I needed an oil tank for this build that would be rather unique. It had to hold a full size battery from a late model electric start Dyna or Softail as my large high compression stroker motor would need all the starting power it could get. It had to completely hide the battery because I didn’t want any of it to protrude above the frame rails and it had to hold lots of oil.
My preference was round oil tanks so I started looking for cylinder like containers to see what size might fit.
After testing a variety of ice cream containers and my wife’s Tupperware I found a one gallon paint can to be perfect. (once I cut the bottom out ...

 My 3-speed transmission started out very similar to my engine, an empty case and a pile of parts, all in need of cleaning.  So the first step was to break everything down into individual pieces and perform a thorough inspection of each piece, to see which parts just needed cleaning and which parts needed repairs or replacement.  Luckily most of the parts were in good shape, even the transmission studs, so everything was put into the blasting cabinet.  It’s always important to note that you don’t want to blast bearing surfaces and fine threads, so these areas need to be covered before the part goes into the blast cabinet.  After a couple of hours of blasting, the results speak for themselves.  Next ...

  “A man’s got to know his limitations”-Dirty Harry Out in the country roads of Moriah, NC., people pick their own tobacco, run their own stills and gut their own deer. At Widowmaker Custom Design and Repair, Hank Thibodeau brings that same self-reliant determination to the design and fabrication of custom motorcycles. Hank has been out here creating, chopping, grinding and giving inspiration to anybody with two wheels and a dream for more than ten years. The two car garage workshop he shares with Patrick Murphy and his father-in-law Jimmy Glenn, has produced more original works of engineered art than most million dollar bike shops. The Widowmaker crew is ready to do everything from rebuilding the top end of your old ...

This bike represents an upbeat era when choppers were kings and the Discovery Channel made it so. We are going to attempt to tell the story of the bike, the shows, and the esteemed owner, Hugh “The Chopper” King, the producer/director. Hugh actually worked for Easyriders, as the video editor/director, while I watched over the magazines. But he moved on to Original Productions. Motorcycle Mania was the first motorcycle show and I got a call. “Who should I recommend?” Dave Nichols asked. I said Jesse James, and the rest is history. “Tom Beers, the boss of Original Productions, came to me,” Hugh said. “He asked me if I knew anything about motorcycles, and I said I knew everything about motorcycles, ...

It took a while before the call shook the receiver on the wall.  “We’re ready, finally to move onto the next stage,” Eric said, and I slipped across congested Long Beach on Pacific Coast Highway to the base of Signal Hill, where the clean offices of Bennett’s Performance and Branch O’Keefe reside in an alley.  There’s a bit of a dichotomy here. When you say Pacific Coast Highway, you immediately have visions of the sea splashing against white sand. That’s not the case when PCH skirts through the Los Angeles Harbor area behind container ships, container trucks, and container trains Terminal Island and through the concrete jungle of Long Beach packed with steel supply joints, body shops, junk yards, stucco ...

I recently rambled about never giving up. This tech is an example in not giving up, and looking for opportunities for success. James Simonelli recently went to work for Biker’s Choice and it’s a company constantly looking for opportunities to succeed. They continue to expand and James is working hard on the Twin Power line of products.I built this bike a few years ago and enjoyed each element of the build. It was my first opportunity to work with Black Bike Wheels and installed the new 23s at the time. I also worked with Rick Krost and the Paughco team, who were building his US Choppers frames and several components. I also worked with Chica for the first time to ...

 I started building my gas tank with a King Sportster tank shell available from Paughco. In this picture I have already cut the ends out to receive the tunnel in the bottom.  In this picture I have already started building the bottom from a flat piece of sheet metal I cut out and a tunnel. The tunnel is 1/2 of a piece of automotive exhaust pipe I cut with a plasma cutter and cleaned up on a belt sander.The elongated slots are for adding a rubber mount system.  Test fitting. Clearance all around the frame tube is required for rubber mounting tanks. The elongated slots left me room to tack weld mounting tabs to the frame. (This was way too complex, I ...

      Oncethat trailer gate hit the driveway back at home I could see tired ol'Betsy begging for another chance at life! As I walked aroundthe trailer she lay resting after the 1500 mile journey back. Iassessed the impending task of making this Ol' girl right again. "Rode hard and put up wet," I said to myself thinkingof all the journeys and adventures she served Scooter Tramp Scotty through.As I took in every line every worn out part of this soul servingmachine I tried to imagine all the places she saw, all thelandscapes, the women who made passenger, the endless white lines stretched for over half-a-million miles. The nomadicvessel of freedom that is this motorcycle I now have the honor ofsorting ...

Once upon a time there was a bike built called the Shrunken FXR. Keith “Bandit” Ball, of Bikernet and other assorted fame, built it. By a stroke of good fortune the bike became mine through the generosity and trust of Keith Ball. This bike was my daily commuter for a handful of years. It was and is always a challenge and a ton of fun navigating the streets and freeways of Los Angeles on two wheels and especially on a custom built motorcycle. I decided it was time to update the look of the bike as well as do some fine-tuning of a few mechanical items I wanted to switch up a bit. Below is a brief summary of what ...

 We are back at the Widowmaker Custom Design & Repair shop for final assembly of our bike. Everything has come back from paint, powder coat, etc. Now comes the patience part of our build, reassembly. At this point you need to have a plan of attack. Hopefully you took note of how you removed certain items so that your assembly is smooth without and scratches. Let us get started. Item One: Where to start? I generally start by getting the bike back into a rolling state. But this can all hinge on your choice of engine. For Harleys and most v-twin engines this is the best approach. This is the way we approached our setup with the Yamaha Roadstar drivetrain.  However, if ...