Man oh man, where do I start with this one? I think the better question is where the hell does it end? Here's the short and nasty. Project ROADPIG is a 1974 Honda 550-4 that I bought from a friend of my middle son Matt, sight unseen. And I say "sight unseen" not because there was anything about this ugly duck that I hadn't been told, it's just that I NEVER buy vehicles without giving them the once over myself. And ugly she was. And the previous owner had told me he had never gotten her to crank so it was with a leap of faith that I decided to give her a new home and start a new project.. And that's where the project stalled for the first time.
Once delivered, damn, she was ugly. In decent shape considering she's 36 years old but hey, I've seen quite a few 36 year olds that turned my head, but we're talking about motorcycles here now aren't we? My biggest hurdle (and one I still have trouble with is "what did I really want to do with her"? My last "project bike was a 1981 Yamaha 650 Special II that I sunk a lot of money into restoring only to not be able to title it in the end without a lot more money than she was worth. So with that bad taste still in my mouth, I was leaning towards some sort of a chop/bobber project for this little beastie. Matt and a few of his friends plan bike trips a couple of times a year and I really would like to be able to make one of those rides with my son before I get to the point in life where I simply can't ride anymore physically. Matt has a 2005 1200 Custom Harley Sportster that I picked out for him his senior year of college, and as I was in love with my 1973 1000cc XLCH Harley Sportster back in the day, he too is in love with his. Sportsters to me have always been the "Corvette" of the Harley line, big motor, light weight, so you get blinding acceleration AND handling like it's on a rail. The Harley advertising slogan for my 1973 Sportster was "Get on - Pull The Trigger!". So, I'd like to make her a road bike, able to make a few long distance trips with both ease and comfort. But I also want it to be an easy to handle street bike too.
The difference between a chopper and a bobber isn't very much in reality. They are both chops, but a Bobber is a lot less chrome, flash and paint and is typically designed as a cheap, easy to ride when drunk bike to hop from one bar to the next without falling off and busting your ass. And if you do drop it, you haven't rubbed off $1000.00's in chrome and paint either. The other key difference for a Bobber is easy to obtain parts and the minimum outlay of cash so they usually don't have extended frames or forks or other highend customization. So, what's it gonna be? A Chopper, or a Bobber?
What about a hybrid? I don't do anything halfassed, period. Which is one of the reason she still sits quietly and patiently in the garage waiting for me to make up my mind and get off my ass and do something. To me 99% of the bikes being custom built today either by a shop/builder or an individual is simply crap. If you want "art", make art, but leave the bikes alone. I guess I'm just a little too old school when it comes to my likes and dislikes for chops. I'm a real big fan of functionality and suitability for the road. I guess if I had to give my style a name, it would be "Industrial". Gotta be ridable, gotta be reliable, and it's still gotta look like a motorcycle and not some type of pipe organ your riding down the road.
Here's what I got in mind for Project ROADPIG... Hardtail the rear, 16" rear tire to help soak up some of that hardtail road shock, simple low tunnel Sportster tank and if I can luck into a set of extended front fork tubes on eBay, then so be it but stock'll werk for a while. Nothing radical, still a very ridable scoot, and hopefully reliable too. I've already determined she runs, and quite well too. The carborators need a rebuild, but hey don't they all? I can't find any weld-on hardtail units I like as they all add too much stretch to the rear section and you wind up with this big empty hole between the engine and the rear wheel so I'll probably have to come up with a hardtail of my on design to suit me. Already started stripping the bike and fixing things as I find them and then reinstalling everything in a tighter, neater bundle. Now it's time to start coughing up the money.
And it's really not a lot of money either, probably well under a grand for everything I want to do to her. I just have to set the money aside and take it one piece at a time. And winter is a damn good time for that sort of a build. I ran into a friend of mine Kevin Camp a few months ago and he had just got a similar bike on the road and was riding it around town when I bumped into him. His is a little older than mine but he had very similar ideas in his head as he went about his build. He had hardtailed the existing factory swingarm and the angles were almost on the money for what I want as far as looks go. I snapped a bunch of pictures of his bike to fuel the little hampsters in my head and I think I have a very workable design floating around in my mind. I still have a lot of disassembly, clean, paint and reassemble work to do before the torch and sawzall comes out to play, so I guess that's when I should start. I'll keep posting as the project evolves from the Ugly Duck into Project ROADPIG for you guys to follow.
