Matt Olsen's Blog: January 2013

I started this site four years ago as a way to keep up with my customers and friends. It has been an enjoyable way to keep track of what is going on at the shop, whether it is bikes we are working on, parts we're making or a trip that we are on with old bikes.

Fast forward 4 years, I just reached post number 1000. I thought that I should do something special for the nice round number, so I went through and tried to get a pic of every bike that we built in that time frame. They are not loaded in order, but you get the idea. Check it out below. I found over 20 bikes which surprised me. I guess we are pretty busy guys up here in the Dakotas. Thank you for checking out this site, and thanks to all of our customers and friends that we have had the pleasure of working with.

This is a 1946 knucklehead bobber that we originally built as a points bike for a friend in Ohio, He decided to move to Columbia and sold all of his stuff to buy a coffee farm. We got the bike from him and sold it to another friend and turned it into a bobber. It was on the cover of american iron, which was pretty wild.

This is a 1945 WL, that we built for my friend Dave in WI, It is a great little bike and a ton of fun to ride.

This is my 36 EL, I broke the seat post doing wheelies with it, and brittney and I put it in a bobber chassis and rode it around the country the first summer we were together. We switched it over to this configuration in three days, and hopped on it and rode it to ohio.

Here is our 53 panhead, my dad worked on piecing this bike together for 15 years, we finished it up and he used it to haul Mike Lichter across the country for the first cannonball.

Here is Ben Bob's 47 all donked out with a windshield and saddlebags. It is so amazing. I love 47s!!!!

Here is my dad Riding Andy's 47. this bike is less than a 100 numbers away from Ben bobs!

I wasn't sure if this one counted or not, but I am posting it any ways. This is my dad's 53 set up as a recreation from the movie the Wild Ones. We loaned it to a museum in indianoplis for a few months.

Here is Doug and Jean with Doug's 36 at the Eiteljorg Museum.

Here is Don's 42 El. I really liked this bike.

This is Frankie's fifty three

And the other side. He has since put an 18 on the front. which is a huge improvement.

Here is a pic of Brittney before she became MRS. Olsen. The bike in the back ground is our op 46, we bought it from the second owner, and mechanically rebuilt it in four weeks.

Here is a pic of my friend Jack and I after we broke the records for oldest Harleys to do an iron butt run.

I ran across a lot of pics like this while gathering photos for this post. We did a lot of bikes in the past four years, and we did a lot more engines!!!

Here is Robert's 46 EL This was another fun bike to build. It has a great scrambler look to it.

Here is Ray on a 52 that we built for Randy in Colorado. This bike ruled. I really love rigid frame panheads.

Here is Doug's thirty six again. This bike is definitely going to be in my top five accomplishments of my life. I love this bike so much.

Here is Ryan's 45. This was the AMCA giveaway bike. I gathered up all the parts from friends around the country, then the AMCA ran an essay contest, Ryan won it. So he came to our shop, Dales shop and Larrys shop and rebuilt it. The bike is really amazing. I really enjoyed this project.

Here is a pic of me with my stunt bike. It has an original motor, and my friends and I built the rest of it. I crashed in Alabama and shattered my arm on this bike. It put me out of commission for a few months, because the Alabama doctors set it wrong and I had to have my arm re broken and consequently it took forever to heal. After all of the misfortune that this bike caused, I am still very happy that I did it and thankful for the friends I made from doing this project.

Here is Tim's 46, This bike was not a restored bike, but it was all perfectly rebuilt and it worked well. He rode it across the us twice.

Here is a shot of the left side of the sears. This was one of the most fun bikes that I have ever ridden.

Here is Vern's 46, this bike is so nice and was a lot of fun to build and ride.

Here is Warren's 64, This was a cool bike, I loved riding it and I am really surprised at how refined swing arm bikes are.

HEre is a pic of me riding Waynes 46, this bike is sooooo cool. I am very proud of how it turned out.

This is the 28 harley JD that I took on the cannonball this year. It was a lot of fun to build. It belongs to the National Motorcycle Museum in Anamosa Iowa and they sponsored me to go on the trip. Brittney came along and helped the staff out with the run. It was like our honeymoon. I really enjoyed the trip from New York to San Francisco I missed 150ish miles because of mechanical issues, I got to put over 4500 miles on the bike, so that was very enjoyable.

Here is the 28 next to a geyser in Yellowstone

Here is another shot of Dave's 45. I love the proportions on these bikes.

Here is a pic of me with the born free 4 knucklehead and my cannonball friend Shinya. We built this bike for our friend Glenn in PA. It is pretty neat, it won best in show at Born free this year, and a trip to the mooneyes show in Yokohoma in Japan. So the bike and I went east with my dad and wife. It was a lot of fun to build this bike, and I couldnt have done it with out the help of Chad, Jordan, Lock, John, Glenn and my dad and wife. thanks everyone, This bike was a very cool accomplishment

I already posted a pic of Benbob's 47, but I really like this photo, so I am posting another. My favorite part of my job is getting to meet so many cool people and making friends. My father and I are very lucky because we work with our friends

lol at this picture of my dad and Ray. This is the backwards seat apparatus that we built to haul Mike around on the cannonball.

Here is Jim's 39. I love this bike. 39s are so elegant.

Here is a pic of me riding John's 48.

This is a really nice bike, the owner is even nicer.

Here is a pic of Ryan on his 45. This bike is so damn cool.

Here is a pic of a really cool green 46 that we built for our friend Tom. He owns a company named auto gem. He is a cool guy and rides the bike all over the place.

Ok, well that sums up some of the bikes we built in the last 1000 posts. I am looking forward to the cool stuff thats coming together in the shop right now and Look forward to the next bikes and posts.

here is a pic of grants tool box strap, it has a few extra holes. I machined up some spacers and welded them into the holes

Someone had drilled out the holes for the seat post terminals too, so, I made some little spacers out of 1020 steel ti take up the extra room, I will braze them in, and no one will be able to tell.

We took some pictures with the 37 and 41 for my friend Taxi's tire catalog. He is reproducing Allstate tires, as well as a really nice early goodyear style tire. The 37 has the allstates on it.