Growing up in his family's machine shop, Kirk decided it was time to branch out on his own.
Nowadays, when you mention the name Kirk Taylor, of Custom Design Studios, almost everyone in the custom motorcycle industry recognizes the name and the quality of work that is produced within their shop's walls. This wasn't necessarily the case when Kirk Taylor and CDS emerged from a small shop in Navato, CA, back in '88. After growing up working in his family's machine shop, Kirk decided it was time to branch out on his own. Being that back in '88 there were already three bike shops established in the area, Kirk opted to open up CDS, which focused on more of the custom paint aspects of the fabrication scene. As years went on, CDS ultimately evolved into a full service shop equipped with a full paint department, as well as a fabrication department and service/parts operation.
Fast forward more than a decade and countless custom projects. Kirk found himself at a bike show in the Sacramento area, where he ran into one of the world's most notorious headbangers out there: James Hetfield. That's right, James Hetfield, frontman of the legendary rock band Metallica. After spending the afternoon talking shop and shop only, Kirk soon found that James was just another down-to-earth gearhead like the rest of us. Being that James is a Northern California resident as well, and they soon sparked up a friendship, with Kirk mentoring James on the "how-tos" of bike building.
If you recall back in January of '06, STREET CHOPPER featured the Widow Maker, a hill climber/flat tracker-inspired bike that Kirk and James received sponsorship from Custom Chrome Industries to build. Well, the fun didn't stop there; the Split Tail featured here is the second installment of their business venture with CCI, this time building a bike with the "wow factor" in mind.
Since Kirk has been around the bike scene for some time, and witnessed the different eras of bikes, he wanted to build a bike inspired by the California Digger style with added European overtones.
The project was started by selecting a 38-degree gooseneck, 2 inch-out, rigid Santee frame from CCI. Utilizing two pieces of 1-1/2-inch C-channel, they were welded together and drilled out, replacing the frame's original backbone. Keeping with the same geometry of the I-beam backbone, a secondary piece was used as the rear fender mount and support, thus the name "Split Tail" came to life.