I started riding motorcycles when I was 12. My first bike was a 69 Yamaha 100 that I bought from my neighbor, without my mom's permission. I kept it a secret until the 3rd day, when she came home early from work and caught me riding wheelies down the street. She promptly went out and bought me a helmet that same day. My mom was the coolest person! Since then, I've had many bikes and I customized each one, whether it was with paint, accessories or a full re-build.

My first Harley, a 77 Sportster, came when I was in the USMC back in 84. Several years later, I stepped up to a 93 Softail FXSTC and I kept that one for 12 years before I sold it to a friend. Now I ride a 07 Softail FXSTC for those long trips with Deborah, my wife.

I recently completed my first chopper build, which took 2 years to complete but only about 7 months of actual build time. This was NOT a kit bike! Each piece was hand picked or built from scratch or modified in some way.

When I first decided to build the chopper, I wanted to take my old 93 Softail and just convert it. After doing some research on all the parts I would need along with the wide tire kit, it turned out to be cheaper to do a ground up build. I wanted something that had 70's styling but with modern components.

I re-used my 93 EVO engine alright but I took off the heads and cylinders and had them stripped and show polished. Next it was a hotter cam and upgraded to a single fire dual coil ignition system. I installed some finned head covers to finish it off. The internal breather and Hypercharger required some modifications but worked out well. I retained the enclosed primary for simplicity but may replace it with a belt drive in the future. The frame I used required a 1 1/2" offset so I was trying to keep as much weight to the center of the bike as possible.

I ordered a DNA 250 Chopper frame with a 6" up and 4" stretch giving me 42 degrees in the neck. I had the shop I bought it from weld on some fender, tank and brake mounts. They were also suppose to build a seat pan too but what I ended up with was a bunch of crappy welds (looked like a sixth grader did them) so they all had to be removed and done again. I learned a really valuable lesson with that mistake, by not checking out the supplier and trusting him to take care of me. It cost me a pretty penny too doing things twice.

So after re-doing the welding with a local guy, we made up a seat pan, modified the gas tank tunnel, fenders and oil tank with some custom touches. I am especially proud of the rear sissy bar because we made it from scratch. I simply bent up some welding rods the way I wanted it to look and used them as a template to create the rest. Many hours went into smoothing out the welds for final chrome but I think it was worth every minute of it. We got the rear wheel properly aligned and the Sprotor bracket re-welded. I went with a chain final drive conversion for that 70's styling look. After that the mock up went with incident.

The front end is a 12" over Phantom 63mm inverted setup from American Suspension. It has an integrated front padlock brake and internal brake line. The trees have an additional six degrees which brings the total rake out to 48 degrees.

For the paint I wanted something really special and specific. I had the opportunity to bid on a custom paint job offered by Latisha Wood of Flames of Steel. She is the artist who did the engraved flames on the OCC Dave Mann tribute bike and a few of their other theme bikes. She was auctioning off her services on Club Chopper to help out a homeless woman get back on her feet. I had the winning bid at $3750 and talked her into doing the molding on my frame as well for a few extra dollars.

The paint came out spectacular as you can see for yourself. The Amazon Girl on the tank is an original design that Latisha hand painted, not airbrushed. It was based off of one of Julie Bell's paintings that I supplied. The Blue Dragon on the rear fender is another hand painted design reproduced with the artist's permission. Rico Holmes of Sweden created the original using digital imaging techniques.

The seat is something I am especially proud of because I tooled the design myself, working under the guidance of my best friend Rocky from PureKustom.com. He came over and showed me the proper techniques for using my leatherwork tools to create the design that I had in mind. I use to do leather craft when I was young but hadn't done anything in over 30 years so I was a little rusty.

During final assembly, I installed an internal throttle on the Carlini bars and added a Wire+ digital speedometer. This proved challenging in the placement due to the curvature of the bars and the dimple that interfered with the throttle assembly. All of the wiring was run through the frame for a cleaner appearance. I created some paper templates and sent them off to a friend who made the custom engraved points and axel covers. I was really surprised to see how much a little detail like that added to the overall project. The parts came out even better than I imagined they would.

I have a lot of people on ClubChopper.com and KlubKustoms.com to thank for my success! Without their help I would have never been able to do it! I made so many good friends on those sites, which is one reason why I volunteer my time to keep them running, working as a moderator. Come on over and check us out! I have the entire build process documented for anyone to see.

Thanks guys!

TOP