If you're wondering about this chopper's moniker, "Poco Grasso", it's a loose translation of "Little Fatty" in Italian. Giving his bikes Italian names is a signature move for Gard Hollinger, owner of LA County Choprods, in Marina del Rey, California. What isn't usual for him is building a bike with a fat 280 backside, like this one. Why? Because when a trend hits the industry, he builds in the opposite direction to stay different. So it's odd that with fat ass rear tires being all the rage these days, his shop would crank out a big-bootied bike like Poco Grasso here.
It started when a customer flaked on an order for a 280 rear tire rigid chassis. Rather than just sell it off to someone else, Hollinger's shop used it as a creative catalyst to launch its version of a wide tire chopper. Ever on the lookout for new inspiration, Gard collects parts that he sees and likes with the intention of using them on future projects. When the pool of parts started getting too large last year, he decided it was time to put some of them to use on a project: this one. This bike was built using many of those parts with the remaining gaps filled by parts LACC manufactures, imports or made one-off. He wanted this bike to be low, but with a comfortable stance for the rider with a simplistic look and style; all of the parts had to fit that bill and he chose them with these tenets in mind.
Searching through his cache of packratted iron, Gard turned up a set of spoked wheels that fit the bill nicely for what he had in mind (to this day he has no idea who made them; all he knows is that they look cool. And that's all that really matters, anyway). Once they were shod in Metzeler rubber, LACC fabricated a 2-inch under billet front end for the snub nose look, after which they finished out the rolling chassis with ISR brakes, for which LACC is the exclusive North American distributor. Regarding ISR, Hollinger says, "That guy's been building race bike brakes for 30 or 35 years. They work great and safety is his main concern."
Like the chopper builders of old, one of the reasons Gard kept the plan simple was to minimize weight. That, combined with Poco Grasso's 113-inch motor, makes the chop pretty quick off the stoplight. Although it's a crate motor and not part of the collection, LACC complemented it with velocity stacks from Gard's private reserve and LACC pipes. Moreover, the Hildebrandt oil cooler on the left side of the mill multi-tasks not only as an oil chiller, it also adds a unique look to the motor.
But there's a lot more to Poco Grasso's looks than an oil cooler. Gard was dying to use a Paughco peanut tank he'd squirreled away, and with its simple, rounded look, it was the perfect candidate for this bike. He'd added a jockey shift setup during the motor phase of the build and gave it a touch of novelty by capping it off with a piston for a shifter knob. What really draws onlookers in to this chopper, however, is the funky paint job. Zeak's Custom bathed Poco Grasso in satin black and medium orange metalflake to turn the chopper into a bit of a chameleon; depending on the light, Poco Grasso looks metallic orange, black, or somewhere in between.
And unusual is a big part of what choppers are all about. For Gard Hollinger, it usually means going against trends, but Poco Grasso presented the challenge of incorporating a major craze (i.e. the wide back tire) and building his own take on it. You may not see a fat rear tire bike like this come out of LACC again for a long time (but never say never).