By now, there can't be very many of you out there who have not heard of Paul Yaffe and his shop, Paul Yaffe Originals in Phoenix. Some of the most memorable bikes built in the past five years have rolled out of PYO. Another thing those of you who have followed PYO over the years know is that the shop is capable of building bikes in every style imaginable. From fat and heavily detailed show bikes to the stripped-down, lean rigid on these pages, you can see that there isn't any style that Yaffe is afraid to experiment with.
When Paul started this project, he asked shop manager, Brian Adams, what he should do if he were going to build the bike for himself. But what Brian didn't know was that Paul had decided to build the bike as a Christmas gift for Brian. Thinking the bike was being built for another customer, Brian gave Paul a few ideas and quickly went back to work.
Paul also wanted to make this his first TC88B-engined bike, just to try something different. Since Brian is of average height, Paul went with no additional backbone stretch, but added 6 inches in the downtubes to elevate the front end. He was going after that tall, spindly, and down-to-business look that Brian said he liked. He also wanted a bit of space between the front rocker box and the bottom of the fuel tank. The rake was set at 40 degrees and a 10-inch-over frontend was constructed with Harley Deuce legs and Paughco triple trees, with an extra 6 degrees of rake to correct the trail of the front axle.
Rolling around was made easy with a pair of Performance Machine Villain wheels. The front is a classic 21-incher with Metzeler rubber and Performance Machine brakes. Rear wheel components come from the same companies, but the 18-inch wheel runs a huge 240 tire to fatten up the look of the back of the bike. Since the bike is a rigid, Paul jokingly tells us that lowering the pressure in the Metzeler tire to a scant 15 pounds of air provides the bike's rear suspension. Hey, you do what you have to do, right?
The drivetrain was the easiest part of the bike. Yaffe ordered an '01 TC88B and converted it to a 95-incher with new pistons and bored barrels. One of Yaffe's signature Force Products air cleaner assemblies was installed, and the custom PYO exhaust system was given a ceramic coating by Jet-Hot. A stock '01 H-D five-speed was bolted to the back of the engine and a Primo open beltdrive was threaded between the front and rear pulleys to transfer power between the two components.
While Paul was busy fabricating the PYO fuel tank with Hot Match Custom Cycles pop-up fuel cap, PYO's Ron Dewey was busy reshaping the PYO front fender that barely covers the front tire. A PYO rear fender with custom struts was attached to the rear of the frame, and the final piece of bodywork, formed by Yaffe and the boys, was the oil tank. Once the test-fitting was finished, Gary Crisp was selected to perform the silver paint and flame graphics work.
After Crisp had buffed out the final clearcoat, the driveline and the bodywork were once again mounted in their respective places. Finally, Paul's new ride was nearing its final phase. To finish things up, the handlebars, the risers, the taillight, the foot controls, and the pegs were all ordered straight from the PYO catalog.
When the bike was fired up and no leaks or loose items were found, Paul told Brian to take it out for its maiden voyage. What would have normally been a 15-minute cruise along their usual test course turned into a 60-mile, hour-long ride. Just as Paul started worrying about Brian being stuck somewhere, he heard a distant rumble and spotted a single headlight coming back toward the shop. Once the guy was close enough to view, Paul could see it was Brian with a slight grin on his face.
"This thing rocks!" he said.
"Yeah, it's gonna look great in your garage, too" Paul replied.