Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Go Vote for my Wife!!!

Voting is still open on the Always A champion contest. 

Go Check out Brittney's entry here-- http://www.alwaysachampion.com/search-for-a-champion/entry/1568950

You can vote every day for her until February 2nd




Tuesday, January 28, 2014

65 FLH and heads

I have been putting parts on Jason's 65 every week for a long time, and I am finally getting close to firing it up.  I can not believe how much stuff goes onto a 65 flh.  I really love this bike, but dont know if I will do another one in the future.
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Even the Dash has a ton of parts on it. It looks awesome with the three jewels.
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Here is a cool shot of the knuckleheads for this batch of motors. I have been sorting out parts for a while but almost have it licked.   four of these sets of heads are for funky bikes, and the rest are going to be shiny and perfect.
Lots of work to go, but luckily we have done a few before.

Mail call

 We got a batch of cool stuff today.  It was kind of like christmas, we got a bunch of stuff that we have been looking forward to getting all year in the mail.  Check out the nice silver face on this 38 speedo
 Here is one of the 47 speedos for the els we are doing this batch.  Do any of you guys know what the difference in the corbin faces is?

 And here are the front fenders for the 36 and 38 that we are doing.  I have to drill the holes for the fender lights and the mudflaps.
What a beautiful crown.   I cant wait to see these painted.

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Uncle Harry's 40 el

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My friend Paul came by the shop this week and brought his knucklehead along to do some light maintenance on it and to fix what he thought was a stuck rocker arm.  He was riding the bike a few years ago and heard a loud bang and the bike quite running.  This bike is very special and was built and tweaked by Harry Mollenaar  in the fifties.  The bike is 85 inches and has a ton of special parts and hand made features.   I have known about this bike for years and seen lots of pictures of it, but this week was the first time that I actually got to touch it and see what it was like. 
 In this picture you can see the special cast aluminum cylinders that Harry worked with Eddie long on casting.   Eddie Long was a genius from ohio that most people recognize from an awesome old photo of a jdh drag bike with a knucklehead top end.  These cylinders are an inch taller than stock cylinders and the frame had to be jacked up to shoe horn the engine in the frame.
 The gas tanks on Harry's bike are widened mid 36 to 39 tanks and really pretty cool.  The bike has a 36 shift arm and a 3 speed and reverse gate.  Also note the adjustable rake hydra glide fork.

 The left side of the bike is really cool too,  the fenders are stock hydra glide trim,  and the bike looks like a nice combination of different harley parts from various years.
 Check out this cool aluminum pressure plate.
 Here is the problem that caused the valves to come out of adjustment.   The cylinder had been previously welded back when Harry had it.   The cylinders are cast aluminum with a pressed in cast iron sleeve.  the cross section of the cylinder is very thin and weak.  In some spots there was only .030 of aluminum.   Performance "upgrades" didn't have very much longevity in this case.
 The rear cylinder was easy to remove,  the front one was a bit more effort.  The heads had studs sticking out of them so that they could have nuts  used to retain them.
 ouch.
 upon closer inspection the flywheels were made out of billet steel and had a four and a half inch stroke.
 The rods are sa rods, which are out of a vl.  The cam was stock
 and here was the other mystery that unfolded.  the belly numbers of the case have an f stamped in them.   I have seen plenty of 40e- cases,  but never an f.   I have heard that Harley had planned on introducing the 74" fl model in 40 but didnt have a chance to iron out the bugs in time.   maybe this was a pair of prototype cases, who knows though.  Have any of you guys ever seen an f in a belly number on a 40 case?

The heads were in pretty good shape and made out of stuff that Harry had in inventory, they are large port heads, with 38/early 39 rocker shafts, and 37 rocker boxes.  we are going to build a 68 inch motor to put back in the bike so that Paul can have trouble free and careless riding for the rest of his life.   I respect the amount of work that went into making this motor a possibility, but it didn't work and the formula is not sound.  

Thursday, January 16, 2014

Lots of various old motorcycle news.

 Here is a 48 that sold at the Las Vegas Auction last week.  There were some real amazing bikes at the auction,  Unfortunately I didnt have time to go.   I was really curious about what this 48 would go for.  It is a bike that my dad and I restored 10 or 12 years ago. It sold for 60k, which is unbelievable for a restored 48 panhead.  It makes me feel good about the job that we did and it also makes me happy to see it in such good shape after all of these years.  I would like to find out who bought it and send them a muffler for the bike.  we were not making them when we restored this bike and it has a substandard reproduction tedds one on it.
 There is an article on the 39 we did for Jim in the new issue of American Iron,  go check it out,  the story is nice and the pictures are good too.
 Here is one of the tires that came with the brown and chrome 53 that my dad bought off of craigslist.  I love seeing these vintage shipping stamps on old tires.
 This is the first harley that I built with my dad. It is a 1948 harley s or what some people call a hummer. I started on it when I was ten and finished it when I was 11.  I rode it around for a few years and its kind of been rotting away in the corner for 15 years.  We are loaning it to our friends daughter in ohio, and giving her a budget to use for upgrades.  she is going to race it at vintage flat track races in the hummer class.  I am really excited to see it get put to use again.  

 Most of this week has been spent prepping and painting cases and installing studs.  It is really time consuming.
 We finally found a frame for Bills 51.  This frame is really primo,  the only thing wrong with it, is that there was a vtwin tool box strap on it that is too wide.   We have been looking for a frame of this caliber for a long ttime and glad we finally found one.  Thanks greg

 oerfect unbroken top motor mount
 fFunky factory welds on the seat post and motor mount

 Check out how nice the bottom tubes are
 This is the first batch of pistons that we are baking.  They are ceramic coated on top and Teflon on the skirts
 Lori from California wrote up a nice story about Brittney and posted it today.  Here is a link to it  http://motordolls.com/2014/01/featured-motor-doll-brittney-olsen/
 We got Justin's 47 el chassis all restored and its going back together.  The frame was pretty nice, there were a few gobs of welding we had to grind off and metal finish, plus we had to straighten it, but overall it was nice.  

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Search for a champion contest




My beautiful and talented wife shot and edited a video for the Search for a Champion contest that Champion puts on every year. The winner of the contest is decided upon by voting,  people from all over the world can go to the always a champion site and vote for their favorite videos and racers once a day, every day until March 23rd.

Her video can be seen at this link  http://www.alwaysachampion.com/search-for-a-champion/entry/1568950

Go to the site and check out her video and all of the other ones and vote for your favorite one.   Brittney is planning on racing her 23 this summer, plus we are loaning my 1948 Harley Hummer to a 14 year old girl in ohio to race in the light weight class this summer. Once she outgrows the bike we will continue loaning it to other young riders so they can try dirt track racing.  By the time our son is big enough to race it, the bike will hopefully be pretty fast :)

 Winning one of the sponsorships offered in the contest would help Brittney take her racing goals to the next level as well as sponsor more young riders who are interested in racing old bikes.  So go and vote for her video once a day until March 23rd.   Thanks for your help and support and have a great week

Thursday, January 2, 2014

Happy new year and two big announcements


Happy new year everyone.   2013 was an amazing year filled with a lot of great experiences.  I can not wait for 2014.  Brittney and I will have our first child in May and we just found out that it is going to be a boy.   This leads me into my second big announcement,  the Cannonball Golden Ticket.  My friends and I have been working on this project for the last few months and are happy to finally share the news with everyone. 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWShJCNHb1I


Here is a short video that my friend Gina made. 
I had a great time on both cannonball runs, but want to experience it from the sidelines this year and help my dad and whoever wins the promotion out.   Go to www.cannonballgoldenticket.com to learn more and see if the project works for you