Caveman gives us his best!
What a beauty. Like he said, this thing is a jewel. You may recall, when we received the BAD Bike donor the engine was at Caveman’s garage. He is a builder and engine expert for shovels, pans, etc. Caveman agreed to build up the motor to our specification for this project to help support the American Diabetes Association. And he gave it his all.
The bike is going to be all black and we wanted the powerplant to be a dark jewel among the frame. We specified the rocker tops and cone to be bead blasted the fasteners all polished stainless steel or chrome and the rest black as you see here.
For the workings we have a brand new S&S Black Super E carb, fasteners from Hillco Fastener Warehouse, Total Seal Rings all in a 1980, 80ci Shovelhead with Andrews A-2 cam and teflon coated pistons. The rockers feature HD Valves, cast iron guides, Sifton OEM style springs & collars, and hydraulic pushrods. Built as a solid runner with minor improvements to increase performance and reliability, this is not a hot-dogger race/bar bike.
When we picked up the motor, Fred was there with his daily driver, shovel chopper that Caveman re-built 10 years ago. The bike is running great and clean, no leaks or anything. “If you run it cool, and don’t hot dog around town on it, keep it at 60mph it will run forever. You start racing it around going 90+ on the highway and it will need some work.” Caveman insisted. And with the four-speed to back it up, we wouldn’t have it any other way, just put along and enjoy the breeze.
Installing it in the frame was a bit of a chore for us. Billy held the bike still with locks on his wheel chair and T-Bone muscled it in while Panzer snored. On the first several attempts this iron beast put up a fight. After a careful review and a chance to breathe they removed a couple of acorn nuts on the top and it easily cleared the frame.
Time for another reveal.
The boys thrashed about that afternoon and evening to put in the transmission to fill the gap a bit. Next they added the new Lyndall Racing Brake rotors that are about a third of the weight of stock rotors. Then neighbor Carlos helped roll it up the ramp into Billy’s rig for a day at the So Cal Cycle Swap Meet to show the progress.
At the show a guy followed us as we rolled all the way through to the front corner and asked how much for the bike before we could even get out of the truck. We said make a bid at the auction and before we could explain anymore, he bolted. Gary and Dave from Wheel Works helped us unload the bike and our buddy Jeff showed up to keep us company for the day.
The bike got quite a bit of attention and people asked if they could donate to the cause so we put out a jar for their awesome donations. Carl from Cyclepath Cycle came over to help us load it back up to take it home. Time for a new ramp. Ours is a shorty quad ramp.
Be sure to follow the progress at www.BADBikeBuild.com the end of the year is coming quick, so we got to get back to thrashing about.