Drews Panshovel

My favorite bike ever, period. And couldn't belong to a nicer guy. Truest of the true.

Spring Chicken

I was out for a ride on The Locust yesterday and my clutch went to hell in a clutchbasket. The BlackBird is still down until I can get a 47 tooth pulley in my hands. Meanwhile my Dad's 75 FLH was just begging to be ridden. This is the bike I clean up my act on. This is "his" bike. All the others are kind of like community bikes and pretty much every thing I ride comes back with a few missing parts, a scrape here or chip in the paint there. I have a way of doing that and he always seems to be alright with me riding his bikes. After riding Choppers for so long you forget just how smooth an FLH with suspension front and rear and a pogo seat can ride. It's like floating on a cloud. I was careful to return with all the parts I left with and paint still in like new condition. I felt smart and sophisticated while riding it..... I even shaved my beard off. Best of all..... I didn't get pulled over while riding through town!

Louie says Thanks!

Louie would like to thank anybody that might have contributed to the Dragons fund, they made their goal of raising cash and started shooting film up Michigan way this week. Here's some progress pics.

BlackBird Rear Fender

I decided to go with a trailer fender for this project because 1.... they are strong and 2... I had a thrashed one laying in my pile of parts. I have always hated trailer fenders..... I guess this is because they are often times used without being made a part of the bike. Sometimes they look right with very little work but most of the time not so much. I had some work to do before it was an exceptable bike fender.

As you can see this fender does not follow the radius of the tire.

It was also riddled with holes. It looked like this all the way around.

I radiused the fender to the tire and added a flip to the one end. This is just tracked together and the radius is to tight. I zipped apart a few tacks and opened the radius because the fender wont be mounted right on the tire.

Welded

English wheeled

After I had my fender look'n pretty I aimed to make it ever more attractive. I took some round stock and put it through the rollers until I had the radius of my fender.

Adding strength and aesthetics

adding some more flare

I made this fender mount out of stainless then made bungs and welded them into the fender

I welded some brake line to the backside to run my wiring through. I also added some steel where I welded in the bungs for more strength.

Bacon set me up with this sissy bar. I reworked it so the lines flowed better and made the fender mounts. Clean... solid.... strong

El Brazo Poco Raro Mexico 2007

I can't remember where exactly this pic is, but I know that a weird little arm fed me beer. The proof is in this picture. I saw weirder shit on this trip... and the one after it- while on this trip.

In Search Of......

.... a 47 tooth pulley for a two inch BDL belt that would fit on a spline shaft.


About a week ago my front pulley flew off and into some tall prairie grass but probably made it's way into the nearby pond. I searched the area high and low on a few different occasions with no luck of finding it. I'm not sure exactly how many teeth were on it but I do know the rear(clutch hub) has 76 teeth on it. My friend Mike gave me a 45 tooth pulley but it seems to be to small since the belt is very loose. I haven't done the math yet but I don't want to loose any on the top end. I think I need something like a 47 tooth pulley? Anyone know the math on the right ratio? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

E-mail me at joshkurpius@hotmail.com

This was my set up before it flew apart

Swiss Cheese

It was very apparent with a quick glance at the BlackBird frame that it had been a "Chopper" for the greater portion of it's life. Every time its look was freshened up with a new tank..... a new hole was drilled and the old one was simply filled with bondo. I just don't understand the thought process here. I mean a chopper should be built to be ridden..... ridden long miles. I first saw a crack in the paint/bondo and figure if there's a crack in the paint/bondo there must be a crack in the metal. It was right where you typically find a crack.... right at the motor mount. As I started to get rid of the paint and found a lot more holes.... in fact the inside of the backbone was completely filled with bondo. As I reached the seat post area I broke out the torch to burn out the bondo and found a lot of lead filler, then brass, then a bunch of weld.

The crack. I used a dremel to take material out of the crack area then filled the area with the tig. The crack didn't seem to wrap around the entire tube so I welded it up. I will keep an eye on it since I wasn't about to pull the motor.... I will make it right next winter.

Holes... holes... more holes.....

I found some round rod that was just bigger than the holes.... then found a drill bit just undersized of the round rod. I used the drill to normalize/clean the holes then hammered the cut off pieces of the round rod into the holes. I then welded the plugs in and made sure to burn them in really good. I'm not sure this is the proper way to do this but it seemed logical to me.

I used a grinder to smooth everything out making sure to not take away from the base material.

Finished.... Looks stronger to me. This winter I will blast the frame and really get into making things right..... I just want to ride it for now.

Sweet Dragger

I stole these from the Den of Sportster blog which were probably ripped from somewhere else....... I see my pictures ripped and posted there often. Anyway the info on these pics is most likely long gone but a sweet bike indeed.

I dig the Headlight/Gas tank

More Shed Party Pics

It's a biased grouping of pictures but a good time was had by all.

Eugene party text'n

A ghostly image of Mitch's face

Party couch

Mike

They came in their Sunday best......

The sensitive side of Peter

Willard and Mario

Torque Fest

I had made plans to go but of course everything seems to fall on the same date. It's just west of Galena IL. on the Iowa side of the river. Should be a good one.

City Toy

While everybody at the Woodstock swap was looking for neato Chopper stuff I was off with the other crowd looking for my long sought after xr400. Picked up this '98 ready to go with the baja designs headlight and fender kit already installed and ready to rip. The chopper kids aren't too into it, all the more reason to love it, not to mention I can carve to the job sites with much ease and park it where they can't tow it. I win.