Happy New Year 2012!

2012???? What the hell happen to 1972! Or...1962, for that matter.
Tempus Fugit........

To all my friends, readers, and supporters.......

The Doherty Phantom oil filter......

Tim Doherty gave me one of his Phantom Oil Filter kits to try out, at the Laughlin River Run about 11 years ago, when the kits were fairly new. I've never had a chance to do just that, until now.

Doherty Machine made some great products, the best known were their PowerVents for both crank and head breather Big Twins, the Power-Pak air filter kits, and their "Mist-Free" head breather conversions for Twin Cams.

Unfortunately, Tim passed away in March of this year, and Doherty Machine ran into some operational problems. It's my understanding that Trask Performance , in Phoenix, AZ acquired Doherty, and is supposed to be producing the old line of products. Whether the Phantom is available again I'm not sure, you'd have to give Trask a call. The old Doherty product distributors show it "unavailable".

The Phantom Oil Filter was designed to be installed in place of the center fill cap on rigid frame 4 speed, and Softail 5 speed horseshoe-style tanks. But, it would mount on any oil tank - like the end of a round oil tank - that gave you a flat 2 1/2" x 2 1/2" surface to work with, and clearance for the filter length inside. The kit took the internal-style oil filter replacement cartridge used in Harley's ElectraGlide 4speed oil tanks, and is easily found.

You can see, Doherty changed the cap on the later kits, to a side feed for the return line, vs. my kit's threaded center feed location, and 1/8" NPT 90 degree elbow. This is the location of my Phantom - LT. side of the tank, between the belt drive runs. When I was figuring out the width of my tank, I was sweating the dimensions to not only get clearance for my starter, but enough side surface for the filter mounting flange. I made it, with an 1/8" extra on each side of the flange - whew! Instead of the the original inlet spigot, I installed a 1/8" NPT male to -6 AN male fitting. Totally hidden oil filter!
See how trick the Phantom was? You just remove the return line, unscrew the cap, and remove the filter for service. Hopefully, Trask will include this in the Doherty product line when they are up to speed.Here's where I'm at on my oil tank. The feed bung is A. in the photo, and the vent line goes into bung B., where there is an internal stand tube that bends over to the right to clear the filter cartridge, then up to about a 1/4" of the tank top. Darin from Bung King has my filler bung and screw-in cap on its way to me.......

Hip Ghosts........

Photo courtesy of Glenn Caley Bachmann
"...East side of Moultrie St., between Cortland Ave. and Eugenia, in Bernal Heights, San Francisco". 06 (?) 8 68 Joe Jerry Hells Angels Frisco

The photographer also pointed out that partly visable in the upper R/H corner (see my arrow) is the name Loaded Linda.

Bernal Heights is just below The Mission Dist. in San Francisco. Bachmann also stated that unfortunately, this strip of sidewalk was torn out and redone shortly after he photographed it in 2005.

Let's dig in the mailpouch again.......

Always in the "Top 10" most viewed posts on Applied Machete are the one's that I did on the Psychedelic Love Temple, the subject of the David Mann Painting by the same name. Not a month goes by that I don't get an Email or two from somebody who partied there, lived there, or crashed there when they were passing through L.A. Some of the accounts I get are concise, clear recollections with dates, times, and names, others are disjointed random pieces (go figure, huh?).

I thought I'd share one Email I just got a couple days ago, from "lewis.kl1". Read on.....

I lived at 1039 S. Ardmore , from mid '67 till the last party, my room/home was the front balcony set of room's. If you came to the house, I'm the one who normally opened the door if it were closed, or I greeted you as you came up the front stairs. We knew when people came in because of the noise the gate made, the gate had a very unique sound. The trike in one of the Roth posters was Tankers, the Panhead was mine. It was a great time of brotherhood, every day was a party.

The painting that "lewis.kl1" referred to, containing his and Tanker's bikes. Everybody calls this painting Bikes, Booze, Broads, but the actual name of this is A Taste Of Honey. "lewis.kl1" didn't specifically say weather he was a member of the Barons MC or not, but Tanker was. Tanker's trike was also featured in the very first issue of Roth's Choppers Magazine - under the title Tanker's Love Machine.

70 years ago today, always remember.........

After all is said and done, and the dust settles.......

This guy is still an assclown. This guy would be an assclown if he was doing beanie propeller hats. Unfortunately he chose "motorcycles". So sad.

They call it FRISCO.....and, a little more for you.

I didn't want to mix these things in with the post below, but I found some interesting things about Chocolate George, and a REALLY interesting document on Hairy Henry Kot. First the Chocolate George items:

* Chocolate George owned a couple auto junk yards in San Francisco, one of which was called D&G A GoGo. The "G" was for George, and the "D" was for his younger brother and partner, Doug Sessions.

*George's original Angel name was "Junkyard George", because of his junk yards (not to be confused with "Junkie George", the HA that kicked Hunter S. Thompson's ass, he's a different Member), but on a run to Berdoo one time, George produced a quart of chocolate milk to drink to sooth his ulcers, and he was renamed "Chocolate George" from then on out. George had reoccurring stomach ulcer problems, and he drank the chocolate milk to calm them down. It was also an easy way for him to consume whiskey (which he spiked the milk with) without it upsetting his ulcers.

And, now for this obscure document I ran across on Hairy Henry Kot. It's the appeal ruling, dated June 1, 1959, on a 1957 arrest and conviction of Hairy Henry on a Possession Of Stolen Property charge. It involved Henry being found in possession of a stolen Pan engine with altered case numbers in a bike he owned/rode:
http://online.ceb.com/CalCases/CA2/171CA2d9.htm

They call it FRISCO.....Chocolate George's funeral.

The famous Chocolate George's Funeral poster, and some on the events that occurred that produced this photograph.

UPI/29 Aug 1967 San Francisco, California, USA... San Francisco Hells Angels-style funeral cortege dots a hilly street as upwards of 200 cyclists roared to the funeral party of one of their members - "Chocolate George". His real name was Charles G. Henricks (sic), a 34 year old Angel who was killed in an accident in San Francisco's Hippie Haight-Ashbury district. It was the kind of last run Chocolate George would have dug the most. The cycle parade into Golden Gate Park..beer and wine..women..and rock music. After all the din and dancing it was, perhaps, apropos that one of the music groups attending the send-off was the Grateful Dead...Image by Bob Campbell

The photograph of Chocolate George's funeral, that became an iconic (and much sought after today - an original 24" x 48" will run you at least $400.00) poster was taken by Bob Campbell, and it ran on pg. 4 of the SF Chronicle with an article on the funeral entitled The Gang Gathers. The photograph hit the wire services, and it was in most of the major papers across the country the next day. Why? Well, because the Angels, hippies, and Frisco were news, and not many people had seen a sight like this in their lives. The original poster was printed by The Print Mint, in SF.

On the afternoon of Aug. 24th, 1967 Chocolate George was riding down Haight St., and went to make a turn right by the Straight Theatre. He hooked the front wheel of his bike on the bumper of the car in front of him (I've heard said it was a '55 Chevy), which caused George to be thrown from his bike onto Haight St. , suffering a serious head injury. George was taken to the hospital, where he died that evening.

George's funeral was held on the next Monday morning, the 28th. The funeral procession actually wound its way down Haight St, past the site of George's accident, with the procession gunning their engines as they passed the Straight Theatre, in a last salute to George. The funeral procession then headed to Cypress Lawn Cemetery, where George was cremated, and his ashes later scattered over Twin Peaks - the 2nd highest peaks in SF, located almost in the geographic center of the city, offering almost a 360 degree view of SF.

After the funeral, everybody went to Golden Gate Park for George's wake, or Wail! as it was called on the posters announcing it. Almost all of the Haight community turned out, because George was a much loved fixture in The Haight. Several of the SF bands played that day, most notably Big Brother, and the Grateful Dead. The Angels supplied the beer, and the Diggers supplied the food. It was a good send-off, indeed.

Here's something for you about what you see in the photograph/poster. Obviously, you see the hearse carrying George's body, with the family car right behind it. Next, behind the family car, riding 3 abreast, is the Frisco Chapter (I noted Pete Knell as #1. in the photo). Riding directly behind the family car is Hairy Henry Kot (#2), next to him (#3) is an unidentified rider - some have told me it's Sonny Barger, but I don't think so. That guy is flying some pretty tall apes. And, to the far right (#4) is Doug Sessions, Chocolate George's younger brother.

And, last but definitely not least.....here's some super-rare 8mm footage below these last two paragraphs, of Chocolate George's funeral, including a brief interview with Hairy Henry, and the Grateful Dead playing at George's Wail! in Golden Gate Park afterwards. If you look, you'll see Galloping Gooses, Satans Slaves, Straight Satans, and a few other clubs that came that day to pay their respects to Chocolate George, and his Club. Don't ask how I run across this stuff!

You know what's always bugged me about the original poster (which I had by the way, but disappeared on one of my moves, along with the first 3 issues of Easyriders, but I replaced those, never the poster)???? I still can't figure out why the Print Mint found it necessary to print the poster with the family's funeral car colored in bright florescent pink, when the rest of the poster is in B&W, save for the words at the top Chocolate George's Funeral, which are in brown and gold. I've never been able to find out if or what that meant. Anybody know?

The "art" of safety wiring.....

A lot of people safety wire their fasteners. Most people have a good idea why safety wire is important on some components, but they are lacking in the how, and don't accomplish the intended results. This guy knows what he's talking about. Watch and learn......

Know how most guys.......

......have a swingarm bike, and they bring the frame to me to have it hardtailed ? Well, Tommy's bringing me one of his bikes that has an aftermarket hardtail frame, and he wants me to splice this swingarm section into it.

I took this OEM rear section to the blaster today.......never throw anything away, right? This should be interesting for you to follow along on.

As my random thought process is wont to do..........

One of my favorite blogs out there is Jon Patrick's The Selvedge Yard, and I have it linked here on my blog. I'm a religious reader of TSY, and you'll find it in my links list on the R/H side. One of Jon's recent posts is about a movie that is on just about everybody's "favorites" list - American Graffiti. The direct link is here:
http://theselvedgeyard.wordpress.com/

Be sure to read the "Comments" section in the post, because it contains a couple more links from a couple people who left them there in that section, that provide a wealth of background information on the movie itself. In one of the links, it provides a mini-bio of Wolfman Jack, one of the driving forces in AG that ties the whole movie together as only the Wolfman could have done.

While I was reading Wolfman's bio, I recalled The Wolfman's move from across the Border, back into L.A. in '66, from reading his auto-biography Have Mercy! Confessions Of The Original Rock 'n' Roll Animal. A great read if you can find the book, I might add. Virtually driven/legislated out by the Mexican Government, Wolfman Jack had headed for L.A., to re-establish radio station XERB on this side of the Border. The studio/offices he set up were on Sunset Blvd., just a couple blocks east of Crescent Heights.

On a little triangle at that intersection of Sunset and Crescent Heights, sat Pandora's Box, a former beatnik hangout, now given way to the Counter-culture/hippie movement. If the name Pandora's Box doesn't ring a bell, it was the epicenter of the famous "Riots" that occurred in '66 on the Sunset Strip, and that incident inspired Steven Stills to write For What it's Worth, and also the exploitation B movie Riot On Sunset Strip as well, filmed and released a mere 6 weeks after the Riots went down. Below is an excerpt from The Wolfman's book, where he relates what he experienced while he had his offices there in that time period in '66. Also, here's a link I found, explaining the full story of Pandora's box from the great website Laurel Canyon Stories:

http://seastwood.com/backup310/pandoras.aspPandora's Box, circa 1966.

"Even back then (My note: Wolfman Jack referring to the late '50's-early '60's) The City wanted to tear down Pandora's Box. It created a traffic flow problem for all the people trying to get home to their expensive pads in the Hollywood Hills. Mostly, though, the pressure was on to demolish the club because the hippies were a lot crazier than the beatniks who used to hang out there a few years earlier. They smoked dope in public, flashed bare boobies at people driving down Sunset, and balled each other right on the sidewalk. They also attracted a lot of greasy, sex-hungry biker dudes into the scene. Plus the L.A Free Press, the local underground newspaper, had their offices underneath the club. So, Pandora's Box kinda had The Establishment pissed off in several different directions".

Pretty current satellite photo of the former location of Pandora's Box.

" Lou (My note: referring to his wife), for one, was glad to see Pandora's Box go. She was still a very proper Southern Belle, and every time she walked from our offices to the bank, she had to pass in front of the club. There she was, striding along in her nylons and high heels, dressed like she just stepped out of a Beverly Hills shop window, while the Hells Angels and Iron Horseman were standing around, smoking pot, and saying, 'Hey baby, how about climbin' on my hog, and taking' a magic ride?'. "

Don't short change yourself on the rest of the Laurel Canyon Stories's site, it's a wealth of historical information on The Sunset Strip, it's clubs, the "scene" in the '60's, and Laurel Canyon in the '60's and before. Just remember to allow yourself several hours, or bookmark the site to go back to in the future:
http://seastwood.com/backup310/default.asp

A little variation.......

The above oil tank, is the one that we used on Part-timer Steve's bike. Originally I built this tank for my FXTT bike, but with the rear frame section shortened up 2", it wouldn't fit - too thick. When It came time to build Steve's bike, he wondered if we could work the tank in on his build. As far as length went, it fit just fine, but it was too wide for the Paughco frame. So, off came 2 1/4" from the L/H side, and voila! It just fit.

This tank was done when I was just getting the hang of TIG welding, but it was a good design, and 50,000 mi. later, it's still hanging in there. No leaks or cracks whatsoever, so I know this style of tank can take it out on the road, in a rigid-framed bike. If Steve can't bust it, nobody can!

This time around (because I have the room, due to the CFL's 2" stretch "over stock" in the back legs), I kept the fender at full length (Steve used a half-fender), and shaped the oil tank's back plate to fit around it, with an 1/8" space between the fender and the tank. I made the frame mounts for the oil tank next, very similar to the Softail's rubber insert mounts for their flatside gas tanks. Once I had a "platform" to work from, I rolled the main part of the tank in 1 pc. (Steve's front was 3 pcs.) to fit the contour of the back plate, with radiused bends at it's front corners. Easier said than done, haha!

The feed and vent lines will come from the lower part of the tank - save for the return line, which will enter the L/H side of the tank just below the secondary drive belt's top run, through an in-tank flush mount Doherty oil filter setup, that uses the same canister filter as the old Shovel 4 speed electric start oil tanks did.

Yeah, you read right, I'm using a 1 1/2" wide secondary belt drive. I don't need to remind you that H-D has been running rear belts for over 2 decades, Phil Ross ran them, so does Sugar Bear. Nobody ever said anything to Indian Larry for running secondary belts on every bike he built from Voodoo Chili to Mr. Tiki's Shop Droppings. Larry, Phil, and Sugar bear knew where it was at, so to all you smarty-pants guys that love to type "Haw, haw...belts are for pants, haw, haw...", I'm gonna tell you guys that "Chains are for wallets, haw, haw". Belts are pretty tough, and if you get them aligned as they should be, tensioned where they need to be run, and use good quality belts, they can take some really hard punishment....stay tuned.

Third wheel......

"One phone call does it all....."

Near as I can figure, with some rare exceptions, I've used Fab Kevin brake brackets on every bike I've built over the last 11 years. Kevin is one of these extremely rare, talented individuals that you can call on the phone, tell him what you're doing, and have parts that show up a week later that practically install themselves after you unwrap them.

These stainless beauties came yesterday from Kevin. The one on the left is for a Brembo dual piston Ducati 999 rear caliper w/34mm pucks, that's going on the springer for my CFL single downtube bike. It's a full-floating bracket for an 11 1/2" rotor.

The bracket on the right is for the rear of the CFL, and it'll mount a dual piston Nissin rear caliper from a Kawasaki ZX14. I cut the softail-style brake mounting tab off the frame, and the rear caliper will now hang at 6 o'clock. Kevin had to run a special CAD on this one, to work with the 10 1/4" oddball diameter Grimeca rotor that Dick Allen used. All done over the phone with Kevin, while he typed it all into CAD while we spoke!

Perfect parts, and.......perfect hair! You're the Master, and thank you once again for being the key to translating what I have in my head into functioning components.
http://www.fabkevin.com/home.htm

Hey....they named a rose after me!

The Irish Rich Marbled. Rightly so! They were probably inspired by my rosey (cough, cough....) disposition, and outlook on life.

William Van Dyke "Swapmeet Special"

I looked all over the internet for this clip, and the only one I could find was on YouTube, from a Speed Channel program clip. It's William Van Dyke's Swap Meet Special, done live at the Buffalo Chip, during Sturgis 1982. Check the size of the crowd at the Chip! Also, check out the makeup of the crowd at the Chip.....a little different cut of attendees back then.

The clip originated from the the Easyriders' Video Magazine #1, in 1988. The good part of this Van Dyke segment is you'll get not only see Van Dyke at his best, you'll also get a couple quick shots of Phil Ross kickin' up his heels at about :46, and 1:00 into it. But.... this is such a sanitized version of this clip by Speed Channel, I almost thought about not posting it. I can maybe understand them blurring out the boobs, but they cut an entire verse of the song out of the video - for no other reason I can think of - other than not wanting to piss off some advertisers, I guess. The missing verse goes, to the roaring approval of the crowd:

"Well, I don't want no Honda, or no Kow-a-sock-ee,
Them Japanese motor-sickles is a little too plastic for me!
So Give me a Harley-Davidson, that's the one for me.
Hey, it's a swapmeet special, I rode it over for you to see".

Do yourself a favor, and hunt up a copy of the Easyriders Video Magazine #1, it's not bad. Segments like the Van Dyke one, and others like "JD John" Cameron and Lance Tidwell talking about, and riding their Flxi sidecar rigs make the video worth getting - it's only in VHS format as far as I know.

Metamorphosis....

Noun; plural
1. A complete change of form, structure, or substance, as transformation by magic or witchcraft.
2. Any complete change in appearance, character, circumstances, etc.
Everything fitted, tacked, and plug welded. I added in an additional 1" of stretch to the hardtail, to bring in the proportions of the previously done 2" downtube stretch. Otherwise, it'd look way too stubby from the seatpost to the axle plates.

You should see it with the Evo in it...... fits like a glove. Quite the difference. A 2" over repop springer, 5 gal. fatbob tanks, upswept fishtails, and a med. height sissy bar are on the build list.........trad Fatbob-style road bikes never go out of style!

HEY! Look who's on the cover.......

.......of the March, 2012 issue of In The Wind. Why, it's PART-TIMER STEVE!

Mike Lichter caught Steve in the rain on the Sugar Bear/Mike Lichter Ride in Sturgis last August. If the rain wasn't enough to ride in, Steve was just a few turns away from riding right into a hail storm.

Congrats Steve - you finally got your cover with a riding shot, just like you wanted, haha!

West Coast Choppers bare steel.....

Ladies and gentleman....Johnny Cash

Cash puts his own imprimatur on Soundgarden's Rusty Cage, and brings in Marty Stewart to administer the knockout punch. Thank God for video tape.......

Patina Turner knocks one out of the park.........

Nice, Brandon, nice.......

http://mullinschaindrive.blogspot.com/

http://www.mullinschaindrive.bigcartel.com/

Thinking about you, Dave.......

Heal up fast, buddy!

A little more progress today........

I got a late start on this this afternoon. It seemed the phone wouldn't stop ringing, and I'm battling with a wiring job on a Sporty that needs to be finished. Plus, Kyle ( you've seen his green Sporty that I worked over and hardtailed here previously) is back from his tour in Afganistan, and he brought his buddy Lumpy and his CFL roller over for me to start Lumpy's build. And, Part-timer Steve had a photoshoot with a model for a feature article on his bike up in the mountains, and he wasn't around today, so I was pretty busy.

I skipped taking photos of bending the backbone, and making the slugs for the neck and seatpost, but they're done the same as I've shown on here before.

The shape of the backbone is similar to what H-D does on their Softail frames. The backbone doesn't follow the line of the rear head, because it needs to be a little higher, then dip down so I can mate the top legs of the hardtail with it later on, and still allow clearance under the top legs for the engine to slide in and out. The top legs will hit the backbone approx. where the white line is on the photo. Next, I marked the seatpost for the angle of the cope, so it will butt up to the backbone.........

.....then into the tubing notcher for a 10 degree cope with a 1 1/2" hole saw. I can't remember who made this notcher (I know it's USA made, but there's no name on it), but I've had it for 10 years, and it's still dead accurate, and it's been used a LOT.

Backbone and seatpost aligned and final fitted.

Closup of the coped top of the seatpost, and how it fits. Here's a bonus tip: If you ever do something similar to this, before you weld the post and the backbone together, trace the post on the backbone. Take the backbone, and drill a 1/2" hole centered inside your tracing, then weld the two together. That way, you can run your headlight wires, coil wires, etc. up your seatpost, and up through the backbone.

I cut the backbone to length, ending it in a "doefoot". I'll cap it to finish it off.Here's where I dropped off this evening. I still have to clean the neck area to weld the backbone there, trim the old neck gusset, and drill my plug weld holes for the backbone and seatpost slugs. Then jig it up, weld it together, and then fit up the lower tank brace tube. From here I'll have a good foundation when I do the hardtail. I'll post up the frame when it's completed.

"Good morning, Mr. Phelps.....your assignment, if you choose to accept it...."

OK, what do you do when you have a titled 4 speed frame with an extremely grenaded Shovel engine, a low mileage Baker 6 in a 4 transmission, a good BDL 3" primary belt drive, and a brand-new S&S stroker Evo?

Well, you do like Deb did - you call me up and you say "Can you make all this stuff work together, and make it a rigid, so I can run The Horse's Stampede with it next Summer?"

Why yes, Deb, we sure can! And, I'm thinkin' if I know Deb, that Charley The Nomad will have her right on his ass, if she decides to run the Stampede with this. Deb's a pretty competitive gal in everything she does, and I'd like to have a bike I've done that runs The Stampede, to show exactly how durable something I modify can be under those conditions.

Here's where we start. Somebody has previously made replacement downtubes 2" longer than stock, and given the legs a rigid frame "dogleg" shape where they meet the lower engine mount. We're not going to change this area, and it'll look more like an original rigid when the hardtail is finished.
Structurally, this backbone is OK, but it just needs to be executed a little cleaner. We have to mod and raise the backbone anyways to fit the Evo, so why not make a nice, new 1 piece backbone? We're going to give it a Softail-style configuration over the back rocker area.
Here's the Baker 6 in a 4 in place on the trans mounting plate. When the Baker 6 in a 4 is pushed forward all the way, the clearance between the trans top and the post is minimal, but the trans will move back some after the primary belt is adjusted, so we won't be notching the new post for clearance in this area. The trans will go in and out of the finished frame no problem. Who says that stroker Evos don't fit in 4 speed swingarm frames? This one seems to fit just fine. OK, we did do a little "trimming" on the backbone..... Here Part-timer Steve is holding a section of 1 1/2" OD tubing to approximate the final post shape we need. The seatpost was cut down close to the white line you see, and a piece of tubing was rough cut to length....... .....and into the hydraulic bender it goes, for a 10 degree bend, with the bend winding up right below the rear exhaust port, like we wanted it to. Here's where we stopped for the day. The post angle leaves plenty of room to get the engine in and out of the frame, and the clearance on the trans top to the post didn't change. We'll leave the seatpost long until we get the backbone in place, then we'll cope the top of the post to mate the bottom of the new backbone. There won't be any need to notch the seatpost for the rear pipe to clear, either. Perfect. More to come.....