GKM

CONTENTS

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31. CHRIS BUNCH

The first time I met Chris Bunch was early 1972. He was talking to Tom Burke about a run called “Big Bike Magazine’s 1st Annu-al Prison Run and Bike Show” that he was planning from Tom’s shop in Long Beach to the Men’s Colony in San Luis Opispo.

20 bikes left B&O Cycles headed north up Hwy 1 to Moro Bay State Park to camp overnight. Mouse – who worked for Tom – and I decid-ed to ride into town and check out the nightlife. We got separated riding back to the campgrounds in a fog so wet and dense you couldn’t see your forks.

I was sitting in the middle of some remote road near the beach when a “happy” hippy in a VW comes slid-ing up to me and called out “Lost?... follow me” and blasts off. I just got my bike turned around as his tail-lights vanished in the fog. I caught up to him and followed him back to the campgrounds. We had to drain oil from a bike to get the wood to burn. It was cold, wet, and foggy. The ‘shrooms came out and next black-ness.

In the morning Chris needed some-one to go tell the prison staff we were running late. The ‘shrooms were do-ing their evil work now and I’m on my way to the Men’s Colony rolling down Hwy 1 at speed. Up pulls a CHP next to me with his window down and yells, “Follow Me”, with lights blazing. Whew! Rush?

The boys finally show up and after warrant checks and the draining of our gas tanks into a barrel we were admitted to the prison.

The inmate show crew had made cool awards, roped off an area for the bikes, and showed Easy Rider during the lunch break. I traded my Jammer tank top with vintage H-D wings for a plain tank top belonging to a guy three times my size. Could be why the inmates voted my Shovelhead “Best Road Jammer” and 2nd Best Bike overall. Chris and I were the last to leave and the inmates stood on walkways near the path we rode in on. Chris blasts out in front of me on his Panhead and forgets the 90 degree turn at the end. At the last minute he locks up his back brake and I almost nail him.

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He fishtails left, right, then highsides on the wet grass and his bike ends up on top of him. The inmates go nuts. A standing ovation. After straightening his controls it’s back to Hwy 1 south.

Remember, we had to drain our gas tanks as prison management had the funny idea the inmates might use some of it for more creative en-deavors. After we hand-pumped it back into our tanks out of that old wet rusty barrel we just made it to the first gas station before our filters clogged. After draining them again and fresh gas we were finally headed south to L.A.

Chris was an early sixties long range recon Army Ranger patrol leader in Viet Nam. He was also the post-Ed Roth editor for Chopper magazine, then a writer for Big Bike and after

that contributing editor and a writer for Super Cycle. He wore his motor-cycle and beer drinking attitude like his leather jacket.

His first writing job after Viet Nam was for the ‘Open City” underground press (peace/love) paper in L.A. from ‘ 67-’ 69. It was finally shut down for obscenity. Bukowski wrote a column for it, “Notes of a dirty old man”. In ‘69 it was picked up by the L.A. Free Press. While at Open City Chris had to tell Jim Morrison (pre-Doors) that ‘We can’t run any more of your shitty poetry’. Who knew?

One night Chris had Bukowski and actress Barbara Gates over to his apartment in Venice to hang out. Bu-kowski got loaded and wouldn’t leave when Chris had to go so he had to throw him out. When he came back

his landlady was freaking out because Bukowski had painted a large render-ing of male genitalia on Chris’s door. He told her not to worry, she could sell it.

Chris went on to write for Rolling Stone, Look magazine and authored or co-authored some thirty bestsell-ing science fiction novels. He passed way too early from the effects of Agent Orange exposure in Viet Nam.

Best memory: Hwy 1, sun’s up, waves crashing on the rocks, my candy red Shovel and Chris’s green Panhead at speed, hair in the air, smiles for miles, heading south to L.A. Chris’s favorite saying was “Don’t care about politics, what’s the pay?”

COCK-A-DOODLE DOO, IT’S CHICKEN POOBoneshaker Choppers’ 45

Benny Thomas, proprietor of Bone-shaker Choppers in Stourbridge, En-gland, is a long time rider and builder of fine custom motorcycles. We’ve featured a number of his bikes in the past, every one of them clean, sleek and neatly fabricated. In fact, totally unlike the musty, crusty, funky little flathead you see here. So why the de-parture?

“I have a friend, Ian, who is al-ways bringing stuff back from the States”, says Benny. “One day he texted me a photo of a 45 chop-per crammed into a chicken coop somehwere in, I think, Colorado. The bars and the sissy bar had been bent horizontal in order to stuff the bike into the coop. ‘Thought this might be up your street’ was the message, and he was right. I loved the look of it.”

Old Harley-Davidsons are still hard to get hold of in the UK and Benny thought he could make some use of the bike. So, bought unseen, he forgot all about it until Ian turned up at the shop a few months later in his van. “When he unloaded the bike it was covered in all kinds of bird shit… and when we got it inside and took the tanks off, there was an old termites nest in there”, recalls a bemused Ben-ny.

From that moment on, the unfortu-nate 45 gained the moniker ‘Chick-en Poo’. But there was something about it; it was obviously a bike with a story, and it had been customised country-style to create a neat little bob-job. Benny and Zip set to work recom-misioning Chicken Poo and work-ing out exactly what they’d bought. “It’s a forties frame with a later Ser-vi-Car ‘G’ motor”, says Benny. “It has

a 35mm Sporty front end and bars with a ‘70s Honda front brake, 18” rims and what I think are Servi-Car tanks. I needed to make up new ca-bles, clean out the tanks and Linkert carb, and get everything to work” says Benny. “I also cut down the ear-ly Sporty fender to get the sissy bar sitting more upright. Oh, and added that little solo seat and p-pad.”

One of the most interesting mod-ifications on the bike is the shifter mechanism; “Someone has at some stage fitted a mousetrap and hand clutch”, explains Benny. “But the linkage between the mousetrap and the clutch arm is amazing: all these homemade pulleys and wires. The guy who owned it obviously had no access to a welder; it’s very Heath Robinson, but is the smoothest shift-ing 45 I’ve ever ridden!”.

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After some fettling, Benny got Chicken Poo running OK, but not as well as he would have liked. “We just couldn’t work out the problem, so we got a friend of Ian’s, Alan, to look at the mag and it turned out it wasn’t advancing fully. Once that was sorted, the bike ran really well.”

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As Benny predicted, the bike attract-ed a lot of interest; it really looks like it could have come off the set of some sixties biker flick. And now it’s sold, the new owner can look forward to owning a truly unique 45. Chicken Poo really does rule the crusty roost.

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“IT HAS A 35MM SPORTY FRONT END AND BARS WITH A ‘70S HONDA FRONT BRAKE, 18” RIMS AND WHAT I THINK ARE SERVI-CAR TANKS. I NEEDED TO MAKE UP NEW CABLES, CLEAN OUT THE TANKS AND LINKERT CARB, AND GET EVERYTHING TO WORK”

Claes’ 1954 Panhead was imported into Sweden from the United States, already chopped, in the seventies. Over the next three decades or so, it was evidently well used – as Swedish choppers tend to be – because by the time Claes got his hands on it about five years ago, it was… well, a mess.

“It was a long Swedish chopper with a car tyre, a blown engine and a frame full of holes”, recalls Claes. In other words, an absolutely ideal buy for a man with the vision and mechanical ability to turn wrecks into righteous rides. “The bike hadn’t run for many years” says Claes, “so first job was to rebuild the engine using the STD cases and unused STD heads that had come with the bike from the previ-ous owner. It now has a 4.5 inch stroke and 3.5 inch bore, which gives it a 87 cubic inch capaci-ty…”.

SWEDISH RESURRECTIONClaes Lindblom’s 1954 Panhead

You can’t fail to have noticed that su-per cool dual Dell’Orto carb set-up; they are 28mm SS1s that Claes says “were found in a box at a dump. They were easy to tune for the bike… sur-prisingly easy. I figured that the two together were close enough to using one 40mm carb. I made the intake and just liked the look of the set-up… it’s something different.” It cer-tainly is – these carbs have a racing pedigree, and are said to have been used originally on MV Agustas.

Claes is a long-time biker who rode for a decade with famous Swedish club Freja Freaks MC, and he learned his mechanical and fabrication skills “by just doing it. I’ve been riding since I was eighteen and years ago worked in a sewing machine facto-ry where 10 out of the 12 workers had bikes; we’d use the machinery at night to make parts for our bikes.” He now rides with “a garage club” called Lyftdon MC in his hometown of Varberg (Sweden’s “surf city”), whose members help each other out with shared tools and knowledge.

With the engine completed, Claes turned his attention to the chassis. “It had a bad stretch and was a mess, so I replaced the front half of the frame with a two inch stretch; it now has a 38 degree rake. I narrowed some Hydra Glide trees by two inches and added a 12 inch-over fork. The front wheel is 21x3 inches and the front brake is a Hydra Glide with an early Sportster rear brake cover.”

It’s this attention to detail and pro-portion that really makes Claes’ Pan-head stand out from the chopper crowd, as it did at the Castle Run in Denmark where we shot these pho-tos. The handmade parts all over the bike really catch the eye, too, getting onlookers guessing and scratching heads. He made the bars, the pipes – which are topped with Superior rocket mufflers – the sissy bar, brake lever and chain guard. That organ-ic looking seat mount is also Claes’ handiwork, inspired by – did you guess? – Crocker motorcycles.

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A smattering of vintage chopper goodies completed the roller; Wassell fuel tank, side-mount Bates headlight and Bates seats look bang-on. The clutch pedal is from a Harley Ser-vi-Car, the rear light from a Swed-ish-made Monark Albin and a BSA fender hugs the eighteen-inch rear wheel. And of course, that glorious tangerine-candy-bronze-and-gold-flake paint job is superb; it was laid down by Pobben Berglund in Hag-

fors, in return for “my help with his nitro Super Twin drag bike”, smiles Claes. The subtle pinstriping was ap-plied by a talented girl called Ankan.

The effect on onlookers as Claes rode his bike into the show was magnet-ic; people started to wander towards it hypnotically, craning their necks to get a better look. It’s won awards, and no wonder:

THE EFFECT ON ONLOOKERS AS CLAES RODE HIS BIKE INTO THE SHOW WAS MAGNETIC; PEOPLE STARTED TO WANDER TOWARDS IT HYPNOTICALLY, CRANING THEIR NECKS TO GET A BETTER LOOK. IT’S WON AWARDS, AND NO WONDER:

IT’S ALL TRUE.

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I think my story is very similar to many. When I was a child I was with my parents when a roaring Harley passed the car and that was it. I thought it was the coolest thing I’d ever seen or heard and knew from that point I’d someday ride, one way or another. It was early 1990. Back then a Harley was rare sight in Finland. Nowa-days they are everywhere.

A few years after I’d graduated from machinist school I wanted a project; with very little money this seemed the way to get started. it was 2006 and I was 22 years old. Almost right away I found a project for sale in a local bike shop. It was a 1942 Har-ley WLA in boxes and pieces. I knew right away this was the one! The price was right and the engine was rebuilt; there were also a frame, springer, tanks and the original speedo and dash along with some little parts. The transmission, wheels and other bits were shot beyond repair.

FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVEJuha Ahokas’ ’55 WLA

When I got back home I felt unreal. I’d got a Harley! I just sat there for hours looking at the flathead engine thinking how beautiful it was. When I was a teenager I’d heard that in 1990 a lot of WLAs were imported from Russia to Finland; just some of the many left there after WWII. And now I’d got my hands on one of them. The engine is stock 45” with a Linkert M88. The frame was pretty good but needed some paint. I paint cars and sometimes bikes for a liv-ing in my father’s shop. But I want-ed the paint to look raw so I used flat black rattle can. The only things I painted with a spray gun (and some old leftover black paint) were the tanks and fenders.

The tanks needed major work before the paint. As the original transmis-sion was beyond repair I decided to use a British one and found a BSA A10 4-speed online. Then started the hardest part of the project, fitting the gearbox to the frame. I didn’t want to chop the frame so ended up making

adapters, which I couldn’t have done without my father’s help. He has re-paired cars and all kinds of machines for a living for over 40 years so he has ‘the eye’ to see if something me-chanical works or not.

We made ‘blueprints’ together and then a local metal worker cut out the raw pieces. I made them fit the gearbox and frame with grinders and files. We also have a lathe and drills in our workshop, which were put to good use during the job. After a lot of lining up and ‘bit welding’ the adapt-ers work fine and are super strong.

Once the clutch was in place came another problem. The rear chain was hitting the frame. It was solved with a chain tensioner from monstercrafts-man that I welded to the frame. The primary chain guard is from my fa-ther’s Royal Enfield parts stash and fitted perfectly after some modifying. Then came the springer. It was rough. I disassembled the whole thing and

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painted it flat black and added the big twin rocker arms and drum brake. The handlebars are original but I wanted the “Hollywood bar” look, so took a three metre long piece of one inch diameter steel tubing, then bent it against an old wagon wheel that had right radius. After that I cut out the middle section and welded it to the handlebars.

Brakes, wheels and hubs are all new. Wheels are 16” black rims with star hubs. I think they are the most beau-tiful wheels in the world! There was lots of work in the rear section be-cause the rear chain and brake are now, because of the BSA gearbox, on the opposite side of the bike to normal. Electrics are the usual stuff. 12 volt system with Hunt magneto and cycle

electric generator and regulator, all easy to do with the help of a diagram I found in Kevin Baas’ book. I made the fenders, sissy bar, gear stick, pipes, oil lines and foot controls. Front light is Cycle Ray and taillight is a Blings Cycles duolamp. Floorboards are original WLA with deluxe cast-ing boards. There are a few vintage aftermarket items, like Bates seat and p-pad, Anderson passenger pegs and CMS kicker pedal. I love original pe-riod parts so I used a few. The wheel covers are from Baas Metal Craft and I fitted an oil filter system under the seat. I also found a 1950 Dodge truck hood emblem that I fitted to the springer. I get parts from friends, online, shops, junk stashes. Almost ev-erywhere.

After five years of blood, sweat and beer I got the 45 on the road. My

biggest thanks goes to Flying Chop-pers, Vesku and VT-cycle. And my father for his teaching, patience, me-chanical and general wisdom! I love this bike and have no future plans for it, just ride it as much as I can and maybe hop it up a little as I go. Although one project is looming: to help my father restore his 1952 Royal Enfield G model, which is what he rode in the sixties. A big contrast to an ex-Russian flathead, but I’m look-ing forward to it.

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THE ENGINE IS STOCK 45” WITH A LINKERT M88. THE FRAME WAS PRETTY GOOD BUT NEEDED SOME PAINT. I PAINT CARS AND SOMETIMES BIKES FOR A LIVING IN MY FATHER’S SHOP. BUT I WANTED THE PAINT TO LOOK RAW SO I USED FLAT BLACK RATTLE CAN.

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THE RIDE BACK FROM DEBT HELLTakeshi’s 1949 Panhead

This isn’t the first rare old motorcy-cle Takeshi has owned; in fact, he’s owned a few over the past sixteen years. And the person who is perhaps most repsonsible for sparking his pas-sion in old v-twins is one of Japan’s most famous bike builders: Shinya Kimura.

You see, back in the late nineties, Takeshi was quite content commut-ing to work on his home-customised Japanese motorcycle… until one of his co-workers rode up one day on an old Harley. It was a flathead.

“Even now, I can recall the shock of seeing my first Harley chop-

per”, smiles Takeshi. “The violent mechancial noise, the blast from the straight pipes, the smell of gasoline and burning oil… it was overwhelming. I loved it!”

Instantly smitten, Takeshi soon struck up a close friendship with the bike’s owner and discovered the bike had been built for him by Shinya at ZERO Engineering. In fact, it was the very bike that ended up on the front of the famous ZERO book.

Mentored by his new friend at work, Takeshi was introduced to Shinya and before long had sourced a ’48 Pan-head for Shinya to apply his magic to.

The result was a chopper that Takeshi rode every day and took on long road trips around Japan on his own; he bonded strongly with the bike and it immersed him totally into the old Harley scene in Tokyo.

So when he was forced to sell the bike five years later, he was heartbro-ken and shed tears as the new owner took it away. Takeshi had borrowed money to buy an American car, had hit hard times and had to sell his ve-hicles to settle his debts. But as he doggedly paid them off, he vowed he would get another old motorcycle.

It took a couple of years, but eventu-ally the debt was cleared and things

started looking up. Takeshi had cre-ated Warlock, his interior decoration and construction business, and it was doing well; so he started looking at first for a UL, but then came across an Indian Chief basket case. This was the one, he thought, with visions of a nice Indian custom in his mind’s eye.

But as he discovered, Indian Chief parts are hard to come by… which in Japan means nearly impossible to come by. Work on the build was painfully slow and it took a few more years before it was on the road; Takeshi loves the bike, but the frus-tration of long waits for parts when-ever they (inevitably) were needed left him yearning for another old

bike to fill the gap.

And this is it: his ’49 Panhead, which he found at Gak’s Hawg Holic shop in Tokyo. Long discussions ensued about what Takeshi wanted and Gak, as ever, created a bike that looks like it was laid up by some custom kid in the fifties, then recently recommis-ioned to the streets of Tokyo. Every-thing you see on this 74” Panhead is genuine 1949 Harley-Davidson, except for the aftermarket Stelling and Hellings handlebars, the period bazooka muffler, the p-pad (of un-known provenance) and the tail light, which is an English Sparto. The tyres are 16” Goodyear Grasshoppers.

And now this perfect ’49 Pan bob-ber has become Takeshi’s everyday transport and weekend getaway bike with his local bobber club ‘The Fly-ing Jaws’. And he says “I love old motorcycles. They have brought me so many good experiences, good en-counters… it’s a great life with an old bike.” Then, with a smile, “Even when they drag you into you debt hell…!”.

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INSTANTLY SMITTEN, TAKESHI SOON STRUCK UP A CLOSE FRIENDSHIP WITH THE BIKE’S OWNER AND DISCOVERED THE BIKE HAD BEEN BUILT FOR HIM BY SHINYA AT ZERO ENGINEERING. IN FACT, IT WAS THE VERY BIKE THAT ENDED UP ON THE FRONT OF THE FAMOUS ZERO BOOK.

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LESS IS LESSJoonas Pirilä’s 1949 Panhead

Joonas Prilla lives in Oulu, Finland, on the Baltic coast. It’s amazing how many spot-on traditional choppers and bobbers emerge from this area of Scandinavia, and Joonas offers the same explanation as many others:

“Living near the arctic circle, it’s good to have something to do to keep our minds healthy when it’s dark and cold outside for so long in winter.”

“There are lots of us building bikes up here”, he continues, “and we all

help each other; some guy has a press, another a lathe, someone else has a special transmission tool, another can TIG weld… you know how it is.” And that’s how this nicely mini-malistic ’49 Panhead came to be: put together over a few winters with the help of friends.

Joonas found the bike in 2008, sold cheaply as a non-runner. As soon as he got it home, a $4 set of intake manifold O-rings got the Pan idling nicely. Job done? Not nearly.

“It was an ugly bright yellow

with aftermarket five gallon tanks and a front disc brake”, explains Joonas. “I wanted it to look more like a real forties or fifites bobber so I began searching for parts; it took two years to find everything I needed, then another 18 months to get the bike on the road.”

Joonas is only a young guy and took his cues for the bike’s styling from old photos on various blogs and websites (the Jockey Journal especially) and from builders such as Garage Compa-ny and Matt Olsen. “I like bikes like

Photos by Markus Tanskala

Mark Austin’s Knucklehead bob-job (GKM issue two) because they are simple, serviceable, nothing too fancy and anyone with basic tools and parts can get that look” he reasons.

Joonas lists the work he’s done to the bike. “Engine was bored and new cast pistons were installed, along with a mild Andrews cam. I got the Morris MM74E magneto from Magneto-zoo. Tail light is an old Sparto that I got from ZZchop.com. Headlight is Unity and I believe it’s from a 1940s truck. The Flanders-style handlebars are Swedish-made, as are the four

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inch Flanders-style risers. They got new bushings made from industrial quality hard plastic since the stock soft rubbers were not my style.”

“Front end is a stock length inline springer”, he continues. “A Firestone Deluxe Champion 16” tyre is on the back and a Coker Diamond Thread 18” up front. I found some original 3.5 gallon tanks and added a Police Special speedometer (maybe sixties, I’m not sure?). Carb is a stock Linkert M-74B and the hydraulic lifters are from JIMS. Transmission got new gears from the previous owner and I got that side cover for “free” in a box of used parts. Oil pump is S&S because it was already installed. I have an OEM cast pump waiting if that

S&S breaks.”A couple of correct period touch-es, of course, are the Chicago kicker pedal and the Superior pipes. Joonas also adopted the old trick of using old Pan valve springs as extra support for his pogo seat. For the electrics, he didn’t risk the old stuff; “I made the electrics with cotton braided wire and an asphalt coated loom. I up-graded to a 12 volt Electric Frank’s regulator and Cycle electric genera-tor. The clutch is a Rivera Pro with a Primo 1.5” belt drive inside the stock ‘closed’ primary.”

The paint job is utilitarian, but fits Joonas’s simple-and-impactful vi-sion for the bike; we think the grey and black set off the rest of the bike

beautifully. “I painted the tanks and a fender matt grey in the garage” he shrugs. ”It’s not nearly perfect but I like to think the guys in the fifties might have done it like I did.”And overall, this bike looks exact-ly like the sort of machine a young Californian gearhead might have put together in his garage: functional, stripped back and cool. Joonas says “Wasn’t it Cole Foster who said ‘Less is less’? That was kind of the theme for this bike…”.

JOONAS IS ONLY A YOUNG GUY AND TOOK HIS CUES FOR THE BIKE’S STYLING FROM OLD PHOTOS ON VARIOUS BLOGS AND WEBSITES (THE JOCKEY JOURNAL ESPECIALLY) AND FROM BUILDERS SUCH AS GARAGE COMPANY AND MATT OLSEN.

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Such is the long tradition of chop-per building in Sweden that many of the bikes we hear about and feature are not brought in from the States or elsewhere, but sourced locally. Roger Lundbäck’s super-cool long chopper is one of these.

This 1957 Triumph T110 had previ-ously been rebuilt and owned by a guy called Kenneth “Lee” Tjarnlund and had been in Sweden for as long as anyone could remember.

“Although it had stood idle for seven years it remained in good running order when I breathed new life into it in the autumn of 2010”, says Roger. “I felt that the new look for the bike should be based on late ‘60s, early ‘70s style, comfortable to ride with that relaxed riding position!”.

The bike’s look stems from a chance find: those outrageous D&D twisted springer forks. Once Roger had them

LET’S TWIST AGAINRoger Lundbäck’s ’57 Triumph T110

safely stashed in his garage, he decid-ed doing the twist on other parts of the bike. The sissy bar and bracing strut beneath the headstock both felt the heat of Roger’s torch: “Heat until it glows, twist and turn, keep heat-ing and then twist and turn again. It sounds simple enough but requires absolute precision plus large volumes of gas to make it neat”, explains Rog-er. The results are more than neat: they perfectly complement the righ-teous vintage springer to a tee.

You may have noticed those twist-ed spokes on the 18” front wheel too. Keeping with the theme – and maintaining a Swedish custom – Roger wanted twisted spokes but found them harder to find than he’d anticipated. Finally, Calle at Calle’s Chopperparts in Moheda, Sweden, managed to dig some up from some-where. Another local shop who came up trumps with parts was vintage spe-cialist Ram & Mekaniska, who found Roger that funky ‘Peace’ tail light. In its original seventies packaging, too!As the engine was running well,

Roger merely replaced the Amals with Mikunis, handmade those love-ly wrapover shotgun exhausts with turnouts, did some sprucing up and added fresh oil.

He also hand-rolled the aluminium fender that sits so snugly over the 16 inch rear tyre and made the seat pan, which was then upholstered by his friend Goran Lundmark. Anoth-er friend, Patrik Widman, laid down that perfectly judged burnt orange paintwork. Roger then added the sil-ver-leaf pinstriping himself. Talented fella, eh?

The bike was finished in June 2011, and started on the second kick. Rog-er was planning a long trip on the bike later that week – what faith! – and as a shakedown run decided to “head for the city, about 25 miles away. I thought, if it breaks down, I’ll just leave the bike where it is and for-get the rest of the journey”, he smiles.

After a shaky first turn wrestling with

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those long forks, the shakedown went well and just a couple of days later Roger set off on a 1250 mile run to the Aland Islands in the middle of the Baltic sea. The bike ran “like a dream” and with the exception of some brake adjustments needed after a couple of hundred miles, gave him no problems.

Yes, it’s true what you hear about Swedish bikers; they really do ride their choppers. “With a little effort and the right attitude you can go a long, long way without tiring”, smiles Roger. Well, he did say this rigid, twisted Triumph was comfortable, didn’t he? And who are we to disbe-lieve him?

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THIS 1957 TRIUMPH T110 HAD PREVIOUSLY BEEN REBUILT AND OWNED BY A GUY CALLED KENNETH “LEE” TJARNLUND AND HAD BEEN IN SWEDEN FOR AS LONG AS ANYONE COULD REMEMBER.

For those of you reading this who aren’t fortunate enough to ride a motorcycle powered by one of Mil-waukee’s finest vintage engines, take heart from Tony Werme. His bike is proof that with a limited budget, lots of talent and a little patience, you can ride something more righteous than you might have expected.

Tony hails from Torsby in Sweden and after buying a Harley WL flat-head in 1992, it didn’t take long for him to find himself hooked on old v-twins. His first ground up build – a two year project – was in 1996: another flathead, but this time a big

twin ULH. So by the time Tony de-cided to build himself a Panhead, he was well versed in the black arts of making disparate Harley parts work together.

As you can see, Tony’s influences are from the formative days of chop-per building, the early sixties, when skinny and minimal were the watch-words for every backstreet tinkerer. “I got a lot of inspiration from Randy Smith and Ed Roth. Roth’s Chop-per magazines… for me, when they talk about bikes that is the old school style I think of. I just love them”, he explains.So, with an image in mind of what he

wanted to achieve, the search started for parts. Tony was on a strict budget, so he wasn’t worried too much about originality in his search: just the right components at the right prices. First thing he found was a cheap Paugh-co rigid frame with stock propor-tions. Scouring “swapmeets, eBay and the stashes of other builders like Mats Hedenstrand in Sweden”, Tony slowly added a desirable Harley RL springer, Hummer tank and 18” and 21” wheels to his project parts pile.

The engine really was put together like the Cadillac in Johnny Cash’s song; Tony “started out with an emp-ty engine case and sat on Ebay and

DAY BY DAY, PIECE BY PIECETony Werme’s ’55 Panhead

searched out each part until the mo-tor was complete”. The cases are a ’52 right side matched to an aftermarket ’55 left side; obviously mis-matched or aftermarket cases are another good way into building choppers on a bud-get.

Tony also collected a Sifton Avenger cam, 1948 heads, OEM chrome cyl-inders, .40-over high comp pistons (10:1) and a Joe Hunt magneto. He then found a chromed Linkert M35 carb and late ‘50s CCE ribbed rock-er covers. Cam cover is a chromed Knucklehead item.

The gearbox is an early Harley three-speed “with reverse, so I can go back-

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wards if I want to. Maybe a good trick”, he deadpans. Of course, listing the components like this makes the whole process sound quick and easy. It wasn’t. It took Tony five long years to get this Pan on the road; method-ically saving for, then sourcing, each individual part.

Once he had a roller, the fun fin-ishing could begin. “I painted the bike myself ”, says Tony. “The tank is painted with candy purple; I saw a

similar tank on a David Mann poster and I tried to copy the pattern. On the sides of the tank it’s flake.” With the addition of those so-right upswept pipes topped off by cock-tail shakers, the finished article is a fine homage to the creative builders and period Tony looks back to – and it’s ridden. In fact, he’s just sent us a video of him riding it in the snow. Swedish chopper builders, you gotta love ‘em.

TONY ALSO COLLECTED A SIFTON AVENGER CAM, 1948 HEADS, OEM CHROME CYLINDERS, .40-OVER HIGH COMP PISTONS (10:1) AND A JOE HUNT MAGNETO. HE THEN FOUND A CHROMED LINKERT M35 CARB AND LATE ‘50S CCE RIBBED ROCKER COVERS. CAM COVER IS A CHROMED KNUCKLEHEAD ITEM.

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RETURN TO ZEROCustoms from Jamesville’s ’88 Sportster

We’ve featured one of James Rop-er-Caldbeck’s bikes before and this Evo Sportster is in some ways typical of what comes out of his ‘Customs from Jamesville’ shop in Copenhagen: perfect lines, minimalist, tasteful. But in a couple of ways, it is a complete departure.

Firstly, as you can see, the bike utilises a (relatively) modern Harley lump, al-though even this one is now 25 years old. James, you see, is known for us-ing vintage Harley powerplants in his builds. Secondly, this is the first ‘Zero’ style bike James has built.

“I’d always loved Shinya Kimura’s bikes since my wife bought me the ‘Zero Engineering’ book”, he ex-plains. “But had never considered building that style of bike until I got an email from a Swedish tattooist last summer called Tony, who wanted me to build him a bike.” Tony wasn’t con-

fident in his request because he knew how much James was associated with older Harleys; but he hadn’t counted on James’s love for gooseneck frames and minimalist engineering, so even though Tony specified that he wanted an Evo, James was in.

Tony had spent years working in Ja-pan so had seen first-hand how beau-tifully made Shinya’s bikes were; this was going to be a challenging proj-ect. “I had never seen anyone outside Japan successfully build a Zero-style bike that looked right”, says James. “So I started to look carefully at photos and work out, in my opinion, where these builds had gone wrong.”

His conclusion was that it was all in the gooseneck frame: no one was manufacturing a frame that looked right, with a curve in the spine. James started researching who might be able to build him one; and because there

was no donor bike for this build, he also needed to source an Evo engine.

That task, at least, was easy. He looked through a local Copenhagen classi-fieds paper and immediately found a 1988 Sportster engine for sale, com-pletely rebuilt with a 1200 conver-sion. “I went round, the guy turned it over, it sounded fine so I paid him”, smiles James. “It was dirt cheap!” Next, he got a good deal on a repro stock length springer at a local bike shop. Things were coming together.

Then someone put him onto Joe at Fenland Choppers in England, who had a reputation for excellent work. Joe was already producing a goose-neck frame and after a bit of discus-sion agreed to modify it slightly to James’s specifications. When it ar-rived, James was more than happy. “It was really nice. And everything fitted perfectly.”

In the meantime James had found some “sexy” 18” Morad aluminium wheels which he shod with Fires-tone rubber and with all the major components in his workshop he was now poised to start fabrication work. He massaged a Danish SCO moped tank until it sat just right and cut up and reshaped an old Sporty oil tank to fit the gap in front of the seat post. He made the bars out of some old Panhead handles and bends, and made the battery box, exhaust, and foot controls, as well as that lovely rear light mount.

He had to “re-invent” the braking system (Ironhead Sportster drum rear, repro drum up front) because despite the 1988 engine, he felt disc brakes would ruin the bike’s aesthet-ic. Making brackets and mounts for this kind of thing, as any builder will tell you, often takes up the most time and head-scratching.

The engine bolted right into the frame and after mounting a stock CV carb with an ‘aged’ but modern scoop and “plugging in three wires, it was running” says James, looking slightly amazed at how user-friendly these engines are. In fact, for some-one known for building Panheads, Flatheads and Knuckles, James ad-mits he “did start to fall for the engine. It’s actually a lovely design. There is something nice and simple about it. And they are fast, smooth and cost nothing…”. Ahh, the zeal of the fresh convert!

Final job was the paint, which James again handled himself. Tony had re-quested a black and yellow paintjob (after one of his favourite Zero bikes) but when James had completed the job, he hated it. “It looked like all the

tank needed was some shark’s teeth; the black made the tank look like a blob. It drew the eye too much.” As it was late, James returned home and spent a sleepless night trying to work out an alternative. While the cat was away, however, the mice were playing.

“It turned out that two of my friends had come into the work-shop that night after I’d gone and were admiring the freshly painted fender and tank. They dropped the fender and dinged it, ruining the paintwork. They then spent the rest of the night repairing the damage and re-spraying the fend-er.” When James came in the next morning, he merrily started strip-ping off the fresh paint “and my friend Peter’s face just fell. It was then he admitted what had hap-pened!”.

In the end, James plumped for that satin silver and gold finish and it suits the understated nature of the bike well. The build had only taken eight weeks as James had a deadline: the Scandinavian bike show, a big deal in northern Europe. He made it just in time, despite the paint hiccup, and the Sporty was very well received.

Is he happy with it? Is it the successful take on the Zero theme he’d hoped for? James mumbles something about a couple of things he’d change (tiny details we’d never notice), then stops himself. “Yes, I am really pleased with how it came out.” And for this per-fectionist Brit living in Denmark, that’s quite an admission.

Customsfromjamesville.blogspot.com

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THE POT AT THE END OF THE RAINBOWPaul Whitehurst’s ’38 Knucklehead

First things first, this bike does not – and never did – belong to Paul Whitehurst. Although it could have done – and in fact, nearly did! He was, as he says, merely its ‘custodian’ for a short but wonderful couple of weeks. And if you read GKM regu-larly, you will know that Paul is no stranger to Harley-Davidson exotica, so it was no surprise that he had a hand in getting this amazing, original paint ’38 back on the road.

So what’s the story?

“Well, I have this friend called Landy”, says Paul. “One day, he goes into the local Harley dealer-ship to get a battery and one of the guys behind the counter calls out ‘hey Landy, you’re into old bikes, right? There’s an old guy who’s asked us to see if we can find someone who might be interested in his Harley. I think it’s from the 1930s.”

Is the hair rising on your neck? Then you’ll know how Landy felt. But you’ll also know that more of-ten than not these Chinese whispers lead to disappointment, not glory, so Landy kept his cool and asked for the old boy’s details. As soon as was able, he went to the address he was given and yes, there was indeed a motorcy-cle for sale, would he like to look at it? And then he was shown the bike you see here.

It’s a 1938 Harley-Davidson EL Knucklehead, 61 cubic inch capacity, one of the collectable and rare early ‘deco’ styled Knuckleheads. As Landy looked around the bike, he realised every nut, bolt and piece of trim was original. The paint is original. The tyres are original. There are even the original dealer decals on the oil tank and front fender.

As Paul says, “he couldn’t do the deal fast enough.” The bike had been in the same family from new, bought by the current owner’s uncle who then passed it to his father, then down the

line it went. The owner’s father had encountered a problem back in the day and hadn’t been able to fix it; the bike had sat in the garage ever since.

First job for Landy was to rebuild the engine: the first time the heads had been off. The next task was to find a buyer; the purchase had left him needing to pass the bike along fair-ly swiftly. This is where Paul came in; with his international contacts and knowledge (as you may remember, he is a long time rebuilder and re-storer of these models), he was best placed to find a buyer.

Which is how Paul came to ride the bike for “two glorious weeks.” Of course, as Landy’s pal, Paul was first in line to make a bid on this extraordi-narily rare find. “We were in the mid-dle of re-modelling the house and expanding the barn where I work and keep the bikes, so it wasn’t the best time,” says Paul. “My wife was a good sport; she said ‘keep it if you really want it’, but in the end I just couldn’t.”

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Paul had a few people in mind for the bike, but in the meantime he rode it. “It was a really nice running bike, even on those original tyres!” he laughs, “but I could feel the foam in the old seat breaking down as I rode along, with the dust flying out behind! These ’36 to ’40 Knuck-les really are majestic machines. The styling makes them unique… the airflow rear light, silver face speedo, ‘skull’ dash… and this bike had all the ’38-only bits on it like the two-rivet baffle on the kicker cover.” The only non-H-D accessories on the bike are the “saucer-sized gas caps, which I’ve never seen before.”

Paul was to get another pleasant surprise when the now ex-owner, having done the transfer, turned up “with original dealer papers, receipts, worksheets and even old plates from the bike: a ’38, ’47 and one from the fifties!”

How rare is this find? Well, Paul is in the business of sourcing and restoring these machines so he knows. He says, “I wish I could have kept it. I know I will never see an early one as nice again.” And, as you can imagine, the potential buyers he spoke to were all, shall we say, keen: in the end, it was the one with the deepest pockets who secured the ’38.

“It went to a good home”, says Paul. “It will get ridden.” And how does he feel having had to pass on the chance to own this gem? “I made it up to myself ” he laughs. “I found an orig-inal paint ’47 a few weeks later that I kept…”

IT’S A 1938 HARLEY-DAVIDSON EL KNUCKLEHEAD, 61 CUBIC INCH CAPACI-TY, ONE OF THE COL-LECTABLE AND RARE EARLY ‘DECO’ STYLED KNUCKLEHEADS. AS LANDY LOOKED AROUND THE BIKE, HE REALISED EVERY NUT, BOLT AND PIECE OF TRIM WAS ORIGINAL.

Brett Gear, who built this Sportster, lives in a small town called Mur-willumbah on the far northeastern border of New South Wales in Aus-tralia. Queensland is less than ten miles away. He lives near some of the most beautiful beaches in the world and the temperature is balmy all year round. It’s the perfect environment in which to ride and to build.

“I’ve been running my business Soli-tary Motorcycles for around ten years now and business is good; I have two pre-unit Triumph projects on the go, an Ironhead and a Pan and a Shovel in the pipeline”, says Brett. His style of bikes, simple and uncluttered with nice lines, are finally making an im-pact on an Australian custom biking scene that has too long been stuck on the big-tyred and fussy.

This 1976 Ironhead Sportster was commissioned by owner Matt (who’s riding it in the photos) and supplied to Brett as a running donor bike with

GOLDEN BROWN, TEXTURE LIKE SUNSolitary Motorcycles’ ’76 Sportster

an aftermarket hardtail rear section, fender and tank in boxes. “It was pretty ugly”, smiles Brett “and had been done up like a big twin. But it came with the 35mm narrowglide front end which I was able to keep for the project.”

In the end, the frame required some serious massaging to sit right and in the end only the front loop was re-tained. 21 inch front wheel (wearing Avon rubber) and a 19 rear (Fires-tone) skinnied the roller up nicely. Brett then turned his attention to the 997cc engine, but in the end all it needed was fresh gaskets and one new pushrod.

Next stage was fabrication. Those neat little drag bars were made by Brett, along with the oil tank, sissy bar, shifter set-up, controls, all the bracketry and the seat pan, which was covered by Cam at North Coast Custom Trim.

The minimalist and super-neat shift-er system deserves a closer look: Brett says it was the trickiest thing to get right during the build, with many re-adjustments and re-fettling required to get the shifter to work with the foot clutch. The foot clutch works with a modified stock clutch cable and the jockey shifter pivots through the brake crossover.

Brett discovered Harleys about 15 years ago after years riding dirt bikes and Japanese road bikes; he bought an early Softail – an ’85 – and has never looked back. “I’ve always tinkered on my own stuff and started with cars”, he says. “I was into early Australian stuff… Holdens, Fords… and went from tinkering to doing panel work, then restorations, slowly building a reputation. I always had bikes on the side and fixed my friends’ stuff… and slowly the bikes have taken over from the cars.”

He is self-taught and handles every-thing in-house from fabrication to

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frame-building and mechanical re-pairs. “I have a lathe, mill… I can do pretty much everything on my own,” confirms Brett. He’s not joking; he even handled the golden brown paintjob on this Sportster.

“It’s a chocolate brown metallic ba-secoat with heavy flake and brown candy, gold lettering and cream pin-stripe. I like pinstripe borders, I think it looks a little more sophisticated.” We agree – and more importantly, so does Matt, the bike’s owner. Blatting around in the sunshine on a well-turned-out, righteous Sporty chop-per… it doesn’t get any better.

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IN THE END, THE FRAME REQUIRED SOME SERIOUS MASSAGING TO SIT RIGHT AND IN THE END ONLY THE FRONT LOOP WAS RETAINED. 21 INCH FRONT WHEEL (WEARING AVON RUBBER) AND A 19 REAR (FIRESTONE) SKINNIED THE ROLLER UP NICELY.

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