint jobs. No miles of gleaming chrome. But there was no shortage of clean, sharp rides either. Bikes in the show stretched from one end of the spectrum to the other. It was almost impossible to pick a winner.
What you will find is plenty of black primer. I saw countless uses of the stuff. If there is a way to be creative with black primer, I saw it there. Then there was the imaginative use of objects one doesn’t see at the usual bike shows.
It was as if someone said, “Hey, let’s see if we can find a way to use this faucet handle on the bike.” These are interesting bikes, but they built to be ridden and ridden hard. Which is the main theme of this event.
Hammer, editor of The Horse, says he wanted this to be an event that people ride their bikes to. There’s even an arrangement up with the local Mailboxes Etc. So that attendees can ship their camping gear or other needed items ahead of time. They can ride their bikes and pick up their gear once they arrive. From the looks of things, it didn’t appear that many folks did trailer duty. Hammer rode his evil black primer hardtail down from Michigan.
About 700 bikes showed up for the event.
There were those like Steve and Trish from Connecticut, who built a week long vacation around the Smoke Out. Steve rides a ’67 XLHC.
A sleek, turquoise kickstart rigid ’76 sporty is Trish’s ride.
Hammer wants to encourage folks to build bikes just to ride to this event. Steve from Clover, SC had just finished doing the top end of his ’78 Shovel chopper. His ride out to Cherokee was the shakedown ride. Nothing like seeing a radical 46-degree raked scoot cruising down the road. And there was plenty of that. This event is a throw back to the old days. Before you could go into a bike shop and buy just about everything for your ride imaginable.
Many of the bikes found here were built with parts found at a swap meet, in the dusty mess of someone’s garage or made simply with a hammer, hacksaw, and vice. Downhome engineering at it’s best.
Meeting members of The Horse’s staff was great. Edge, a radical writer, rode his bike up from South Carolina. It’s the only bike I have ever seen with a taillight off a ’66 Mustang.
Mr. Wild does many tech articles for The Horse. I have known Mr. Wild for a few years through emails. It was the first time I have met him in person. He’s a bit deaf, so we typed out most of our conversation on his laptop computer. It gave my typing skills quite the test, but it sure was a fun way to talk. He rode down from Wisconsin with his dog.
Some folks camped at the KOA. For those who prefer not roughing it, the motels along Cherokee’s trout stream offered a peaceful retreat. I spent a night at The Bennett Hill House Bed and Breakfast. Perched on the side of a mountain, hosts Dennis and Barbara provided an elegant escape in their incredible Victorian home.
For those who aren’t familiar with The Horse magazine, it’s not your average bike rag. Hammer says they are trying tone down the dark, cynical attitude they have displayed in the past. Yet, The Horse is still far from tame. They want it to be reader-friendly, catering to the backyard builder, the working guy who builds his own ride. They even have a dialogue going with the Motor Company. The latest issue of The Horse features two pages on HD’s new V-Rod. More mainstream builders are checking out this magazine.
As for my Smoke Out experience, I had been checking out the bikes. The Iron Maiden Contest was just starting up, when I noticed the smell of tar and spotted a bag of feathers. I saw the glint of sharp axes and heard whispers.
Seems a rumor was circulating that I was a spy for an enemy camp. As Bandit was loafing on a sailboat in the tropics, I needed a bodyguard. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted a great replacement. He was tall, handsome, and sitting on a savage rigid. We quickly made our escape down the road to Bryson City for alcoholic beverages and some much needed Mexican food.
I have been attending m/c events for over 20 years. I have never had a weekend quite like my experience at the Smoke Out. I will definitely be back next year. Just about everyone I talked to, plans on returning for the 3rd Smoke Out next July. The event is being lengthened to 3 days. Hammer is expecting upwards of 5,000 bikes. For more information on the 2002 Smoke Out or The Horse Magazine, click on the link below or go to http://www.ironcross.net
-Crazyhorse
Peanut Butter and Harley-Davidson
By Bandit | | General Posts
As usual when I visit my 78-year-old mom, she slips me clippings of stories she reads about motorcycles. As she slid this one onto the desk, I noticed that it was the same one Earl McNeely sent me from federal prison in Texas. When I was in Vietnam, my mom sent me clippings about guys who were wiped out on motorcycles. Of course that was to push her feelings on helmets. Years later, she gave up on helmets and fought along side of me in the name of freedom, at least intellectually.
On one recent afternoon, she gave me an article fromThe Los Angeles Times about a guy named Harold Benich, who turned his Softail into a soybean-burning bastard. When I first read the short piece and studied the photograph, I got the impression that he had altered anEvo engine to make it run on diesel fuel, but that wasn’t thecase. He had replaced the Evo engine with a small displacement dieselturned sideways in the frame. According to the National BiodieselBoard in Jefferson City, Mo., it is the first diesel-poweredmotorcycle in the country to run.
I gave Harold a call and found out that soybean oil iscombustible at 300 degrees, which makes it very user friendly. Standarddiesel fuel is combustible at 150 degrees, although there is asubstantial difference in the flash point. “If diesel oil prices gotoo high, the trucking industry could turn to soybean fuel,” Haroldexplained. He gets 100 miles to the gallon. Unfortunately, soybean oil is $2.50 a gallon, compared with $1.39 a gallon for gas in Pennsylvania. With diesel fuel prices cresting the 2-buck mark, soybean fuel could become an alternative.
According to the Biodiesel Board, trucks, cars and even planesrun on food oils. But the motorcycle crowd may be reluctant to playsince the installation of diesel motors in their bikes, as Harold hasdone, may reduce their ability to have kick-ass power. “Soldiersrode such bikes during the world wars to save fuel, but since thenthey’ve gone the way of the Edsel,” said Jenna Higgins, a spokeswomanfor the Biodiesel Board, a trade group that promotes food oils asgasoline alternatives.
The 21 HP Perkins Diesel pumps up to 35 horses!
The positive aspect of soybean fuel is its cleanliness, before and after it’s digested by a diesel engine. “You can eat this stuff,” Harold said. “Cleanup consists of a little water on a rag. It’s wonderful.” Soybean oil is consistent and readily available. “When others speak of alternativefuels, they are often referring to waste vegetable oils. These oilsare not consistent and should be used in home furnaces whereconditions don’t change,” Harold explained. “Soybean is pure, can bepurchased in 5-gallon buckets or tanker trucks full. Some waste oilscontain animal fat, peanut oil or even canola oil. Just depends onthe quality of oil a restaurant pays for.”
Another garage-inventor, Hugh Gerhardt of Holland, Mich., is working on a custom bike that will take a rider from Corpus Christi, Texas, to San Diego, Calif., on a 12-gallon tank of soybean oil.
According to Jeffery Bair of The Associated Press, “Harold’sbike gets 100 mpg, roars like a jackhammer and smells like a freshbatch of McDonalds fries.”
Harold used $15,000 in H-D parts and an engine he rescuedfrom a construction site. “People wonder whether I have come to mowthe lawn,” he said. “It doesn’t accelerate like a stock H-D, andcosts a third more to run currently (4 cents a mile compared with3 cents a mile for the stock bike), but the fuel won’t catch fire andit runs so clean even the fish will eat this stuff. It’s also readilyavailable. Currently, due to the influx of foreign oils, farmers arepaid not to grow crops of soy. If demand grew, the likelihood ofreduced production costs are great and the price would drop, makingit even more competitive with fossil fuels.”
Using food oils for fuel is not a new concept, according to the AP story. “Inventor Rudolph Diesel ran the first diesel engines on peanut oilin the 1890s, and Erwin Rommel, the crafty German general, putcooking oil in tanks when they ran out of gas in the Sahara Desertduring World War II.”
Some vehicles combine food oils and standard fuels, accordingto a fuel salesman, but Harold wanted to go where few had gonebefore. He attempted to make the standard aircleaner cover concealhis sideways engine. It works until he fires that sucker up. “Some guys just thought it was a Softail, until I start it.”
Harold grew up in the Great Lakes Region near Erie,Penn. “I started riding with a Harley Sprint when I was 14.”Although his wife thinks he’s nuts, they’ve stayed hitched for 11years. “We live five miles from Albion, which is a town of 2,500.We’re in the sticks. My neighbor thinks I’m building a space shuttlein my garage.” Harold worked for Detroit Diesel for 14 years beforejoining the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections’ VehicleRestoration Department. “We have 60,000 square feet and it’s packedwith vehicles to tinker with.”
Harold suffers from rider’s block (snow) from October untilearly April. “We still have snow on the ground fromHalloween, when it started. This year we had record count. Currentlywe’re up to 180 inches of snow for the season. I bought a ’92 Fatboyand was riding it when my neighbor suggested, ‘Your next bike willhave to be diesel.'”
Harold started thinkin’ and the snow started falling and thenext thing he knew he was buying a 2000 frame, transmission, frontend and controls. “The bike is Bozo-proof,” Harold said. “It operatesjust like a stock bike, no strange controls, levers or switches.”
Harold started playing with alternative fuels a decade ago. “I had adiesel generator that ran on soybean oil. I was generating my ownelectricity for nothing.”
There’s the story of Harold, a brother, an inventor and a manconcerned about the country’s fuel problems. We’ll keep in touch with him and see where he goes with this. Wonder if he can make whiskey…
–Bandit
October, 23 Part 1
By Bandit | | General Posts
Biketoberfest shot from Roque.
Biketoberfest is a wrap, and we have the story thanks mostly to Rogue our Florida imbedded moto-journalist for over 30 years. We’re hitting the news hard this morning. We made a pre-dawn run to the Sacred Grounds for a pot of 92 Octane coffee. We dropped the blonde off on her favorite street corner and picked up parts for the Shrunken FXR.
We’re busting our asses on a killer tech that should roll onto the site before the end of the weekend. Then we’ll kick back with a shot of Whiskey and read holiday fiction that will curl the toes of your boots, cause you to sit on the edge of your barstool and keep an eye on the exit sign for a month.
Let’s get to the news:
Photo from Rogue.
BIKETOBERFEST ROLLS INTO THE SUNSET–DAYTONA BEACH — Chalk it up to crisp, fine weather or the mechanics of chance, but bikers lingered Sunday, bringing Biketoberfest to a slow close.Daytona Beach’s Main Street was packed this weekend as Biketoberfest 2003 enjoyed four days of mild temperatures and clear skies.
Few vendors, bar owners or hoteliers were complaining.At 5:30 in the evening, Main Street clothing stores were packed with last-day deal seekers, and the sidewalks were brimming.
“We had a lot more foot traffic than last year,” said Chicago resident Matt Norskoy, who was selling T-shirts under a tent at Oleander and Main.
At the Full Moon Saloon, where turkey drumsticks were still moving and beer tubs still “womanned,” executive Brian Romain said he had hoped to attract a younger crowd this year — and did.Romain, whose company also owns Dirty Harry’s across the street, brought in 12 bands for a broad mix of music. Though decibel meters had to be used all weekend to keep the volume within the city’s noise limits, the strategy attracted “a lot of younger riders on crotch rockets” in addition to the Harley-Davidson crowd.
Down south in Samsula, the band played on at Sopotnick’s Cabbage Patch Bar, where both the patrons and bikes tended to have more miles on them.
Scott Hall, the pianist for the Massachusetts-based Drunk Stuntmen, said during a break that the band had loved Biketoberfest, as usual, but were wiped out after four straight nights.”And sick of beer, and sick of weed,” he added, before being collected by fellow band members to go on a helicopter ride over Samsula.
“Business is possibly bigger than last year,” said Cabbage Patch owner Ron Luznar, walking barefoot through the tent city around the bar.
His friend One-Eyed Red, meanwhile, sat at the bar’s front door, enjoying the cool air and showing off copper roses he’d sculpted. Inside the bar was a realistic, if enormous, cabbage he’d fashioned from motorcycle fenders as a gift to Luznar.
Red said he thought the bike-week events could benefit from a stronger artistic presence in addition to the T-shirts. And that the crowd on Main Street in Daytona Beach was a little too green and rich for his taste.
The richer ones did fill the Adam’s Mark hotel to capacity — including the presidential suite with its grand piano, jumbo Jacuzzi and views from river to sea.
As for the size of the crowd overall, event organizers could only guess, but said it looked close to last year’s estimated 100,000 — despite the recent Harley-Davidson centennial in Milwaukee, which some feared would steal thunder from Biketoberfest.
–By VIRGINIA SMITH
Staff Writer, Daytona News Journal
–from Rogue
ALL NEW PAUGHCO WEBSITE–If you need old school frames, narrow or wide springer front ends, or parts for Pans and Knuckles, check the Paughco site. They are rocking with tradition. In fact, if you read our latest East Bay history, in the Cantina, the Paughco family was there in the beginning. Check it out.
Shot from Jill Z.
BIKERNET STUDY, FEMALE HORMONES IN BEER– Yesterday, scientists for Health Canada suggested that men should take alook at their beer consumption, considering the results of a recent analysis that revealed the presence of female hormonesin beer. The theory is that drinking beer makes men turn into women.
To test the finding, 100 men were fed 6 pintsof beer each. It was then observed that 100% of the men gained weight, talked excessively without making sense, becameoverly emotional, couldn’t drive, failed to think rationally, argued over nothing and refused to apologize when wrong. Nofurther testing is planned.
–from Chris T.
WOMEN IN THE WIND — When Jennifer Chaffin climbed off the back of her husband’s motorcycle and onto one of her own, she had no way of knowing how many women she would influence.
Now, 20 years later, the Edgewater grandmother joins women from across the country in celebrating a defining moment in their lives, when they take control of their destinies and move from the back of a motorcycle as members of Leather and Lace Women’s Motorcycle Club.
“I have completed my goal,” Chaffin said. “Giving women the freedom to ride a Harley.”
And that’s exactly what she’s doing with her “sisters” during Biketoberfest.Chaffin is the founder and president of the Edgewater-based club, which has about 200 members nationally. The sisters — as they call themselves — are tall and short, thin and hefty, tattooed and not, boisterous and shy. What they have in common is a twin-angel symbol of Lace they wear on their back, a feminine bond that stretches across the miles, and a fierce independence.
These women may ride next to their men on occasion, but they are individuals willing to stand up for themselves and each other, Chaffin said. They are not going to ride in the back of the pack and make the potato salad, she added.
But this respect did not come easily.”We started this because the men said we could not ride on our own,” club member Kat Shaw of Melbourne said, talking about the attitude some male motorcycle club members showed toward women riding on their own. “They would cut off our patches with knives.”
Lace members were not the first women to take the handlebars. Women have been riding since these two-wheeled steeds were invented.
Effie Hotchkiss rode from New York to San Francisco and back — her mother in a sidecar alongside — in 1915. And Dot Robinson started the Motor Maids in 1930s, the oldest women’s motorcycle organization in North America.
According to a 1998 survey by the Motorcycle Industry Council, a California-based industry trade group, 8.1 percent of motorcycle owners and 17 percent of operators are female.
The 1998 study also showed the median age of women riders is 38.5 years; they have a median income of $52,730 annually; most work in professional or managerial jobs and more hold college or post-college degrees than their male counterparts.
Harley-Davidson’s 2002 buyer demographics show 9 percent of its customers are women.
Genevieve Schmidt, editor of Woman Rider Magazine, said women are the fastest growing segment of the motorcycle market, an explosion that started in the mid-1990s.”Women came into their own in our society, such as owning their own businesses,” she said. “Motorcycles are a way of expressing their self-confidence and self-esteem. Women are also seeing more women on bikes and saying to themselves, ‘If she can do that, so can I.’ “
–By MARK I. JOHNSON
Staff Writer, Daytona News Journal
–from Rogue
HORSE PROJECT EGO–We would love to see Geno’s new chopper, but he only sent a shot of his tank with the HORSE magazine partner’s name pinstriped onto the top. So what about the rest of the flaming machine? What gives? Suppose we must run out and steal the next issue off the newsstand? We’re waiting for answers.
BIKERNET HALLOWEEN PARTY– A couple were invited to a swanky family masked fancy dress Halloweenparty. The wife got a terrible headache and told her husband togo tothe party alone. He, being a devoted husband, protested, but she argued and said she was going to take some aspirin and go to bed and there was no need for his good time to be spoiled by not going.
So he took his costume and away he went. The wife, aftersleeping soundly for about an hour, woke without pain and as itwas still early, decided to go to the party. As her husband didn’t know what her costume was, she thought she would have some fun by watching her husband to see how he acted when she was not with him.
So she joined the party and soon spotted her husband in his costume, cavorting around on the dance floor, dancing with every nice “chick” he could and copping a little feel here and a little kiss there.
His wife went up to him and being a rather seductive babe herself, he left hisnew partner high and dry and devoted his time to her. She let him go as far as he wished, naturally, since he was her husband.After more drinks he finally he whispered a little proposition in herear and she agreed, so off they went to one of the cars and hadpassionate intercourse in the back seat.
Just before unmasking atmidnight, she slipped away and went home and put the costume away andgot into bed, wondering what kind of explanation he would make up forhis outrageous behavior. She was sitting up reading when he came in, so she asked what kind of time he had.
“Oh, the same old thing. You know I never have a good time when you’renot there.”
Then she asked,”Did you dance much?”
He replied, “I’ll tell you, I never even danced one dance. When I got there, I met Pete, Bill Brown and some other guys, so we wentinto the spare room and played poker all evening.”
“You must have looked really silly wearing that costume playing pokerall night!” she said with unashamed sarcasm.
To which the husband replied, “Actually, I gave my costume toyour Dad, apparently he had the time of his life.”
–Rogue
Old shot from Bob T.
COPS ROLL INTO BIKETOBERFEST– “Thefts of motorcycles is our biggest issue during Biktoberfest,” said Detective Mark Cheatham. “We use the bicycles because we have better mobility to get around the crowds. It’s much easier than cruising around in a car.”
The three detectives and two bicycle unit officers who make up the Biketoberfest detail said they mainly weave in and out on their mountain bikes among the pedestrians that clog the sidewalks. Their main objective is watching for anyone who is acting furtively around a motorcycle.
“You can tell who’s acting funny around a bike,” Quartier said. “Most of these bikes are pretty expensive.”
The crowds were thick Friday on Ridgewood Avenue in front of the Highlander Restaurant just south of the Police Department. Dozens of white tents crammed the sidewalks as merchants hawked everything from motorcycle parts to leather halter tops. They contrasted sharply with the moving sea of black leather and chrome.
–By LYDA LONGA
Staff Writer, Daytona News Journal
–from Rogue
Continued On Page 2
Sturgis ’99 Project Bike
By Bandit | | General Posts
| This is original assembly Excelsior-Henderson number 103. And we’re proud to bring you an original, exclusive, first off custom Excelsior. Since this is an original production run bike, we won’t cut or alter the frame, change any major components, or add many billet components. This is sorta like customizing a bike back in the late ’60s. There were few parts and almost no variety for new models, so we had to work with parts and pieces from other bikes, or modify what we had. In this case we don’t want to modify the original sheet metal, in case the bike becomes a sought after collector’s commodity 40 years from now after I’ve been planted. One of my ex-wives can sell it for nothing. “The bastard rode away one on of these damn things, now I’m gonna party.”
The fenders had to go, though, and Jesse James is hunting through his rust bins in the back of his shop trying to find some scrap for us to work with. We will strip the front end and chrome the rear legs. While we’re at it, we’ll take the front wheel and lace it to a 19-inch rim with Buchanan’s spokes. By the way, the work is being handled by Marty Ruthman at Hi-Tech Custom Cycles in Van Nuys, California. Marty suggested I replace the stock headlight with a Headwinds Mariah headlight. He also suggested that we raise the tank slightly and fill the notches for the heads. We’ll naturally slice the seat to shit and see if Bob La Pera wants to attempt a custom saddle for the ride to Sturgis this year. Won’t be much in the way of performance modification to this 1500cc rascal, unless E-H comes up with something, although we did slip on a set of slash cut muffles. Al Martinez will dazzle us with a black base classic flame paint job. We’ll also replace the rubber on the rear with a 150 Avon and the front 19 will match. Finally, highbars seem the only option for long arms and their risers, and we’ve sized my ass with 14-inch apes. The risers have an oval base and without major modifications, I can’t run my standard Custom Cycle Engineering dog bones. In addition, we’re removing the fender rails to improve the line of the chassis. We’ll hide some rails under the fender to give it that added rigid look, and Marty has already devised a bracket to lower the bike an inch or two. Now, we’re beginning to talk. From a finish standpoint, we’re going to remove the battery cover and oil bag cover on the other side and paint them to match. There’s nothing like classic flames and that may be the solution. I’m wrestling that along with a couple of girls and my shed in San Pedro. But we’ll get to that later. |
| Ride Forever, –Bandit |
Sturgis ’99 Project Bike Part Two
By Bandit | | General Posts
| In the last segment we discussed the lines of the new Excelsior-Henderson and what we planned for it. As you know as well as I do, any custom job is a matter of dreams, someone’s ability to conceive a great notion, and the team of experts you put together. We were blessed on all fronts.
Not only were we graced with the opportunity to work with a brand-new manufactured bike, but we were fortunate enough to work with Marty Ruthman at Hi-Tech Custom Cycles in Van Nuys, California. Here’s what went down, once the madman came around. Marty took off the fenders, the handlebars, the brakes, the front end, the fender rails, the rear brakes, both wheels, and then called us. “What the hell do you want me to do with this crap?” Once he calmed down, we called him back, and a plan was hatched. Marty grabbed a couple of scrap Jesse James fenders and hacked the shit out of them. In fact, the rear fender is barely the fender tip of one of Jesse’s creations. The front unit was once one of Jesse’s long sweeping fenders. Our notion was not to make it look like a H-D custom. Something needed to be done to the front end, but one of our goals was to continue to work with the original front end, which had caught some flack from a handful of the motorcycle press. We decided to chrome the rear legs and Marty took it a step further. He stripped the front end of the brakes and controls and sent the whole batch to the chrome shop. The next move was to add high bars and a slimmer front wheel. We decided on a 19-inch and sent the hub to the experts at Buchanan’s. We were under somewhat of a time crunch so we asked them to move on it. They didn’t and ultimately delivered the wrong wheel. So we erased them from the competent list. Marty and Jim, his machinist, went out on a limb to round off the corners of the Super X looks by manufacturing axle caps, axle adjuster caps, a master cylinder cover, and a platform for two of the E-H turn signals to reside as taillights. We found some wild lenses to fill the bill and the license plate bracket acts as a mud flap. Oh, yeah … the seat. We went to great lengths to find a custom seat for this puppy, only to have it miss the boat and the trip to the Badlands. There will be some shots of both here so you can compare them. I think that’s it for now. I’ve listed the team for the project. I’ve been building bikes for 30 years, and if I list someone, it’s because they know what the hell they’re doing. |
| Ride Forever, –Bandit |
He’s the type of motorcycle maniac who wants to experiment with anything big twin, so when we said Super X, he didn’t say, “Fuck you guys, take it some where else.” He said, “Fuck you guys, don’t come in here, I don’t ever want to see your sorry asses on the planet again.” We dropped off the bike and left. 
It had to retain the original look, only chopped, and we were headed in the right direction. We raised the front of the gas tank one inch, which allowed the top of the tank to flow with the line of the frame and not dip in the front. It also allowed Marty enough space to fill the cups in the sides of the tank, so it flowed as a unit. 
While riding to to Sturgis last year, we discovered that guys with short fenders and fat tires sling the gravel. We wanted that rowdy look but not the heartburn for our brothers. I know I’m forgetting something, but you’ll catch it in the Sturgis saga when you check the final shots on the road. 1939 WLDR BY MILWAUKEE IRON
By Marcus Cufford | | General Posts
This bike represents one of the many reasons I love motorcycles. Scooters have stood beside me through jobs, five marriages and various relationships that thankfully didn’t result in more weddings. There comes tough-as-broken-spokes-times during relationship hell that a man needs all his faculties and all the positive influences the biker world can afford him. This scooter carried me through one of those eras.
I fell in love, head over heals, for a women with loose hinges, mental instability and great tits. I was lost in a black hole of infatuation with an evil being. My draw was stronger than heroin to an addict. I fought it night and day, usually unsuccessfully. I worked as hard as my fleeting concentration would allow. I hit the gym harder and tried to focus on other women including my lovely ex who I abandoned. I failed miserably.
In the center of this fiery hell a call came from Randy Simpson of Milwaukee Iron. “I have just the thing you need,” Randy told me, “but you have to hang on while we restore it.” Those words twisted inside me.
I’m not sure my mind and vocal cords were connected, but in a deeper sense I believed that Randy understood my tsunami pain. His business had grown quickly, and we spoke almost weekly about the industry and his own expanding-enterprise woes. During a rough winter the snow piled so high on his building that the roof collapsed. Talk about a single motion that can knock an man’s lifestyle to its knees.
Randy recognized the wavering tone of my distant voice from Lynchburg, Virginia to Los Angeles and understood a deeper motorcycle related need. He purchased this running flat track racer complete in ’83 from Rick Allen and Ed Rich from Asheboro, North Carolina. It lacked only basic fasteners and the original clutch pack. Weekly Randy reported on restoration progress and the sheet metal paint scheme which was sent to Dawn Holmes in Prescott, Arizona. At that point I planned to escaped the inner city and hide in a small condo on the edge of town.
Each time the phone rang Randy’s hopeful tone momentarily released me from a lover’s doldrums. I sensed that he was taking a mental dip-stick to my heart in addition to accounting for the bike. I perceived in my mind that I would overcome this affliction. I knew that I was not alone, that men and women all over the globe were facing heartbreaks. Weekly, in the news, the terror of relationships-gone-wrong splashed across headlines. Recently a man attempted to kill all four of his kids to express his rage over a woman. I prayed I wouldn’t stoop to anything foolish or destructive. I told my brothers, fleeing from terrible break-ups, that there’s another woman with the touch, beauty and heart to erase your pain. During the onslaught of emotional terror, it’s hard to imagine.
During a weekly check-up, Randy explained that most reconstructions, especially race bikes, begin with frame straightening. Milwaukee Iron houses a rare, original, precise chassis table for just such chores. After stripping the bike, frame truing came first. Milwaukee Iron trues and modifies frames constantly
I couldn’t concentrate on the technical aspects of the renovation. A brother recently stared at me across a table and pointed out examples of men, in the industry, who destroyed their businesses and lives through break-ups. The community property law can cut a company so fast it never recovers. Even more importantly, it often slits a man’s ambitious drive like a 16-penny nail through a tire at 100 mph. When deflated some guys can’t reach the can of Fix-O-Flat. Life is wild.
One week while Randy was taking my temperature he told me that Rick and Ed developed a Harley Museum in Asheboro called American Classic with 36 notable Harley-Davidsons and assorted memorabilia. He actually told me the address at 1170 US Highway 64 West, but I lost it (I had to call information). The number is (336) 629-9564.
When that ’39 WLDR was delivered I was moving into my stucco cave on the outskirts of society. I lived upstairs and a neighborhood kid and I struggled to haul that little 45 cubic inch flat track racer to the top of the stairs. I surrounded myself with motorcycle art, memorabilia and that ’39 WLDR. I looked at it from day to day and told myself that this classic would feel no pain even if my heart was crumbling. The quality of the Dawn Holmes intricate paint scheme wouldn’t change. The frame wouldn’t rust but remain strong and resilient, always a solid quality example of motorcycling history.
That motorcycle is still with me, remaining an inspiration, still looking as good as the day she rolled off the truck. It’s a constant reminder that as human beings we can bust up our own lives, partnerships, and relationships. We destroy or build, it’s our choice. Randy proved to me that while I was fumbling inside, he was creating new products, rebuilding his shop and had the time to restore this classic on the side, in 120 hours. He reminded me of the essence of friendship and the quality of accomplishment.
Remember brothers and sisters, when life is bleakest, there are the fine lines of a custom or antique motorcycle to releash and the open road recalling pure freedom. At our grease-stained fingertips is the constant opportunity to attain distinction and the hardened steel drive to reach the next brilliant achievement.
Dust your down-trodden-self off and hit the road. Thanks Randy.
–Bandit
