Once we had the bike all mocked up and ready to go, we sent the frame, fork lowers, trees, hubs/rims, handlebars, and "oil" bag out to powdercoat. Our friends at East Coast Performance Coatings handled this. The frame was coated with "Laser Rootbeer" and the rest of the components were done in gloss black. Paint, as always, was done in-house here at Choppahead. It's a dark metallic brown with black panels. Pinstriping was handled by our pinstriper extraordinaire, and New England legend, Charlie the One-Armed Bandit. Beware the rusty hook!
We sent the seat out to fellow LB brother Jay, of Truckalope Leather infamy, for a complete work-over. Jay works out of a small hunting shack in the remote, hostile wilderness of New Hampshire. To find him, you have to follow what would be the snot line trail of the now-crumbled "Old Man of the Mountain." Legend has it that Jay only uses the hides of his personal fresh kills for seats and leatherwork. It's also of note that he has 101 uses for platypus semen. But we won't be exploring that here. Needless to say, Truckalope Jay took our bland Bates-style solo saddle and recovered and re-stitched it in leather that he hand dyed and tooled with a Choppahead banner.
So we had this bike looking sharp. But that's not all; it now also had better performance and more power. We accomplished this with minimal effort, and without having to get into the engine. All we did was re-jet the carbs, replaced the restrictive stock air cleaner with UNI-pods that breathe better (like an inhaler to an asthmatic), and took off the stock mufflers. This simple modification opened her up and gave considerable gains in power. It was like a whole new engine. Not to mention the fact that she shed a lot of pounds in her transformation, going from bulky stock bike to lean and streamlined kustom. Overall, she was better-looking and faster. Mission complete!
The most excruciating part of the build was the wiring. We're used to old bikes with few wires. However, the wiring diagram for these new Triumphs looks like a bowl of multi-colored spaghetti laid over a NYC subway map. Once we got our bearings on it, we were able to really trim the harness down by losing of a lot of the unnecessary components, like turn signals, speedo and instrument panel, carb heaters (the kid lives in Cali!), and so forth. This turned the bloated anaconda of a harness into a baby gardener snake.
When all was said and done, she was donned the Brown Eyed-Cyclops and made her public debut when we delivered her to the customer at the Smokeout West in Cottonwood, AZ last October. We did this photoshoot somewhere off the beaten path out in Bumble Bee, AZ, while on a quest for wild peyote and rattlesnake venom moonshine...but that is another story. Needless to say, she turned a lot of heads at the show, and we're working on another new Triumph Bonneville chopper as this was written.