HARLEY 45 – LOCKDOWN PROJECT’S RARELY AS GOOD AS THIS!

I WAS GOING TO START THIS ARTICLE BY QUOTING SOME OF THE LYRICS FROM ZAGER & EVANS’ IN THE YEAR 2525 (REMEMBER THAT?), BUT DECIDED AGAINST IT FOR THREE REASONS: FIRSTLY, THE PERFORMING RIGHTS SOCIETY’VE STARTED CHARGING MAGAZINES FOR LYRIC REPRODUCTION, SECONDLY, IT’S A BLOODY DEPRESSING SONG, AND THIRDLY, AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, YOU REALLY DON’T WANT TO HEAR ME SING, TRUST ME.

This absolutely glorious chop is indeed a ’45 45, hence the link to the song – a 1945 45 cubic inch (750cc) H-D. The engine’s from a Servicar, and is very slightly different to one of the WL war models (not much, just to do with the heads mainly), and it’s been mated, very cleverly, to a modern five-speed FXR gearbox, with a kickstart conversion, using a clutch from a 1950s 650 Triumph (Pete, the owner, had to bore the clutch centre and keyway to get it to fit the Harley ’box). The mounts on the ’box itself ’ve all been ground away, and new threaded bosses made n’ welded on, and it now attaches to the frame via its bottom (if you’ll pardon the familiarity). He also made an adjuster for the primary chain linking the engine and ’box together ’cos… well, the last thing you need, when yer trewsers sit reet close to it, is a chain that flaps about, isn’t it?

Said frame is a complete one-off, as I’m sure you’ll’ve guessed, made for him by his good friend Simon Harris at Attitude Cycles in Southampton. Pete and Si’ve been mates for a while now, and the first lockdown period was the catalyst for this build. Attitude weren’t, as

I’m sure you know, allowed to open, but rather than sit at home scratching their respective bums, Simon started on Pete’s frame, while Pete cracked into the motor.

As both o’ them are full-on chopper-heads, there was no way the bike was ever going to have stock-length forks. Pete picked up a set somewhere (he doesn’t know what they were originally off), and made his own eight-inch over tubes, machining the spiral design that flows through the bike into both the sliders, and the stanchions at the top between the yokes too (and the handlebar grips, and wheel spacers an’ stuff). He made the yokes too, and the fork brace, from aircraft-spec alloy – something he’s very familiar with as his day-job, before he retired, was an aircraft engineer.

Moving backwards, the tank’s a Sportster that’s been narrowed for a more pleasing shape, the seat’s a one-off by the respected Glenn Moger, the oil tank’s a one-off, and the rear muddie’s an aftermarket one cut n’ shut to sit close to the 5.00x16 rear tyre. Pete made the forwards hisself, and the manifold the SU carb (from an 850 Mini) sits on, while Simon made the ’bars, and the exhausts with their very cool chopper pots. The sissy-bar too is Pete’s work, as is most of it really.

Wanting a ‘no messing’ finish to the new/ old ’Arley, he decided to get everything that’d normally be painted powder-coated to make it as easy to clean as possible (we won’t mention the fact that there’s more than enough polishing to keep him occupied anyway), which was done by Attitude’s ’coaters of choice, Trestan Finishers, and is so well done that I really thought it was paint (that and the colour – not yer basic powder-coat colour, is it?). Steve, the guy in the hat with the sigils at Attitude, worked his dark art over the loom, and that, pretty much, was that (he said, making building a one-off chopper of this quality sound as easy as tripping over a wonky pavement is these days).

The little (little? It’s a 750!) Harley was built and finished during the first of what seems to be a never-ending series of Covid lockdowns and, by the time you read this, will’ve been on the road for just over a year. I photographed it back in August

2020, at the same time as Simon and Amelia’s bikes, on a long, hot summer evening – all three of them were ripping through the late Southampton sunlight, hands, face and knees in the breeze, while I was stuck in t’van, sweating and trying to keep up. Jealous? Yeah, just a bit…