Roadies

When we road to California by way of Denver and Mitch Romero put us up. Number 1 host, perfect weather, perfect food. Worst swamp ass I have ever had.

Mr. Burgess "The YouTube Star"

YouTube is kind of evil but amazing at the same time. I have wasted thousands of hours of my life getting lost watching semi truck runaway ramp videos and road rage compilations, but then I have also learned a lot from it and managed to uncover some cool history. With people posting their old home movies on there for random people to watch, you are bound to run into some old motorcycle gold. Eddie was 17 when he built the Panhead in the video below. I came across the video and fell in love with the footage. It's pure, and kind of sad because you watch it with the old tune playing and can kind of feel like Eddie, missing how simple shit was and how everything can quickly change around you as you get older. It's almost as if he posted his personal home video to say "Hey! I was doing this stuff too guys, just didn't have an audience at my fingertips to show it off". Anyhow, I am not old enough yet to preach about the good ole days, but I can see clearly how much it probably ruled living in 70's as a teenager. Hell, I miss the 90's. So with the video, came my curiosity of what became of the guy in the video with his girlfriends tooting around the yard on his panhead chopper? What happened to the bike?? Well, with the power of the internet, it was not hard to track down Eddie. I reached out to him like you would to someone you found on youtube and asked. As you guessed, yea, he regretfully sold the bike(s) years ago. Built it inside his house, and had a crew like most of us do today. The shop they hung around was called Mikes Choppers and unfortunately does not exist today. I really just wanted to pick his brain and see if he had any old pics of his bike and what not, and he did. He sent me some awesome pics from local custom shows he attended and of his other bike, a nicely done up 45 chopper. Thanks Eddie.

Winter re - do

Fender mounting, and sissy bar construction were all really left before I can fully take hold and finish my bike on my own. Duane and Moon came through in a big way to help me. This was probably the 6th sissy bar I have made with Duane and it always takes so long to do because he wants that fucker PLUMB, straight, and sturdy. They always turn out pretty damn nice. Crude and primitive bending methods.

Numerous placement double checks.

Make do with what you have. Even though I decided on a small radius, this was worth showing. The first pull around the base of this chair was perfect, just a little to high from fender to frame for me.

Figuring out how to mount it was a combo of an idea I had to taper the upper bend and weld it to the underside of the sissy bar and it turned out nice. The other was Robby suggesting from experience on how to mount to the frame. Drilled out the frame all the way through and sleeved it so a bolt runs nicely through and holds it down firm to the rest of the setup. I got measurements for Moon and he banged out some stainless bungs at his house for me, coped the bottom side to sit flush on the frame.

Duane handled it! Very happy with it. Going to metal finish a few areas we built up and have my buddy Mike help in the polishing department. Spring is approaching!

Snow Day

Birmingham always shuts it down when a few flurrys come down. Bring it on!

Things to do when the weather is nice

Swap Meet

Hang in the parking lot

Take a family photo

Hookup

Ride Motorcycles

More pics from Raymond Horne's archive

Rocco & Cheaters

Birmingham has no shortage of hot rod history either. Rocco & Cheaters started up in 1947 I believe, and operated until the recession in 08 and when the internet began driving down mom and pop shops with cheaper parts and the convenience of shipping. Motor work out of the small building at first, and as they grew, so did the jobs. Eventually they moved into the larger space in the photo below in the 1960's. I wont go into much detail about the shop history or who these two are as you can find some stuff on the web already, but hearing the stories from Brad, son in law of the last and current owner operator, we could have only dreamed to see that place scrambling on a Friday to close down shop and get to the track in the good ole days. Below are some pics of back when, and some when i rode over there the other day to met with Brad.

Present day store front. All fenced up and still full of all the old inventory : ))))

He had the original shop truck / parts hauler outside too. Currently on its way to live the rest of it's life out at the Talladega Super Speedway museum. He said they used to load that panel truck down with parts and haul down to Daytona for the old speed week's, along with all the other big race deals.

Brad was nice enough to dig up some of the last remaining slide decals from the shop. Also a nice old postcard. Super cool stuff right in our own neighborhood. Have a great weekend!

First of the year

Moon rules, he helped me address a crack in my rear motor mount that has been there since I can remember. A little heat revealed the other crack in the same side. He handled it though.

Then we equipped my motor with Morris Mag. First for me, pretty excited about it.

This rad lookin hooptie is for sale by the dojo. Wont be running any low ET's, probably hauled a few bodies in its day too.

About time to do this all over again.

Thanks again Moon!