Feature Scooter: Punisher
Having seen the scooter advertised as an unfinished project, Martyn ‘Burty’ Burrows immediately recognised its potential and jumped at the chance to buy it…
If you didn't know much about The Punisher before, after you've seen this scooter you'll be very clear on what the character is all about!
The basic theme of the scooter, The Punisher, had been started and for those of you who don’t know who The Punisher is, he’s a fictional character named Francis ‘Frank’ Castle, born Castiglione, who appeared in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character is depicted as an Italian-American vigilante who employs murder, kidnapping, extortion, coercion, threats of violence and torture in his campaign against crime. He is driven by the deaths of his wife and two children, who were murdered by the mob for witnessing a killing in New York City’s Central Park. The Punisher wages a one-man war on crime using various weapons.
He is a war veteran and a United States Marine Corps Scout Sniper in Force Recon’; Castle is skilled in hand-to-hand combat, guerrilla warfare and marksmanship, and is known by his skull motif on his chest. With all The Punisher’s unique crime-fighting credentials available to be considered for the theme, the possibilities were endless. However, things need to be balanced, because if all of those ideas override the objectivity of the project it’s more than likely going to end up looking confused, overcomplicated and lacking direction.
Flames
In early 2016 when Martyn bought the scooter it came as a frame with the body panels, forks, cylinder-head cowling, flywheel cover, rear mudguard and petrol tank. In terms of the project being partially started, the side panels and front mudguard had flames on them and the forks, cylinder-head cowling, flywheel cover, rear mudguard and petrol tank had the orange flame-style wrap.
Having developed an idea of how he wanted the paint to look, Martyn sent everything over to Chris Queen for the existing artwork to be developed. In the meantime, Martyn decided on the engine set-up, which would be a TS1 230 kit, with a 60/110mm crank, a 30mm Dell’Orto carb and a JL exhaust supported by a six-plate clutch and a Jet 200 gearbox.
While Martyn was building the engine, and while Chris was working on the paint, Martyn also began to search for unique items which would give the theme an interactive feel. To get things moving, he did a lot of searching on the internet and called on the services of several other contacts who he’d previously used in the development of his other custom scooters.
Treasure trove
During 2016 while Martyn was on holiday with his family he also used the time to search for additional custom items for the project. “In February or March we usually go to Norfolk and in October or November we usually go to Devon or Cornwall. The seaside towns we visit usually have little curio shops, antique shops and gothic shops, and I knew these could be treasure troves for the plans I had for the scooter,” Martyn smiled. Looking at the scooter it’s a real head-turner, and I’ll guarantee that if you didn’t know much about The Punisher before you’d seen the scooter, after you’ve seen it you’ll be left in no doubt as to what the character is all about. The Punisher’s skull motif appears as the main mural on the legshields. The skeleton hands, which Martyn fabricated from a gothic cut-down candle holder, fit round the K2 skull horn grille and inside the eye sockets of the horn grille are LED running lights. The pathfinder headlight and cover are Harley-Davidson items and the skulls on the sides of the mudguard are also by K2. The seat is a bobber-style custom one-off item built by Cult Custom Seats and underneath the seat Martyn’s fabricated a Series 2 grab-rail, which also houses a leather tool roll bag. Moving to the rear of the scooter, in the position of the rear frame badge are two small skulls which have red LED lights for eyes and also light up with the running lights. The Punisher badges, which appear at the front and rear of the seat and on the legshields, have been fabricated by
Martyn from custom belt buckles. Below The Punisher badge at the rear of the seat are two halves of a Colt 45-style pistol grip and the original side panel handles have been replaced with customised semi-automatic kid’s Airsoft guns. Remove the side panels and the momentum of the theme continues. The revolver cylinder cross-sections at either side of the fuel tank are again fabricated belt buckles, and the giant-sized bullet in the leather skull pouch attached to the rear footboard frame mount is actually a novelty flask. The original flame-style wrapped fuel tank, cylinder-head cowling, flywheel cover and rear mudguard blend nicely into the theme and the themed K2 flywheel guard is neat.
I’ve only touched on a few of the custom
features, which run throughout this scooter and there’s plenty more to talk about because the creativity, assortment and diversity of the origin of some of the items which have been blended into the project is amazing. However, with this in mind I dare say that while Martyn was on holiday with his family his grandkids might have missed out on the odd ice cream or two and in turn possibly the odd birthday or Christmas present or two. Nevertheless, with everything taken into account I’m sure the prize was worth the price. But having said that, I’m also sure that when Martyn’s grandkids do see the scooter they may work out where some of their birthday or Christmas presents ended up!
Words: Stu Smith
Photos: Gary Chapman