Coming from working out of their garages for three years before opening Acme in 2005, Wayne and Jason's mission is to build simple bikes that the average person can afford, using handmade quality parts. This bobber "was our attempt to build a $40,000 bike for under $25,000, using a lot of H-D take-off and stock parts," Wayne said. Of course, it helped that he has a friend who works at a local H-D shop, where they can get first dibs on take-off parts. Between those parts and a '98 Road Glide engine and transmission that Wayne came across on Craigslist, the shop had a solid platform to start the build. Wayne is also influenced by the Japanese-style bikes, liking the no-rake, no-stretch specs, and low, retro-looking styles. "The Japanese-style bikes tend to be aggressive-looking and low, and have short wheel bases and frontends, as well as high-profile tires," Wayne said. They incorporated those Japanese styles into this bike, although one of the most frequent comments people have when they see it is that it looks more like a vintage museum piece.
This bobber's museum-esque style may partly have something to do with its polished aluminum bodywork, hence its name "Aluma-Bobber." The amount of time spent to get the aluminum gas tank and rear fender to its shiny glory was, let's just say, painstakingly long. There's no paint, powdercoat, or polished metal on this bike. A feature of the Aluma-Bobber as well as most bikes built by the shop is sufficient ground clearance. Seems trivial, but they keep at the forefront of each build where the customer lives, because plenty of ground clearance is needed for any hard riding in the Northeast, for example. "This bike has the looks," Wayne said, "but it also has to handle and be able to take a beating on the roads."
Whether it's the crew's scrutiny of parts chosen and made for this bike, its overall lines and finish, or simply acting the part of looking expensive, they seem to be doing well with it, as it's placed first in all shows entered in the Bobber Class. They've even built a handful for customers that are based off this bike's design. It's undetermined what's next for the shop, but we do know that they'll choose wisely.