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ContentsAUGUST 2012

ON THE COVERVolume 22 • Number 6 • Our 185th IssueWith little in common but a pair of wheels and45 degree V-Twin motors, our two cover bikesspan more than a half century of Harley-David-son history, nearly 4,000 miles of earth's sur-face, and a huge stylistic range of what passion-ate people are doing to their bikes. But don't letthat distract you. Whether you're entranced bythe slinky metalflake allure of Boccin Custom Cycles' '46 Knuck or find yourself drooling overthe streetwise cool of Hoxie's Shadley BrosRoad Glide, we've got something delicious foryou to sink your teeth into. Read on!

FEATURE BIKESSouth African Hot Rod .............................8Diversity personified

Metalflake Knuckle ................................22Let the motorcycle do the talking

Shovelhead Sidecar Outfit.......................24From father to son

Soulful Shovel .......................................28Bling’s Cycle goes heavy metal

Shadley Bros Road Glide ........................38Well ridden and never done

Ultimate Showstopper ...........................44From T-n-A Customs

Led Sled Gets Back ...............................48A Shovelhead-looking Sportster

IW GARAGEIW Product Review ................................36Motorcycle armor for your bike’s hard bags

DP Replacement Clutch..........................56A high-performance solution

About Avon...........................................5820 things to know about tires

Rusted Nuts Tech .................................60Commandeering a proper workspace

Ceramic Coatings 101 ...........................62Jet-Hot tells you how to keep cool

S&S Cycle Story....................................64Listen up, Knuckleheads

Shop Time with Mike Witt ......................66Hard ridden Road King

FEATURE STORIESDonnie Smith Show 2012 ......................32Milestones and mentoring

The Quail Gathering ...............................74The Pebble Beach of bike shows

DEPARTMENTSLetters ................................................18Readers report in

Made in the USA...................................52Rinehart Racing roars along

Induction & Exhaust Buyer’s Guide...........68What goes in must come out

Seasoned Citizens .................................761911 Pope

IW Eye .................................................82Worth a thousand words

REGULARSMarilyn Stemp ........................................6Be here now

Sam Kanish ..........................................12Trouble with authority

Bert Baker ...........................................14How to be a popular kid

Rick Fairless .........................................16Economic indicators, Texas style

Ed Youngblood ......................................72Transcontinental record setters

38 22

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Growing up is weird. Before startingkindergarten, the focus is on learn-ing how to walk, talk, and not poopin your pants. There’s no rules, yourmommy feeds you and naps are encour-aged. Skin color and socioeconomic back-ground mean nothing. Then grade schoolbegins and so does the process of con-forming with the system. You must stand inline, wait your turn, and speak only whenspoken to.

In high school the rules change becausethe sexual awakening begins as we all heedthe call of our ancestors to propagate thespecies, which adds an interesting dimen-sion to the military internment camp proto-col of our regimented school system. Physi-cal attributes, intelligence, ethnic back-ground, socioeconomic status, and popu-larity are used (whether we like it or not) todefine who we are. As a result, manygroups and cliques form as young adultsmark off their territory. There’s the freaks,jocks, geeks, popular kids, and outcasts. Iwas the fullback on the football team so Idrifted in and out of the “jock” world but Iwas an outcast and proud of it. People whoplayed with cars, rode motorcycles, andpartied like Jim Morrison were much moreinteresting to me.

Then you get out in the real world and

nobody really gives a rat’s ass if you were acard carrying “popular kid” Some people tryto hang on to their former identity but eco-nomic survival is number one; it does notcare about former affiliations because theworld will chew you up and spit you out re-gardless of who you are, what you are, orhow many times you tagged Back-Seat-Becky in your mom’s minivan.

I got my first bike when I was 12 in1974, a Honda SL70. It was my ticket tofreedom. Dirt bikes were everything to me.Jeff Ward, Marty Smith, Bob Hannah, andJody Weisel were my heroes. In the ‘70s Ihad a Husqvarna WR125, Honda TL125,and a Suzuki RM100. Old fat guys whorode Harley-Davidsons were dumb and mo-tocross was cool. In 1980 I left motorcy-cles to go to engineering school much tothe relief of my mother who viewed my ob-session with them as a “phase I was goingthrough.” After getting out of school I gotright back in the game and raced 250ccmotocross on 1984 and 1986 Kawasakisonly to find out that at 23 years of age Iwas old and tired relative to the 16-year-olds who beat me every weekend.

So I hung up my leathers in 1988 andconceded that maybe my mom was right.Motorcycles are for little kids. I went with-out a bike until I couldn’t stand it anymore.

So in 1993 I got my first Harley-Davidson,a 1994 FLSTN, picture shown above. Itwas then I realized that dirt bikes are forkids and Harley-Davidsons are for adults. In1994 I spent a lot of time customizing mybike to make it special. I hung some obnox-ious fishtail drags on it, chromed this andchromed that and I was too cool. One dayme and my friend were walking out of abeer store and an old coot with a greasyPanhead shouted at us and said “sissy bik-ers!” Apparently he did not get the memothat I was the toughest and coolest rider inthe Midwest. Besides, his old crusty buttlooked like he didn’t have a pot to piss inand hadn’t been laid in years so what hesaid was irrelevant.

Seven years later I was knee-deep in thewide tire custom bike scene. Wide tiresand big motors were the hot ticket. Anyonewho rode anything that was stock or nearstock procreated in the missionary positiononly and didn’t understand what life wasabout. Riding anything from Milwaukee waslike going to Cold Stone Creamery and or-dering vanilla ice cream. Why bother? Radi-cal ground-up customs were the only wayto be out on the street.

Six years later I was all about the jockeyshift foot clutch scene. Without a doubt, thiswas the closest you could get to motorcy-cling roots of yesteryear. Getting back to theroots of motorcycling was real. Ground-upradical customs were overpriced garbagewagons and stock bikes were lame.

In recent years I’ve looked back on howmuch energy I’ve wasted on different bikesand bike scenes. My thoughts and opinionswere much like the high schooler trying tobe part of a group and shunning the oth-ers. I’ve concluded that none of it matters.If you’re on two wheels you’re alright withme. If you ride down Main Street in Sturgiswearing a pink tutu, that’ll work. Ride a dirtbike or a moped? That’s cool with me, too.Even if you don’t ride but have a remote in-terest in bikes we can have something totalk about on some level. So what do I ridetoday? I don’t really care but my personalchoice is to ride anything with a 45-degreeV-Twin. Stock bike with stock mufflers orground-up custom with nary a Milwaukeepart on it; it doesn’t matter tome anymore. IW

14 IronWorks August 2012

Baker In GearBERT BAKER, BAKER DRIVETRAIN

We’re All Pink on the Inside

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