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Irish Rich Custom Motorcycles at 85th Sturgis Rally #431
Irish Rich Custom Motorcycles at 85th Sturgis Rally #431
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About this episode
Rich, known as Irish Rich, shares his legendary experiences from the custom motorcycle scene at the Sturgis Rally. He reminisces about the early days of Sturgis, recounting wild stories and memorable moments, including the infamous burning of port-a-potties. The conversation dives into the evolution of motorcycle culture, the rise of performance baggers, and the significance of community among riders. Rich also discusses his projects, the challenges of modern biking, and the importance of craftsmanship in building bikes that resonate with personal history and style.
Topics:
sturgis rally history
custom motorcycles
performance baggers
community among riders
motorcycle culture evolution
craftsmanship in biking
memorable sturgis stories
chopper building
motorcycle projects
riding experiences
Irish Rich is a custom motorcycle builder with over 50 years of experience in motorcycle customization! On this second visit, we sat down in Rich's shop during the 85th Sturgis rally to hear more stories from the past.
Rich's Instagram https://www.instagram.com/irishrichcustomcycles
The Fast Life Garage Youtube https://www.youtube.com/@TheFastLifeGarage
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What's up, everyone, and welcome back to the Fast Scythe podcast.
On today's episode, I'm sitting down with none other than Rich, aka Irish Rich, who is
a legend here in the custom motorcycle building world.
He's almost in every magazine I seem to pick up on my shelf and flip through from the days
past.
He lives up in Sturgis, South Dakota.
So now I think we're on this path of sitting down every year at Sturgis to catch up, hear
some more stories, talk some more motorcycles, and just get to hear some of his wisdom.
So before we get into it, please guys take a moment to check out our sponsors, 1-800-LAWTIGERS.
If you or someone you know has been in an accident, they can get you dialed in on
the right path to getting things taken care of.
If you need some cool shit for your motorcycle, Arlen S has got you covered with tons and
tons of amazing products that I personally use as well.
If you need to get your bike lit up, front and back, seeing the future and letting the
past know you're out of there, check out Custom Dynamics.
They got you covered.
Also, if you're looking for a new or used motorcycle, my guys over at Cowboy, Harley
Davidson down in Austin, Texas, they're going to get you taken care of, so check
them out.
Now, let's get into this episode with Irish Rich.
Hey guys, you ready to let the dogs out?
How you been man?
It's been a year.
Yeah.
Well, I'm looking forward to this.
I enjoyed it last year, so I guess we'll do it again if you're willing.
I'm willing.
Yeah.
And we'll talk with whatever you want.
Yeah.
I mean, like I said, last year, I think we kind of really went over a lot of like, you
know, your path getting into where you landed here in Sturgis.
Yeah.
So, you know, like, yeah, I was thinking about it on the way over here.
I was like, I wanted to ask you, like, what do you think your most memorable
time ever in Sturgis was?
Probably the first year.
First year?
When they ride in City Park and they burnt the border potties because they
wouldn't come in.
Yeah.
And everybody was so rowdy they wouldn't come in and pump out the border potties.
So they tipped them over and burnt them and the cops wouldn't go in, you know.
So, I think that's probably, that was my first year up here.
And I mean, you know, Sturgis was, it was pretty wild.
Yeah.
Still, you know, I think there were like 26,000 people.
Okay.
So, pretty much everybody was staying, there wasn't really a bunch of campgrounds
everywhere and things like that.
Well, there were some, you know, and...
But that was the place to be with City Park?
Oh, City Park definitely was what was happening.
And there were still quite a few people that were running out their houses and stuff.
Yeah.
And, yeah, that was the place to be.
Yeah.
Either there or Deadwood.
Deadwood?
Yeah.
Because, well, they still kind of run close together.
They had Deadwood days in 1976 with the Parades and the rodeos and all that.
Yeah.
And then the rally started.
Was the other cities like your Hill City and Rapid City, were they much a part of the
rally in that time?
Or was it...
Well, people would stay in Rapid City.
Yeah.
You know.
And, no, as the time went on, everybody was looking at Sturgis and they're going, well,
if these people are making money, you know, weakening.
And Sundance was pretty big at that time.
And, obviously, Deadwood.
But Hill City and all those, they had people that were staying there, but there really
wasn't much going on.
Get up in the morning, leave, come back at night and go to sleep.
But now Hill City's got like a little mini...
Yeah, they've got their own rally going on.
Yeah, they've got a mini main street there.
Yeah.
And Spearfish the same thing.
They've got one street in, down at the end of town there.
They've got vendors set up and they've got...
Yeah.
They had that gas station at the end of Spearfish Canyon that's always got tons of vendors
at and whatnot.
Yeah, it seems like you said everybody started getting in on the money aspect of
being able to sell some real estate for some brand or some guy to come out.
Well, Hill City has, like I said, like a little mini main street,
little mini Sturgis there.
And they have vendors set up on almost every gas stop in there.
Yeah, yeah.
No.
I mean, they might not be major vendors, but a lot of them are like pretty good
t-shirt vendors.
Yeah, yeah.
You know, and some parts of accessories, but I don't know what they're charging them
up as Hill City, what the rates are.
You know, I mean, they've got to be cheaper than mainstream.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
And I think that they looked around.
Everybody looked around and they said, hey, if Sturgis is making money,
everybody's got to come through here.
Yeah.
Let's make money too.
Exactly.
So I don't know what they charge for, like, you know, vendor permits and stuff,
but, you know, some of these places downtown, I don't know how they make any money
because you've got to buy your tax licenses,
yeah, permits and your vendor spot and that.
And even before you sell a t-shirt.
Yeah.
It's like $2,500 to $3,000, you know.
My buddy used to set up right on the corner across from One Eye Jackson
and the side of someone's yard.
It was $13,000 to be there.
Oh.
And then, yes, you do have all the, what they call the Sturgis Mafia.
They want their money.
You know what I mean?
Yeah.
Well, they probably still do it.
I vented up here at Sturgis Community Center with a company called Giants.
Yeah.
They did it in 2000 and 2001.
And you had to pay your taxes on Sherman Street there on a Sunday and then Wednesday
and then to Saturday before you left.
And if you weren't down there in the morning to pay your taxes,
in the middle of the afternoon, there would be the Sturgis tax people with a clipboard going,
you didn't report your income here.
Yeah.
You'd pay your taxes and they'd want the money right on the spot.
Yeah.
That's wild.
Yeah.
And I know there's an additional fee like if it's a tattoo parlor, you know,
or a tattoo operation.
Why?
I didn't know, brother.
All right.
Get out of here.
All right, guys.
All right.
Okay.
We'll let them pull off.
So we'll let them pull off that way if it gets super loud.
Yeah.
Okay.
They'll probably roll down.
Now because actually when I would leave here,
a lot of times we'd go to Spearfish and look around there and get something to eat.
Then we'd take, I don't remember the highway.
3, no, 685.
I don't know.
It runs from the middle of Spearfish.
It comes out right at the bottom of the hill right before Newcastle.
Are you talking about the one that'll take you to Deadwood or the one that takes you down?
Oh, Newcastle.
That's like Wyoming, isn't it?
Yeah.
Yeah, that's right.
You come out right before Newcastle and Newcastle's just south of there.
You climb up and over the hill.
Yeah.
Isn't it the road that comes out of lead and goes all the way out there?
No.
That's 385.
Oh, okay.
That's Newcastle.
Okay.
Okay.
Yeah.
That's 385.
I'll tell you if there's a road up there, I'll tell you.
The motorcycle won't see you because we're out east, you know?
It's now beyond here.
Still got that.
I think he's got that job.
It looks like an FXR surgery.
No, he doesn't need to change it.
Every little FXR surgery is just like two thirds the size.
Yes.
Yeah.
The settlement makes that.
Settlement.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I had to make the choice this year of going to the settlement party or going to Keith
Falls.
Oh.
Deal on Friday night.
And I always go to the settlement party.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And he has his on Friday night and they revealed the 85th anniversary painting.
Oh, that's cool.
In his shop and the Law Tigers took care of the refreshments and stuff.
Nice.
But I figured I have to support Keith.
Yeah.
How far do you all go back?
About 25 years.
Okay.
Yeah.
About 25 years.
So about what?
2000.
Yeah.
2025, right?
Yeah.
Yeah, it is.
So when did he get, when did he stop being the editor of EasyRider?
Oh, you know, it had to be in the early 80s.
I'm not exactly sure.
I could look it up.
Yeah.
But Frank Keisler was on the staff.
He was on it in like about 80 and 81 is when he joined.
And when Keith left, then Frank Keisler took over.
They tapped him for editor.
And I think he was editor for quite a few years, maybe four or five.
I don't know.
I'd have to look all this stuff up.
My mind is not, you know, I can't pop this stuff.
I can't pop it out anymore.
So I'm kind of like a computer running the slow Windows 98.
You know, not even second edition.
Yeah, yeah.
The five and a half inch flop, instead of a three and a half.
But the Frank left.
Keith came back.
I'm not exactly sure what happened.
And I can ask Keith.
I can't ask Frank because Frank passed away four years ago.
So I can't ask him.
Yeah, I mean, I stayed at his place in San Pedro.
And then I stayed with him when I was out there in LA.
When he bought his place in Wilmington.
Yeah.
He bought the old Siemens Hotel where the guys would come in to the docks.
And they, you know, be there like two or three days.
Yeah.
They'd catch the next ship out.
They'd stay there.
Yeah, that's cool.
So I had a little historical significance.
And then down at the end of his street was like the only access from San Pedro to the ocean.
So Keith thought that'd be a good place to buy because, you know, they were going to redevelop that whole area.
Yeah.
And they were more accessible in that.
I don't know.
I think it all, I think the Dragon of Heald on.
Yeah.
The alley's broken.
Okay.
You know, they don't, they don't have a pot to piss in.
So, you know, I think that kind of, I don't know if they're still doing it or not.
Again, we'd have to ask Keith.
So he can, he can fill you in on all that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, it's funny we're talking about easy riders.
Well, Dave Nichols became the editor and I'm not sure he was editor when I had my FXTT bike in Easy Riders.
He was the editor and I'm thinking that was like 2012 or 2013.
A guy I graduated high school with.
He's a musician, songwriter.
He travels all over the country.
He's been in a whole bunch of different groups and stuff.
And he asked me one time, he goes, hey, do you know a guy named Dave Nichols?
I said, yeah, he's the editor of Easy Riders.
He said, where's my next door neighbor?
I said, yeah, well, tell him he owes me money for quoting me in his last book.
Yeah.
So, but that I'm not clear on the dates.
Yeah.
I didn't have the dates all fucked up.
Yeah, yeah.
What was the first bike you had in Easy Rider magazine?
The, the, my bike that was called the FXTT.
What was that bike based out of?
Like the whole?
It was a, I wanted to, I wanted to build, I had this Kraft Tech frame hanging around.
Yeah.
And finally, Steve said, we're going to build this thing or not.
Yeah.
He said, well, you know what I'd really like to build?
I said, I'd like to build like a Texas shortster.
And I don't know if you'd know what that is.
I don't know.
They would take a rigid frame and it'd shorten it like two to three inches in the back
section and shorten up the wheel base.
Yeah.
And then derake it a little bit.
And then they'd race Class A like that.
Oh, okay.
They'd race it in, in, at the College of Texas shortster because that's where they came out
of.
Okay.
So that's what I did.
I shortened the back frame section two and a half inches and I lined up the bottom
leg.
So it would raise the axle plates and lift the bike up or lower the axle plates unit
and lift the bike up.
And then I realized everything and got it all straight and went from there.
It was a SNS shovel head and 39 millimeter front end.
And a super glide gas tank.
The long peanut style.
Yeah.
And when I bought the tank, I got it on eBay and the guy took pictures of it.
They had a whole bunch of pictures, but he didn't take pictures of the one side.
So when I got the tank, it was 50 bucks.
So when I got the tank, I looked and the sheet metal screw in the side of the tank,
there was a hole in there and he drilled out, put a sheet metal screw in there.
So I had to take care of that.
You know, I moved the filler, put a flush mount in it in the tank.
But when I got it, it was like metallic green.
Yeah.
And she's going, man, there's like the ugliest tank I have ever seen in my life.
I'm going, don't worry about it.
I said, you know, this is just raw material.
I said, you'll think different, you know, when I get it finished.
Yeah.
And he said, I doubt it.
And then when I finally worked it over, you know, the hidden mounts on it.
Like I say, the filler relocate and that.
And he's going, man, he's going, that like fits the bike really well.
That's cool.
Hell yeah.
And I got it on the cover too.
I mean, it was, it was down at the bottom of the cover.
Yeah.
But it was, it was a good sized picture.
And then I got the first feature in the magazine and they always put like their
premiere bikes were always the first feature.
Yeah.
So when you got through with the table of contents and the columns and stuff,
the first feature you went to was usually the one that they wanted to spotlight.
So that's where it was.
Yeah.
And looked at the photography on it.
It made the thing look fabulous.
This was when you were based out of a Denver area.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Because Mike was only a half hour from me.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And there was Mike that insisted I put it in EasyRider.
I said, okay.
That's, you know, that's still like probably one of my goals is to,
you know, hopefully the EasyRider magazine continues to go on.
And then I can, you know, that's one of the things I want to get, you know.
Well, it was with me too.
I mean, I have the first, you know, I have the EasyRiders from like the very
first issue.
Yeah.
You know, as soon as I got on the newsstand, I grabbed it.
Man, this is an unbelievable magazine.
Yeah.
You know, I bought them.
I have them all up to the issue that they did the coverage on the
95th anniversary for Harley-Davidson.
Okay.
And after that I didn't, there was nothing in there I really wanted to see.
Yeah.
You know, and I didn't like the editorial content anymore.
So I just quit buying them.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But that being said, because I had bought EasyRiders ever since the first issue.
Mm-hmm.
And it always been one of my goals to get a bike in EasyRiders.
Yeah.
So it didn't matter to me when Mike said, well, we're going to send it to EasyRiders.
Mm-hmm.
And it didn't matter to me at the time.
I just, I said, well, I got a bike in EasyRiders, finally.
Yeah.
I checked that off my list.
Yeah.
You know.
It was like putting a, trying to get a bike into the Grand National Roadster
Show in Pomona, California.
Yeah.
Because it's really hard to get in that show, you know.
Because you've got to send in your application.
You've got to send in, you know, right, left photos, front, back.
Same thing with the cars.
They cut the bikes off at 75 entries.
Because that's not a lot in Southern California, I mean.
Yeah.
75 bikes is not anything.
That's a bike night.
Yeah.
And they, they sent in my application.
Mm-hmm.
And that was like good enough for me.
Yeah.
Just to be on the floor at the Roadster Show.
That was another one of my goals.
And I did it and I won the Chopper class.
Oh, that's fucking cool.
The booth, you know.
So that was, that was another one off my bucket list, you know.
Check that off.
And what else you want?
So how many did you, you said you ended up having three features
in EasyRiders with three different bikes?
Or what was it?
No, no, no.
I said Mike had shot three of my bikes.
Mike shot three of your bikes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
One for EasyRiders.
And then Frank Keisler shot that one.
The one I, he shot the Chrome Nun, the one that's in the museum.
Yeah.
Here's the museum.
He shot that one for Street Chopper.
Okay.
And then the third one, you can't remember it.
When he was, it was three.
Yeah, yeah.
I'd have to go down because I got all the magazine feature plaques.
Yeah.
And I'd have to go through the plaques and go, oh, here it is.
Yeah.
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Yeah, I missed the days of the magazines, man.
They were, you know, obviously they're still around.
They're moment nostalgic now.
I've been collecting old ones.
I pretty much got the 80s and most of the 90s
summed up of all the magazines, the Easy Riders,
but a little couple of 70s here and there,
but they're getting kind of hard to find,
you know what I mean?
Well, they are.
And if, you know, somebody's,
usually you don't see the Easy Riders
we have separate issues.
Yeah.
You know, and if you do they're like outrageously bright.
Did you ever, like, what was the other one?
Was it a, was it Cycle Connection or Cycle Showcase,
another magazine that was out back in the day?
Supercycle was the biggest header of Easy Riders.
I've seen some of those.
I haven't really ever bought them though.
I have a full collection.
For real?
Yeah.
That was run by Steve Iorio.
Okay.
And he owned SIE that sold, you know,
Springer Front Ends, Fingers and Tanks
and LL bars and Risers.
He was based out of Chicago.
And I don't remember what the connection was
and I remember he used to run ads in there all the time.
Well he ran ads in all the magazines,
but somehow he got Supercycle Magazine.
And then he moved to Huntington Beach
and then he changed the name of the company
to Harley Nostalgia.
Then Harley sued him.
And he had to change it to Nostalgia Cycle.
Okay.
But he kept going with Supercycle.
That's cool.
And I have a full set of them.
And Steve wanted to sell Supercycle.
He didn't want to do it anymore.
And the original editor, Larry Comfortman,
was actually killed on his way back
to Southern California for sturdiness.
Damn.
He had an accident on his strike and he killed.
Damn.
And then Steve took over full time
as the editor and publisher.
So that magazine kind of had the same premise
as Easy Rider, you know, a lot of lifestyle,
a couple of features.
It was actually a little
rar image and content than Easy Rider was at the time
because they wanted to be better than Easy Rider.
Yeah.
It's kind of like the Playboy penthouse thing.
Yeah, right. Exactly.
That's a good analogy.
That's exactly what it was.
And when Steve wanted to
sell Supercycle,
Paisano Publications wanted to buy it.
Yeah.
And he said,
there's no way in hell I'm selling this
to Paisano.
He said,
I'll just end the magazine.
I'll just walk away from it
before I sell it to Paisano.
Yeah.
So he...
Well, a company like that would probably
smooth it all over and,
you know, get rid of the thing that makes it what it is
and try to make it more palatable to
like you were saying earlier on the newsstands, you know?
Yeah.
Well, what eventually happened was
that the people that Steve Iorio
sold the magazine to
turned around and sold it to Paisano
after they ran it for a while.
It's almost like they backdoored them.
Yeah.
So Paisano wound up with it anyway.
Yeah.
So then what they did,
which was what Steve was afraid of,
is that they merged Supercycle
and Biker Magazine.
Oh, okay.
Together because it said Biker on there
and then at the top it said
with Supercycle
and then it killed the title.
Damn.
Got rid of it.
Kind of like got rid of the competition almost, you know?
Yeah.
That's exactly what they did.
Let's cut through it back then.
I know.
What a tangled web, huh?
Yeah.
You know, like when I got into the industry
there was so many magazines.
You had Road, Iron
and, you know, you had so many magazines
that were more kind of just trying to capitalize
off of the early 2000s commercialization
of Harley in the motorcycle industry.
Yeah.
And they all slowly kind of merged
and kind of went away to where you were left
with like Hot Bike and Easy Rider
and of course Chris Callin with Cycle Source.
And it just kind of, I don't know,
Easy Rider went through all these different changes
and then coming back and changes
and it's like the last reiteration of it was
the old Easy Riders are back
but then you look in the magazine
and it doesn't look like the old Easy Riders.
You know what I mean?
No.
And they, you know, they sold Easy Riders.
Yeah.
And they tried to put out the companies
at the bottom.
They weren't even motorcycles.
Yeah, yeah.
You know, had no connection with motorcycles
and then they wanted to make it.
I don't know where they came up with this idea.
They wanted to make a combination of like
Easy Rider magazine and GQ magazine,
Gentleman's Quarter.
Yeah.
Well, that was a big flop.
Yeah.
And it was expensive.
It was like 15 bucks.
Yeah.
You know, had that lasted for two issues.
Yeah, that wasn't going to work.
Have you ever got into like the DICE magazines
or any of those guys?
I have some.
Yeah.
I thought they looked pretty cool.
My favorite is the old, it's not old,
but you remember the show class magazines
that came out for a while?
I have a few of those down there too.
I've been trying to collect the whole thing of that.
That's, that's, those are kind of,
there was a guy selling the whole kit
that I really wanted to buy.
Like all, he had every one of them.
But it was like, I was just getting back
from a motorcycle trip and I spent all kinds of money
and I just couldn't swing the money at the time.
But yeah, that's always been my thing.
I think it was show class and like issue three,
they got a hold of me and wanted to do an interview.
That's cool.
Yeah.
So I did one with them.
And then I didn't have much contact with them after that.
And DICE, I knew those guys.
Yeah, yeah.
And I had a feature in their magazine
on my black shovel head.
Yeah.
North Cal Widow.
We called it because it was like a
Northern California chopper.
That style.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I think that was issue 10 or 13.
I don't remember.
Anyways, it's the issue that's got
the Captain America helmet on the front.
Oh, there you go.
That's the issue over there.
But I used to see those guys all the time.
Yeah.
Every time I go to a lobby,
so those guys would be around someplace.
Yeah.
I want to say that one of the guys passed away
a couple of years ago.
I'm not Dean.
Mike, right?
Was it Mike?
No.
They're going to kill me because I can't remember.
Yeah.
I forget it too.
I can't remember.
Yeah.
He passed away.
And then I think the Dean actually moved to
North Carolina now, I believe is where he's out of.
I don't know because he went back to England
for a while.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
Ah.
Oh, now it's going to drive me crazy.
I'll think of it in a minute.
Like I said, we're running a Mundo 98.
You know, I can't recall a lot of that.
Anyways, ask me something.
Ask me something I know.
So how many, how many Sturgis events have
been made in your, you know, in your run
in this motorcycle world?
You can't record that.
My first year was 1982.
Yeah.
And I've probably missed six or eight.
That's crazy.
Yeah.
You know, up till now.
Yeah.
Now you kind of got the cheat code.
You're already here.
Like everybody's coming to you now.
Well, that's true.
You know, my wife says, you know what?
I really love living up here.
She says, I just love this place.
That's why I said looking for Sturgis.
And she says, but I missed that ride up here.
Yeah.
Back.
That was almost as good as going to.
Yeah.
The rally to begin with.
Yeah.
That's the excitement and the unknown
of what's that you're going to be like.
And she was going through all of us.
She's going, we rode through ice,
you know, on the highways.
And we rode through hail storms.
We rode through torrential rain.
Yeah.
From, uh, Denwood to Denver.
Yeah.
Never let up and wind storms,
you know, where we went through this all the way home, you know.
Yeah.
And she said, I really miss all.
So, you know, that's, that's the, uh, the not plus size.
Yeah.
I can see that.
You know, living in Dallas, like we, you know,
we don't have the net natural landscapes that lend itself
to really amazing riding hills, you know,
oceans, things like that.
You know, we have our little things that are good enough.
Right?
Uh, but there's also this aspect that when I get to ride
somewhere, I get to really enjoy it and I take it in more
than I feel like.
And I try to remind a lot of my friends that live in these
badass places.
Like, dude, go watch that sunset on that coast right there.
You know, go, go, go appreciate that shit.
Cause next thing you know, you might be stuck in Utah
or which isn't a bad place either.
But, you know,
Why does everybody pick on Utah?
I don't know.
I love the place.
You know, it's, I think it's pretty good.
Utah used to run these tourist promotions.
Yeah.
You know, and they had two hippies that were just part of
this one promotion.
They had these two hippies standing next to a BW
micro bus.
And, and the guy is going, Utah, isn't that like where
you pass through to go to California, man?
You know, but they were, you know, come to Utah.
Yeah.
But I, you know, so I don't know how, what route you
usually take to go out to Southern California?
Uh, when I was on my baggers, it was usually just
highway blasting.
But since I've been trying to, you know, ride in the
FXR Chopper and once I get this, uh, shovel head
I'm doing done, I want to ride it out there as
well.
I, I like the interstate like 10.
Yeah.
Maybe 1040.
I kind of jumped back and forth, but sometimes I'll
drop down on the eight and go through the Southern
part of like, you know, around the, the Salton Sea
and all that shit.
Yeah.
Oh, but the highway I found that I love is, is the one
29 Palms highway just above the 10.
Yeah.
Coming out of like Parker into like Joshua Tree.
There's nobody on it.
It's got beautiful vistas.
You know, I can stop and shoot some photos
anywhere.
It's, it's amazing.
And, but I, you know, I wanted to do it, start
doing it on like the chopper, the, the FXR chop
and these other bikes because it makes me want to
get off the main highway and go at a slower pace
and just cruise, you know.
The secondary roads and that.
Yeah.
Well, it's like I say, you know, coming up here
for all those years, uh, you can't take the
same route all the time.
Yeah.
100%.
Yep.
And so I've probably covered the majority of the
roads in Colorado, Wyoming and South
Dakota.
Yeah.
You know, I've, I've ridden all through all those.
Yeah.
And, uh, they're all different, but I mean, a
lot of it was, you know, secondary roads.
Yeah.
You know, we used to go from here to, uh, Gillette.
Mm hmm.
And then I think it was 52 went straight down
from Gillette to Douglas, Wyoming and then
we catch 25 and then take it.
Yeah.
Spend a night in Chugwater.
Yeah.
And it was all, you know, that was too late
and there wasn't a single person out there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Because the only thing about halfway between
there is right and it's basically a center
for everybody that was in the oil and coal
industry.
Yeah.
You know, you go there and there'll be
like 70, 80 trailers.
Yeah.
I mean, with the guys that are working.
We, uh, won the 2020, we came out here.
We did a extended ride, went to Bear
Tooth and Yellowstone and all that shit.
That's awesome.
It is.
It's Bear Tooth and Chief Joseph is one of my
favorites.
Yeah.
Chief Oasis.
Yeah.
I like Red Lodge.
I like Cody.
I just think it's a perfect way to either
come to Sturgis and go through there first
or go home and check that out, you know.
Yeah.
Every couple of years, uh, we would go
to, uh, Cody for a couple of days.
Yeah.
Go to the Buffalo Bill Historical Center,
which I just love, you know, I could
wander around in there for a week.
Yeah.
Then we go into Yellowstone for like three
or four days and stay in Yellowstone.
And then we ride from Yellowstone
back through Cody.
And I'm trying to remember the highway.
I know how to get there.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, uh, go to, uh, go across to, uh,
Grable and then go over the big courts.
Yeah.
Come out of Sheridan, Wyoming.
That place is nice.
I've ridden that.
And come to Sturgis.
And that was, uh, that's a beautiful ride too.
But that stretch from like Cody to, uh,
Grable, it's just kind of boring.
Yeah.
You know, it's mostly reservation.
Yeah.
Have you gotten to, I mean, you've always
kind of lived west of here.
So most of the times you're coming
and going from Sturgis, you're going through,
you know, like you said,
Wyoming, Colorado and things like that.
You ever get down into like Nebraska
much or in any of Kansas and stuff like that?
Well, we used to take from here
either coming or going.
Yeah.
We would take a 385 out of Deadwood.
And, uh, then we would go, uh,
to, uh, right below, uh, to Shadron, Nebraska.
Yeah.
Which is almost right on the Nebraska
salt border board.
As soon as we come through there on our way up.
And we would go through, uh, Shadron,
Scotts Bluff.
Yup.
And come down, uh, it's Sterling, Colorado.
We'd take I-76 back home.
Yeah.
Just to be different.
That's typically, we come up through Alliance
and how'd you say it, Shadron?
Shadron.
Yeah.
That, to me, in those towns are pretty cool.
They got some cool little bars in them and,
you know, a good stop on the way up.
And, uh, I love it there.
Well, Shadron has, uh, a community college.
And, uh, they also have the museum
of the fur trade there.
Oh, okay.
Which is an awesome place.
All right.
There she goes.
Somebody's got to earn some money around here.
Yeah.
This is me.
She's, uh, caretaker for this one gal.
Okay.
That lives, uh, pretty close to Ballpark Road
in Junction.
Okay.
And, uh, she takes care of her, you know,
in the morning, lunch, and then she goes back
for dinner and puts her to bed about 8 o'clock.
She's about 67 years old.
And, uh, not my wife, but the gal she takes care of.
And she's got cerebral palsy.
Oh.
So, I mean, she needs special care.
The poor girl works a lot of hours because,
like we talked about before,
they can't find anybody that's qualified up here.
Yeah.
There's a real shortage of, uh,
assisted living caretakers.
And, uh, it's like everything else,
like a shortage of deciding to blow off,
you know, like I said,
trying to get somebody to come out to begin with.
Yeah.
And then it's rally time.
So nobody's doing anything.
Yeah.
They're all hibernating for a couple weeks.
Yeah.
They're either leaving or they're participating
or they just, yeah, staying in the house
and that's it.
It's a, uh, they don't come out.
That's like the guy, uh,
an assistant of the Mola lawn here.
Yeah.
This is so big and I'm not buying a $2,000 lawn motor.
Yeah.
So I just pay them to do it.
Yeah.
And they, they call it,
because we've had so much rain.
They mow the lawn and a couple days later,
it's like this high again.
And, uh, they said,
well, you know, we're, uh,
we're going to be leaving for 10 days
during the rally and they do it every year.
I said, where are you guys going?
North Dakota.
That doesn't sound like a vacation to me.
No, not unless I watch all these people
from North Dakota.
Yeah.
But, uh, the fishing is good up there.
I've, I have ridden through North Dakota,
but it's, it's kind of laughable.
What I did, I literally clipped the corner of it
over there, north of Sioux Falls
to go into Minnesota.
Okay.
So I need to properly go through there one year
and check out like some of the,
you know, whatever it has to offer.
I haven't been much in the,
into the Eastern part of Montana either yet.
Done all the stuff out West.
Um, but yeah, I need to check more.
We were talking about Nebraska too.
We used to go in, uh, the middle 80s.
Uh, Lake McConaughey is right up above,
um, I'm not sterling, but, um,
Ogallala.
Yeah.
Nebraska.
So that's, we get off the highway there
and then we cut up towards Alliance from there.
Right.
That lake seems pretty nice.
I love that big ass bluff you kind of drive,
drive right over.
So everybody would like,
come and go through there,
there'd be like big parties and like,
yeah, yeah.
And, uh, it just kind of take over the campgrounds
and stuff.
That's cool.
And the lake and tourists would kind of leave,
you know what I mean.
So they would kind of do that
on the way to the surges rallies or what?
On the way there and on the way back.
Nice.
You know, they'd come through there.
And, uh, um, that Ogallala, I mean,
it's just a hop, skipping a jump
over the Colorado border.
Yeah.
I-76 cuts off of, uh, 80 and goes to Denver.
Yeah.
And, uh, that used to be called
80S when they first built it.
To the, um,
it's like when you go through Nebraska,
it says the Abraham Lincoln Highway.
Yeah, Lincoln Highway.
Right.
Um, that was part of the original spine
of the interstaces.
Yeah.
See it went like 90 to 80 in Chicago.
And then 80 to 80S there, Ogallala.
And, uh, that went down to Denver.
And then 70 went from Denver to, uh,
was it, uh, St. George?
No, uh,
where it hits to 15, right?
Yeah.
Right.
And the majority of 15 was converted from,
used to be, uh, the 91.
Okay.
The Highway 91.
That was like Vegas's main drag through.
And, uh, then it hit 15 and it went down
and caught 91 into Los Angeles.
That was the original spine of the interstate system.
That was Eisenhower's plan.
Yeah.
Some sections you'll see it says Eisenhower Highway.
Yeah, because it wouldn't, you know,
that, that documentary they did a couple years back,
the 21 Days Around the Sky is when they wrote
from San Francisco to Brooklyn.
Yeah.
Trying to ride along the, the 80,
like variations of it from San Francisco to Brooklyn
as if it was a hundred year anniversary
of the Lincoln Highway.
I think in like 2015 or something like that.
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I'm trying to think.
See, you know, I'm going to have to
confess that I've never seen him.
Yeah, it's a good one. It's one of my favorites.
But yeah, it's...
You know, I've been wanting to
dig more into learning some of
more of the Eisenhower stuff.
I do know that it was like World War I.
He went over there. He was in Germany
and saw the Autobahn and wanted to bring
that highway structure kind of back to the States.
Wow, he was in World War I.
Yeah. Okay.
He patented and
MacArthur. Yeah.
We're in World War I,
along with Hitler
and Mussolini.
They were in World War I, too,
but on the other side. Yeah, yeah.
I have a...
I have a relative
that
he always used to say
he fought the First World War.
Right.
Even on the other side.
That he came here
after the war, to America
after the war. Yeah.
That's always funny because he was always...
We always thought he was
a dole-boy war hero. Yeah.
It wasn't. He was
a German.
But that's
the...
Eisenhower, I think he saw World War II.
Okay.
Okay. I believe
you can correct me, but I believe it was World War II
when he saw it. Okay.
And
it was his idea, actually,
most
like
city streets and whatnot,
the lanes are eight and a half feet wide.
Yeah. And the interstate highways,
the lanes are 10 and a half feet wide.
Yeah. And the reason that they wanted
to do that was because Eisenhower
planned was
if they had to get
if we were ever attacked, you had to get
troops of supplies across the country
and they made the lanes
10 and a half feet wide so they could
accommodate. Yeah.
Fast travel back and forth during
a wartime situation
if I have my...
Yeah, that's what I remember, too. Yeah, from then.
But yeah, he saw the autobahn. He saw how
wide it was. Yeah.
How fast people could travel on it.
That was his idea.
So he was the one to push the interstates.
We owe him for all this
connectivity of riding motorcycles
on nice paved roads
everywhere. Yeah. Well, I mean
before that, I mean like
Route 66, which is
you know
interstate 40 now.
Yeah. It follows
and doesn't follow
the original Route 66. Yeah.
Some of them were like
just like huge gravel sections
of roads. Yeah. Mud.
You know
and
when they put the interstate highway system in
and it made it smooth
and it made it so everybody could travel.
So after World War II
everybody got in their
cars that they couldn't get during the war
took off on vacations
and stuff. Yeah. A guy in Chicago
could go to Disneyland. Yeah.
You know, I mean
and take his family and do it
Yeah. But I mean there were
still sections of
of
forties that weren't completed. Yeah.
You know, where you go back down to two lanes again
for a while and
back up again.
But yeah, it made
it easy for us. Yeah.
Can you imagine, I mean like those gals
in the
20s that got on the
the two Harleys. Yeah.
And rode all over the country. And rode all the way to
the west coast. Yeah. By themselves
just the two girls. Yeah. I mean
I was pretty adventurous. Yeah.
In this in this place. Yeah. I mean
it would be adventurous today if
I mean have all amount of
amenities and
you know, pretty reliable motorcycles
and stuff. But it would
even be hard for like two girls
today. You know
and
Yeah. And just think about how much
it was wasn't even
completely developed moving west
in that time. You know what I mean? No.
Because what the AC didn't really like
AC
air conditioning wasn't a thing yet. So
a lot of the cities out west weren't really kind of
like growing as fast as
they did once AC was invented.
Yeah. Well, that was the big thing in Vegas, you know
that the hotels and the
casinos and stuff and at that
time they were real small. Yeah.
To put up there
we have air conditioned
air. Yeah. That was a big drawing
point. And
you know, the hotels when you
were on the road did have
ice cold air conditioning. Yeah.
Then that became a norm and then
it was HBO. We have HBO.
Yeah. Well, first it was we
have colored TV. Oh, there you go.
We have colored TV
and then it was we have HBO.
There you go. And cinemax. Yeah.
Yeah. Because
well that good friend of mine, Terry Nails
he was born
born and raised in Las Vegas.
And
he could tell you everything
that happened in Vegas, how it grew. Yeah.
Yeah. How the 91
was, you know, the main drag
through town and it went all the way down
to LA. See, that's why
yeah
like all the
interstates, the freeways and stuff,
even numbers go east to west and the odd
numbers go north themselves.
Well, when the 91 comes down
and it turns and it goes across
LA.
But it's all, it's not
91 east and 91
west, it's 91 north
and 91 south. Yeah.
Because at one time it was. Yeah.
You know, north and south.
And they just kind of moved
15 over and it just kind of
you know,
went right along Vegas.
But
I've been on almost
almost 70s down there.
Yeah. The desert is not
one of my favorite places, okay.
It doesn't matter when you go through it.
Yeah, it's either hot or cold.
Well,
you know, we
went through one time
in November
and I remember
we got to
I'm trying to think now
and I can't
got how I can remember.
It's got the world's largest surround there.
Baker. Baker. Thank you very much.
Yeah. The gateway to
Death Valley. Yeah.
And it was like 92
when we went through them. Well, wow,
it's pretty cold here. Yeah.
Because usually the temperature is like
115. I went through there
when it was 115 once on a way to
born free one year and
when the temperature like when you would
kind of go peaks and valleys there
if it went from 115
to like 108 you would get chills.
It was still hot but it's like
I would get chills because of the temperature
difference and it's still super hot.
I can't really explain it. I'm not a
scientist. It just you would get like little
chills on your skin and stuff. I've never
noticed that. Are you on the bike? Yeah.
Because you know, completely covered up
because it's like a hair dryer on your skin.
But I remember
the first time I took Steve to Los
Angeles
with me.
He had never been there.
I mean he'd been to Disneyland with his family
but he had never traveled there.
And
we were in Baker
and
he gets off his bike at the fuel stop
and he goes
do you know where we are?
And I said, well, yeah, we're in
Baker. There's the world's
thermometer.
He's going, no. He's going
we're in a Mojave fucking desert.
It was like 108 degrees and he's going
I'm dying here. I can't take it.
He said, I thought my gloves
were going to spontaneously combust.
He was
he was pretty miserable. So I said
calm down, calm down. And I
took him over to TCBY
yogurt. Yeah. Yeah.
I'm down with a glass of water and a yogurt.
We chilled out there for a while.
One time coming back from
Born Free. I think it was Born Free
3.
We stopped in Baker
on the way home. And it was
hot. It was like 115.
Yeah. And
we gassed up
and there was a sports assistant
at one of the pumps.
So Steve wanted to clean
off his windshield
and his headlight.
And there were no papers in this
over here. So he went to walk over there.
And it was some guy playing
in between the gas lines.
But
you better get inside. Yeah.
Yeah. We would like take our shoes off
and dump like soak them with
water. Uh huh.
You know, soak our jackets, our helmet
and it would be dry in
10 minutes on the road. Oh yeah.
Well, that's Fab Kevin's trick
is to soak all your clothes. Yeah.
You know what I mean. And let the
snow evaporation
cool you off. Yeah. That's his way
to cope with that.
I remember going through
see
it caught me at a loss again.
Uh
it's right across the Nevada
border.
Uh
Oh, from Utah? St. George?
No, at the bottom of
you go come down through Arizona
for that little 20
trip from St. George
and it's right there on the
page.
Into Arizona?
No.
It goes through Arizona and says
welcome to Nevada. Cause you're only in
that canyon there for a month. Oh, it's my
Keeman? Keeman
Arizona drops you into that long
100 mile stretch that takes you to
uh, what is it? Boulder City
or something like that where you cross the uh
No, that's not what I'm thinking of
John 15.
It's right when you get across the Nevada
border. Mesquite.
Mesquite, okay. Yeah, I've only ridden
through that spot one time.
And uh, where Mesquite
is when you go through the like the
there's like sheer canyon walls. Yeah, yeah.
So going through there, it's like a
reflector of it. Do you know what I mean?
Not only you get the sun, but you're also getting
the reflection of the rocks. It's
just burgeon.
Burgeon to a crisp.
And uh, that's
that's a miserable
section there.
I don't, I don't know.
And they get snow there during the winter time. Yeah.
Which is kind of hard to believe.
Yeah, I went there once
uh, hell I went
I went to
Vegas in uh, February this year
for a thing with Indian
and they had, they were snow on the mountains
everywhere. I was like, oh shit, it gets. Oh yeah.
You know. Yeah.
Cause that's where my buddy Terry
lives, lives in
Toronto. Yeah. Which is
up in the mountains.
Cause they were gonna, they're gonna
build
this is going through with it.
And I found out last night
it's going to be in
Laughley.
As a Woody's opening up the
Buffalo chip. Oh.
In, in uh.
They're going to try to revive that river run
and try to make something else happen there probably.
I don't know. It's out there. I heard
he bought some land or something in
in Durango too
that they were going to try to like expand some stuff.
You know, I don't know what
the exact thing is. Yeah.
But uh, I was told last
night it was Laughley. That's cool. Cause they had
um,
primitive assets right on interstate
15 says right under California border.
Yeah. And
uh,
they closed up whiskey bills.
The casino there. They closed
up Buffalo bills.
Hotel and casino. And I don't know
if the Prim Valley resorts is still going
or not. But they're going to
build
cause they're out of room. Uh, in McCarran
Field there on Laughley. Yeah. They're out of room.
They can't expand the airport any further. Yeah.
So they're going to put like a satellite airport
there between Prim
and Jean which is the next
next city up north.
They're going to put a satellite
airport in there. Yeah.
And
put a monorail up to
McCarran Field. That's wild. So you can
land down there but you'll wind up in
the airport
in Vegas.
But there's a lot of development going on
down there. And I
it was rumored that they were going to
Woody was going to do it some place
in the southern part of Nevada.
But it's supposed to
be a big deal. Supposed to have a 10,000
seat amphitheater. Supposed to have
a hotel and casino that looks like
an old barn. Oh yeah.
So
I don't know how that's going to go over
but. Yeah. And the chip
is the chip. Okay. Yeah.
You can call you can call
something anything. Yeah.
But you know the Buffalo chip is the
Buffalo chip because it's here. Yeah.
It's sturdish. You know.
And it started out
with
nothing
except for two flatbed
tractor trailer bodies
for a stage.
And that was about it.
And it's grown into what it is today
but I mean it's still the chip. Yeah.
Okay. I don't think you can export
that. Agreed.
Yeah. Well they tried to do that with Fools
Auto a lot too where they were
back in the day when it was all the
TV shows and shit. They were trying
to get the Alveston and all these
other things which I get the marketing
side of it of trying to you know expand
and you know having that brand
recognition or whatever you would call it
but yeah I agree with you. It's like
that's the thing that's here. So if
you were to do something there you kind
of figure out what. It's not the same.
I mean it's called the Buffalo chip
but it's not the Buffalo chip. Yeah. You
would put the Buffalo chip.
Coming to the Buffalo chip Vegas.
It's like they know Buffalo out there.
Well you know I don't know because
like they're closing
like the hard rocks are all closing off
I mean the one in Vegas closed I know
the one in Denver is closed.
We had one in Dallas that closed years ago
and
you know
well your buddy Richard Rollins look at
his success. Yeah it's
that he's. He opened
up a couple bars. Well he
he's had multiple he's had a bar in
Dallas before but it's more like
it's not really his it's kind of like they're just
licensing his name.
Well this is pretty much what it's gonna be. Yeah.
It's gonna be you know. He's
I don't know I've never met the dude a lot
of my friends that I've worked with
in different car automotive
places bike shops have kind of passed
through gas monkey over the years
but he's just
you know Richard seems to be like in his own
world he doesn't really
you know mess with anybody in the city
other than like Rick Fairless or whatever you know.
Well I
one his actually was
an easy riders
yeah a store yeah
and I guess
yeah easy riders store
and those were all
well the iron horse used to be a
easy rider. Oh yeah that's right. Yeah.
And then before that they have one of
those easy rider shops
and cafes at
exit 30 where that
pizza ranch is
they have one there.
Dude do they still have that
easy rider or no it was a Harley Davidson
I'm sorry it was a Harley Davidson spot they had
and like on the new part of the strip of Vegas
where you can go in they had like
a restaurant a Harley Davidson restaurant there
like across from like Caesars
Palace and you know
the Cosmopolitan. Oh I'm not sure
it doesn't even worry about
yes more because I ignored it
yeah no usually
I mean I have friends in Vegas
but if we're traveling
we go
to
Speedway Boulevard. Yeah.
Which is where the you know
Las Vegas Speedway is
you know motor complex
there and
we gas up there we take a little
break and we ride right through Vegas
we don't stop because
I don't do well gambling
yeah I mean I might as well just
ride through Vegas and just throw
money like this
you know I mean it doesn't mean the same amount of
good you know I get the same return
out. Yeah.
But Las Vegas is not a motorcycle
frenzy city. Yeah.
It's
it's really hectic
15 going through
Vegas it's really hectic
and you really got to watch yourself
because there's a lot of people there
from Southern California but there's
also a lot of people there like
this is the same problem with Denver
is it comes from all over the country
yeah and when they come they bring their
driving style. Yeah.
So from Boston they drive like they're in Boston
they're in New York City they
drive like they do in New York City
they're Southern California
you know you can always tell them
because they'll be over in the far left lane
exit comes up they go all the way across
you know what I mean it's a very less
Yeah. No consideration. It's dangerous
and it's even more dangerous at night
than everybody. Yeah.
Which is well I'll tell you
here for this so far
I mean I've seen four accidents
Yeah. You know
since like Thursday
last week. Just riding from out here
on the highway. Yeah out on 90. Yeah.
And
walking around Friday and
then yesterday in town it's
packed. Yeah. There's a lot
of dangerous people out there.
Yeah. There's a lot of scary guys
and gals ride motorcycles.
Yeah I mean sometimes it's the
only time of year they ever ride
out here. Yeah.
And you can tell they're scared as hell around
every corner you know
I got behind
a guy on a trike going into town
and I swear it's
like 40 miles an hour. Yeah.
You know and
even though they dropped the speed limit
at 65, 40
too slow. Yeah. But there's like
from here I really can't
there's no back roads
to take me to town. Yeah you gotta tip on the highway real quick.
Yeah unless I want to take
horse older
road here but then that brings
me out of Fort Meade and
I still have to turn left
and go into town. Yeah.
It's convenient if you're going
out to the chip in that area.
But
you know you just
but I watch these people you know
it's just
it's scary. I always think it's funny
how we all just
you know driving a car
riding a motorcycle we have this like
unsung
or un
we agree to just
all stay in our lane and obviously not everybody
does but it's like
we just trust that everybody's
going to do what they're supposed to do. Well yeah
you know. Yeah and
you know I mean
like
going up
85 from here
back through
Wyoming
a lot of it was
up until a few years ago
a lot of it well it's still
it was too late. Yeah. So I mean there was
a lot of passing going on. Yeah.
And there were a lot of motor
homes and stuff you know and
Christ they'd have 20 bikes
stacked up behind that motor home. Yeah.
I mean trying to get around
it and that but then you got all this traffic
coming this way. Yeah it's miserable.
You know but
I would always
if I didn't feel like going fast you know
if somebody was coming up behind me I'd move
over the far right side of the lane. Yeah.
And let them go up
the lane. Yeah.
That was where the trust came in. Yeah.
I knew if he was in my lane and he was
passing me that he wasn't going to
smash into me and knock his bolt down. Yeah.
You know. I'd be
hard pressed to do that now.
There's a lot of you know
we like to kind of ride fast
and so we try to respectfully go around
people. Yeah.
You know like sometimes just completely
in the other lane if not like we're
going we're passing them because they're on the
outside of the lane in it
you know we're not like zooming past them
we'll give them a wave and thank you and get
through it but there's some guys out there
that you would think that you just ran
them off the road you know they're just
they're doing
they're doing 30 miles
an hour down to 55
because their wife's out there with an
iPad filming everything
and you're just like man I just want to do
the speed limit at least and
then you get to the next stop light and they're losing their shit.
That's all I expect
people to do is
speed limit you know
if it's 45 to 45
65 to 65
you know
that's the other nice thing about Utah
as soon as you cross the border the speed limit goes to 80 miles
Yeah, yeah.
What do you mean Wyoming?
Yeah, yeah.
But in Utah it's the same way.
It is. You haven't been out there in a while.
We have west Texas we have a lot of 85 miles an hour
highways. See I didn't know that.
Yeah.
One of the shows I see on cable in that they go
well we're in Beaver Utah.
Beaver Utah is
about halfway between where
I-70 dead end to 15.
Yeah.
And it's down about
40 miles maybe.
On the 15? Yeah.
But it was a notorious speed trap.
Always. You just knew
and the speed limit dropped
from 75 to 65
in that stretch of 15
and Beaver was
an notorious speed trap.
And I go, guess what?
I go, I got a ticket to Beaver.
Yeah, everybody gets a ticket to Beaver.
And there's no warnings.
But when they raised the speed limit
to 80 miles an hour
there was that.
That record was done.
Have you ever done any of
Highway 50 out there going through Nevada
out of Utah and everything like that?
Like that loneliest highway part?
No, I haven't done that.
I don't want to do that personally.
I kind of like to do it.
Takes you right into what is that
Laughlin, not Laughlin
Virginia City
over there, Carson.
Maybe I'm not thinking of the same one.
I was thinking of the one that ends
in
Interstate 80
in Nevada.
I'll think of it.
Yeah.
I want to say.
Yeah, I think this one's running east and west
and it's like
it was the Pony Express route
originally.
Yeah, they call it the oldest road.
Yeah.
I don't know.
How many gallons you got in that tank?
3.8, 3.9.
So it's a King's 40 tank.
Yeah.
If I'm not high on the RPMs
acting a fool
I get about 140 out of that tank.
That's pretty good.
That's about what
my King's 40 tank
is about.
3.4.
3.4.
Then
the
2001's 40 tank on the other bike over there
with the flat bottom
and a low tunnel
and a raised filler
I get about 3.8
in that.
It's a little longer.
So you get that extra.
Yeah.
But I think that stretch I sink
is like 120 miles long.
Yeah.
So if you had like a little
wassylpita tank.
You'd have to have like a gallon
of
gas container on the back of your bike
to make it through there.
We were talking about the El Forest arrows before.
Tom Fugel's
way to do it was, if you were going to do
because there's no gas
between
there in
in Utah
there's that one stretch that's like
I can't remember because it's been a while since I've been through there.
But there's that one stretch
in Utah
where there's no gas
and no services or just ran checks.
Yeah.
They've got the big sides up and said this is no bowl.
Last chance for gas.
Yeah.
And Fugel what he said, you know,
in a stretch like that
he just at the last gas stop
he'd buy a
like a gallon or two gallon container
gas
and he'd fill it up and he'd strap it to his sissy bar
and then he'd ride until he ran out of gas
in his tank
and he'd throw the can away.
He said it was cheap
because then he said there were like a pocket of half a piece.
Yeah.
Dude, a gas like a one gallon gas can
is like $25 at a gas station.
They know you need it.
You mean an empty one?
Yeah, that's how they,
it's crazy how that works.
It's like they just want to,
I mean it's convenience, right?
You go buy it at Walmart when you don't need it.
Right there it's, you know,
that's whatever.
You need to
mention the fact that the guy is like five miles
from the gas, right?
And he seems to have got to walk there
he's got to hitchhike
and leave his bike, you know
and
then he gets there, he's got to have a gas can
to go back
and they charge him $25
to get out of here.
It's a racket, man.
Yeah, it's nothing like, you know,
it's all stuck in the
in the mouth strap.
There's a whole line of mice behind him
and it says, when you're in trouble
everybody wants a piece of your ass.
But that's a few moves.
They were like a fucking sport.
Yeah.
That's kind of what I do with camping gear out here.
It's like, you know,
it's muddy, it's all messed up.
I'll run to the Dollar General and get me a pillow
blow up, floaty
air mattress, you know, just like if you're going to go lay out
in a pool or something.
And yeah, when I'm done with it, just leave it there
somebody wants that they can have it.
Well, you're not the old ranger doing that.
Yeah.
Because if you're looking at trash brails and the campgrounds
there's all kinds of cheap pop-ups
Tads stuffed in there, you know
deflated air mattresses.
I mean, I've been in the campgrounds
where, you know, we're packing up the leave
and this guy's out there with his knife stabbing
air mattresses and wound it up with
the trash, so
you're not the only one that does that.
And then
some guys I know they just
they pack enough to get to where they're going
and
they just, they use
old t-shirts, old underwear and stuff, old socks
and they just keep throwing them away.
Yeah.
Stop at the nearest Walmart,
get some more and repeat
on the whole trip.
Yeah, I did that for years and
then it's like
I don't know, you get to a point where I've gotten
to a point where when I ride somewhere I want to be
I want to take
enough stuff
to get me through a handful of days
but then it also makes me stop and chill
do some laundry, you know
kind of reset and stuff like that
you know, they just buy more stuff. Plus I don't
I don't, sometimes I live like
I have a lot of money and I really don't so it's like
I need to be, you know, an underwearing cheapy
$20 for three.
Hey, I don't know.
I just, I
the wife buys the underwear
Yeah, yeah.
She
she feels like I need
a new set, so she'll buy it.
Yeah.
That's how mine has become.
Yeah, so it's that, now
Steve, when we travel
he worked for a place, I'm trying to think of the name of it
in Boulder
that was kind of like an REI
Okay.
Like a Cabela's or REI
It was more like REI, it was Cabela's
but they had all this
backpacking stuff
you know, and his like
this sleeping bag was like this big
you know, but it was good to like
you know, form below
but it was, you know, it packed into
a little, look like a little sausage
you know, same thing with his tent
the same thing, you know
it's a really big pack.
And you don't want to throw those away.
Yeah, they're like 400 bucks.
But he had the employee discount.
But
yeah, that's what
there was a target used to sell this Coleman
tent, it was a
technically it was a four person
tent, it fit two people comfortably
right, but it packed up to about
that size, right?
It was $29.
Wow, that is.
The bottom of a stock saddlebag
or easily on a sissy bar
and I ran those things
for years and I'd get probably
you know, they have a tarp bottom
so the tarp bottoms are the ones that are harder
to kind of pack up because they're so
they don't compress, yeah.
But you want a tarp bottom if you're out somewhere and it rains
and you know what I mean?
Well, yeah, you don't want that soaking through
exactly and then everything is
going to might not be soaking wet
but it's going to be damp.
It's cold and clammy
you know, and it's
sticking to you when you roll over
and it's
like
like I've got the
I bought the cheapy
bike cover
yeah, that's like
17 bucks or something
well, I'm not going to be out
I don't need UV protection, I'm not going to be outside
I just want to cover some of the bikes
when I'm working out here
because the stuff goes all over the
grinding dust and
all that and then it gets on there
and then it gets like sandpaper
you know, anytime you touch it it'll scratch
that's what somebody did to my bike
yesterday, they must have
put something down on
my back fender like a purse or something
you know, and they rummage through it
and they scratch an area about that
that's where
you know, because it's got marks like this
and like this, so I'm thinking of somebody
that should dig it in something
and people don't have any respect to this
yeah
yeah, it's definitely
the other day I was at the
Thunderdome and my buddy
I was helping my buddy with his bike show he's putting on
and I knew most of the bikes there
yeah
and I was standing next to one I had actually painted
but then when I was up there watching him do it
I put my arm on the handlebars of this other bike
which I did not know who that person
was and it was this ladies bike
and she came up really nicely
and said, can you please take your hand off my bike
and I was like
I was taken back by it but I was like
I'm in the wrong
so I'm in the wrong
I thought I was leaning on another bike
I was like, I'm sorry, my bad
but it was kind of like
I was like, yeah, sometimes
it's easy to forget sometimes
it's that way
I shouldn't be doing that because I'm so used to
being around all my friends bikes
well that
my wife wanted to take the
the gal that she takes care of
electric wheelchair
so
she wanted to go downtown
and see the Budweiser Clydesdale
oh yeah
opening ceremony for a week
and she wanted to see the Budweiser Clydesdale
and stuff and for the most part
she said everybody
was really nice
she got her up to the front
of the people
so she could see the parade
because the wheelchair
is not that high
and they moved her up to the front
but then there was this one lady
my wife said just
I could scream at her
you don't belong on Main Street
you're right away
and I thought
let's have a little human
compassion
she's got cerebral palsy
she has to be in the wheelchair
now yesterday I saw a lot of people in the wheelchair
yeah
then I saw a lot of people riding them
little scooters that shouldn't have been riding them
yeah yeah
you see that lady, I forget her name
but she just turned 100 years old
yeah, Gloria
didn't she ride like an FXR back in the day
you know I don't know if she had an FXR
I don't know if she had Soft Tail
Soft Tail, okay
I'm not real familiar with her
but I know she was one of the original motorbies
yeah
probably if I bought her book
I'd probably know the whole history
yeah she was right behind
the Budweiser Clydesdales
in one of those
one of the three wheelies
with the two wheels in the front
and one in the back
and
got 100 years old
she doesn't look like
she's
she doesn't look like she's
capable of taking a long trip
by herself
but up until a few years ago she was still going
that's what I heard, yeah
and
I think one of her goals was
once you reached 102
ride off to California
for some reason
that'd be wild
you would have to ask
we could run up and get
a dance wife
she's a motorbie
but
yeah more power to her
she was out there
at
Motorcycles at Zard
she was out there
she was motivating around in the wheelchair
and she was out there with her
daughter and her granddaughter
they were taking care of her
nice
how long
did you camp out at these events
were you hitting the campgrounds
or did you do a lot of the hotels
or houses
well like I said the first year I spent in the city park
and that was over with the second year
so then we tried
blank home
for a while
and
it was
starting to get rowdy
like to chill
and then we
hooked up with this one guy
that was right at the bottom of Anaheim County
yeah
that
was an older guy and all his kids
well his one daughter
was living in a mobile home
that was on the property
but he had all his property in his big house
and all his kids were gone
she left his daughter in the mobile home
so he would rent out all their bedrooms
oh that's cool
for a while
and then we went to
hug heaven
if we were camping it was at hug heaven
yeah I've always tried to tell people
it's an experience to camp out here
I mean you meet people
yeah the weather can be what it is
but like there's just so much going on
and you don't have to go to bed
if you don't want to you know what I mean
well that
was the thing we like, Glencoe would go 24 hours a day
24 hours a day
like the chick
and the
like the fourth time
that naked Santa Claus
and his naked Mrs. Claus
on his bike is making like the fifth trip
around the circle you know what I mean
screaming and yelling and stuff
that kind of thing
I mean if you want to party
at the party camp
hug heaven
they try, they have some bands
out there but they try
and like shut that
down like about 11 o'clock
you know
their bars will still be open
and you can come and go
but they try
quiet it down about 11
I remember when we were
first out there they used to have guys
in golf carts coming out
and going hey you guys are too loud
you know it's 11 30
too fucking loud
Glencoe
you know it was like the chip
I remember one time walking
with my wife from the concession
stand back to where
the
tent was
and all of a sudden I hear
blam blam blam blam blam I know
that sound you know what I mean
some guys just shooting
and I grabbed her
yanked her down on the ground you know
so that was the last time we stayed
there
I'll get where else should we
I'm missing something here
oh I'll probably
yeah we've camped I've been staying at the
days in for the most part one year I did
I did one night at that camp zero
at Buffalo chip but it's kind of
it's kind of like there's nothing
there you know zero
amenities basically
yeah well it's
I guess they're
thrust is like you know this was
like the old shit yeah
in camp zero yeah
and it's supposed to be like super cheap
so you're not having to pay the hundreds
of dollars to get into the chip to camp there
right but then I don't think
the camp in there doesn't entail
you to go to the couch yeah it doesn't
yeah in that section
yeah I personally
that's I said I like where we stay it's
on the it's right at the corner of the
cell and an 80 so
or 90 and so you can get right on the
highway and go any direction you want
you know you want to go to Deadwood you
don't have to wait through all the surges traffic
to get to there because it's right
there on Ambulance Road yeah
I wouldn't mind camping
in the hill somewhere once
like I haven't done that yet I think
in the last
one that we did didn't I tell you
one time because that's all national
forest going up
14 a yeah
Boulder Canyon
from Sturgis to Deadwood
used to be able to camp along in there
we see them camp yeah I see people getting in there
all the time in camp
usually the racers would chase them out
because the camp is supposed to be
prohibited in there
but when I first came
up here there were a lot of people there
that'd be cool just kind of camping right there in those little canyons
yeah
Dick Allen and his crew
that's where they used to camp
yeah
and
I know I'm missing a
I know we went someplace else
I can't remember
where we where we stayed
yeah
because I know the guy the guy we stayed
with was
right at the bottom
of Van Hocker Canyon
right before you started to go climbing up
yeah this place was right there
so that's easy to get to and from
Sturgis from there you know what I mean
and
that was before they paved
Van Hocker it was gravel
well it was paved up a ways
and then it was gravel
and
he
died
the guy we used to stay with there
rented out the roof yeah
it was super cheap it was like $50
and you get up in the morning he had
donuts and sweet rolls
coffee and that there's something
to get you going in the morning
he's a really nice guy
well he passed away
and his daughter got the whole thing
and then she
met up with this guy
and married him and he had two kids
so they took
the two of the roofs
and then she decided to not
not rent the roof
because she had young kids there
so she decided
to not
let everybody there so that ended
that
trying to remember
I don't know I'm missing one of them
but
mainly we stayed in Hocker
you know I got
friends that wanted to stay
here you know and I had this
I said I tried it last year I said
Saber is just not
tolerating anybody
coming into the house yeah my shepherd
I said he's not tolerating it
and I said you know if I have you guys
stay here I really hated to say this
but I said if I have you guys stay here
I'm going to have to practically be here
like 24 hours a day
because if somebody comes in
at 2 o'clock in the afternoon
and they have to take a poop
they'll be able to get into the house
and you know
showers and all that other stuff
kitchen privileges
it just can't do it
well it seems that your place
as when I got here
as testament to that has been
a savior for a lot of people's motorcycles
over the years you know get in here
you have all the tools to
rebuild the bike 100%
build the bike from scratch
well that's the black one there
I mean that was
I was looking around at it
I got a transmission case
I got a gear set
I got this frame that's been here for like 3 years
front forks
don't have a tank
don't have an engine
a rear wheel at the fender
and all I had to do
was actually add the gas tank
and motor
and the engine
and the bike was finished
yeah
and
that one over there is pretty much the same way too
almost ready
so I'll sell this one and I'll probably keep that one
yeah
so the hardtells ain't kicking your ass
you built right for the hardtells
or what?
no I just
I've got
hard problems
I just don't want to do the hearts not in it
you know what I mean
I'm trying to slow down
I mean I'm retired
but that didn't work out
yeah
and then a lot of the guys
I've done work for in the past
and they want to come back and have me do work again
and I really can't
I really can't signal
because they're loyal people
so
but then I keep taking
he's project
but I hate to turn somebody down
actually if I've known him for a long time
I know him real well
you know
to trust me with their project
and to
like this guy
Mike number 7 I'm going to be building for
yep
so
and besides I got a tight deal
yeah that's pretty cool
I don't know what I'm going to do with that
well like we were saying it's got a lot of good parts
so you can keep it together
or chop it up
and go somewhere else with it
well Bill Meiser was here
he's been eye of that
ever since he's been in here
and he came back and gave it another once over today
so
we'll see what happens there
do you have a couple of people that are interested
in the black one
that would be nice
but I'm not asking a lot of money for it
so
if I break even on the deal
be good
most of my bikes
I like
a lot of people I buy parts all the time
I say oh god the sliders
20 bucks a pair
I don't buy them
and it might be 2 years until I use them
or 40
but
you know
and I stash them away
that's why I say I go oh I have the front
forks for this
springs
and that's how
the bikes aren't built on a junk
but I mean they're good solid parts
but I just happen to have them
yeah
and that makes me
well I don't know
you've been
how many bikes are you putting together now
seriously the one for born free text is this one
it's a 77 shovel head
we're hard telling
so I assume you and Corey
have been ordering a lot of parts
so far I haven't
ordered the only thing I've ordered is wheels
I don't like spoke wheels for traveling
well I don't blame you
so we got some
mags on the way
but when we get back
Corey is more of a wizard
when it comes to
final drive gear and all that stuff
and I want to be able to cruise to stay on the highway if I have to
so
and we're doing
I want to
travel across the country on this bike
I want to get that experience of riding a hardtail
coast to coast
and so I've been
to
have you done it
then I want to do it
but I did it when I was in my
20s and 30s
I'm coming late to the game but I want to be
able to say that I had that experience
I understand
you want to see what it's like
you want to see what people experienced in the past
well there's I think that there's
no shortage of
like you just said
in your 20s and 30s you rode these bikes
and then you progressed up to more comfortable
things right?
I started off on the most comfortable bike they make
so it's like I skipped
what I would say is
the hard part and I
kind of want to be able to go back and experience that
and understand it and give myself
a better
for lack of a better term understanding
of what this culture has always
been about you know and I don't want it to be easy
it's it gets boring
when everything goes
I don't want things to go wrong
but it gets boring when I can just twist a throttle
and do 200 miles
and
not even remember anything I saw
you know have
music in my ears
and I'm not even listening to the road
you know I want I like the other
feeling that's why I don't have any gauges on that bike
that's why there's no there's no information
it's just what's out there you know
it's like we got that
clockwork
teafaring yeah
well it's an RP
but it's a nice kit
because you got the
fairing imprimer
and then Brian gives you the bubble for the headlight
gives you the mounting kit
and it gives you the
flare windshield I think
I believe it's 7 inches
that's a
smoking setup
the only thing you have to buy
is the headlight
the 7 inch headlight
which I have
I've got it in my stash over there
but you have another fairing over there
or is that
what's that RP fairing over there
that's the one that
this one is replacing
replacing that one
if you go over and look at it
smashed up
the thing that I'm
the process I'm doing on my shovel head
I don't know what bars I want
to run I don't know what tank
but I have been
trying to collect
different oil tanks and stuff to see if
if I want that look
if I go with a
a wassel tank then I know that I kind of would rather
have A-pangers on it and if I go with another sporty
style tank I want to want
you know that
this one he wants
to clean his sporty tank on
he wasn't too sure
what handlebars he wanted to run
he got kind of addicted
to the Flanders number two bends
okay
which I'm my favorite handlebar
yeah
and
they watched something different and he came in
when he dropped the stuff off he came in and he saw
the
tracker bars on this and the
medium risers he saw the tracker bars over there
that were a little bit higher
so that's what he wants
get that feeling and stuff
I've been running the T-bars
and motor style bars on all my bikes
for the last you know nine years
and I had an FXR
before
Sturgis last year it was
84 all crusty
but it had these narrow
like 14 inch apes
and I fucking loved riding that bike
you know what I mean just super narrow
you know kind of narrow at the bottom apes
yeah cause
anything else that any apes
put on there that worked
with the 39 millimeter front end
it'd be too wide at the bottom
exactly
you know that would look really stupid
yeah I enjoyed riding that bike around
and the only reason I got rid of it
was because everything I wanted
to do or felt like I needed to do so
it would be mine would have taken away
what that bike was you know what I mean
it was just a perfect
old crusty paint job that was original
blonde motor
you know the whole bike was just a
fucking good one you know
I mean I'm still riding rigid frame bikes
but I mean
you know I went from a frame
mounted seat to the
the air ride yeah the sole
springs to the air ride yeah yeah
like I guess I'm kind of cheating
you know no I
I'll tell you
I'd always put all my bikes
together yeah right
and my ex
was going to put another one together
and she's going you know what she said
instead of
putting another bike together
it's going to take you another year
why don't you just go down to the dealership
and buy one and I want
you know what I mean
I never expected that to come out
of my life
so I wanted to get
a FX lowrider
yeah I shoveled
at the time to shovel
in 1929
I wanted
the FX
Y Glides to just come out
and
I went to the dealerships
and I couldn't find either one
of them
I just didn't have them on the floor
and I went to this one dealership
and they had a 79
electric
like classic that was the
you've seen them there that
I've seen cream special edition
13 spoke wheels
on a mag wheels
and they had the king tour pack on there
and
I've got this one he says
it's got a good price on it
you know it's a 79 it was brand new
and he said it's
$52.95
yeah
for a bagger
and I'm going I don't know
this is a 79 I'm going
I don't know I'm going
well dressers are kind of like for old men
and he goes
you're going to get there eventually anyway
why don't you just circumvent that
and he says go take this out
for a ride this is when
you can go out and ride a Harley-Davidson
test ride it for the dealership
and they wouldn't send a car out after you
you know or you didn't have to put
somebody on the back to ride around with him
and
he said take it out for like an hour
back so I did
and I started out and I'm going God
I hope nobody sees me on this
but the more I rode it
this thing is nice
so that was my first bagger
were they rubber-mounted
motors on that one?
it was the same
four-speed frame as the FX
it was
the FL
but it was the same frame
four-speed frame solid mounted engine
because I think it was like
82 or someone that started going
to the rubber-mount
well that was when it came the FLT
the FLT
the FLT started in 1980
and it was rubber-mounted
ok
and it had the five-speed
transmission
early five-speed
and they were trying to get
because
dual was
in on the design team
Eric dual was in on the design team
for the rubber-mounted frames
for the FXR
and for the FLT
and they weren't quite
done with the development
on the
FXR
and
the design team
knew
because the evolution
project was already going
so
they brought the FLT
out first with the shovel motor
in 1980
and in 82 they brought out the FXR
with the shovel motor
and two years later
they both had evolution motors
84 right?
and
everybody always says wow
if it wasn't for AMF
Harley Davidson
wouldn't have had the evolution motor
wouldn't have had the five-speed
and all it had
you know
what they don't understand is
around that time
AMF was kind of looking around for somebody to take it off
their hands because it didn't turn out to be
the recreational investment
that they thought it was going to be
right?
and
what happened was
they went to Porsche
ok
and had Porsche
do the R&D work
for the NOVA project
ok the four cylinder
water tool
fuel injected
the original FXR
and then Harley Davidson
itself
in-house did the R&D work
on the evolution motor
the AMF didn't pay for both of them
they paid for the
for the NOVA
Harley Davidson
pretty much paid for the
development of the evolution
and AMF got tired of
putting money in the NOVA project
they just
scrapped it
dumped it
and then he had the buyback
in
1982
so
people always say
AMF wasn't for their money
but at that time it wasn't
that developed the evolution
and
I know a bunch of guys
that went and got brand new evolution motors
and put them into rigid frames
it's like don't you have to
basically the evolution motor is taller
so fitting them in the old shovel head frames
you have to raise the whole backbone
the rocker box
the rocker box
the rocker box is higher
and back a little bit further
and
how I put them in the frames
probably different than everybody else
but
I give the down tubes
in the front a two inch stretch
which isn't that much
visually you really can't
you can't really tell
and then for the seat post
I used to
raise the backbone
up a little bit higher in the back
because you're already up
you've already raised the backbone
by going with the two inch stretch
in the down tubes
most of the time what I would do
is make a cut
in the seat post
and bend it back
and put a filler piece of it
so that didn't look out of place
because
like when I got that other bike over there
that was
I got a
roller from Cycle Source
best of show in the 75th
anniversary
and there was a real huge gap
over the top of the motor
I didn't like it at all
brought it back down
yeah I took like three quarters of an inch out of the seat post
I shortened the rear section
I shortened the backbone
I
cut the double down tubes out
put the single down tubes in there
yeah I remember seeing that frame here last year
when did you do all the fab work on that
oh
before I moved up here
yeah I remember seeing the bike
like that frame and stuff here
last year right
when I was in here
it wasn't that was that one
that okay okay yeah
yeah
where did that frame come from
from the same guy that gave me the Titan
oh for real
my Christmas present one year
oh that's awesome
he goes I'm never going to build a project out of this
you could have it
and at that time it was
Anthony owned
I believe it was an orange
Calibrian
chassis design company
and then he sold it
and I guess they weren't too successful
with whoever he sold it to
and then Anthony got back
into it again
in Florida
and that's where you see
10 words now
that's the same company
they're basically the same frame
I mean they even make a frame that's similar to that
for real
but that's where that frame came from
he just brought it in
he picked up one bike I had just finished
he goes here he goes very cursive
I'm never going to use this
with the title and everything
that's awesome
Steve calls them
our number one client
our number one client
well I mean I've got
a handful of guys that really
they it's almost like they
they invested me right
they like the products that I make
which I'm assuming he likes the products that you make for him
and to them it's like
it's their way of like
supporting an artist you know what I mean
trying to keep them building cool shit
to get what they build
you know and I mean I think that shit's awesome
I mean I have a few guys like that
for me that I'm very thankful for you know
well
like I say a lot of the people that I do
work for are repeat people
they come back over
and over
and
like my wife says she said
you know you never do anything half
fast she said you either do it
or you don't do it
she said no
Mickey Mouse stuff
no paper towels
and the dent in the tank with Bondo over the top
you know what I mean
and she said you will fuss with it until it's
right
Fab Kevin one time said
you know
it was not one of the message boards
he said you know Richard Spicer one of the few bikes
he said that I could roll off his lift
and put gas in it
and he said go to California
and he said not worry about anything
you know that's what I pride myself on
you know
I mean anybody come back
we always had to say when I work for the transit company
anything we're doing once
we're doing over and over again
that's not
cause bad news travels fast
you know
it's like if you look up Yelp Reviews
all the Yelp reviews are people who aren't happy
nobody ever puts up
there jeez I had a great pizza
at this restaurant
you know
it's just the people that put
I was eating this pizza
I thought I was eating the cardboard that was on the bottom
but do you know what it is
good to see on Yelp
so bad news travels real fast
yeah it definitely does
and to that point of using Yelp
or just the internet in general
you fuck over one customer
and everybody in America
that's tapped into this world is going to know about it
and you know
I guess we're all wired
to
go towards like oh what happened
who did what who did who wrong
and we're just wired to it
like we're you know it's like in our
our DNA
to kind of like make sure that that's not a threat to us
or something like that you know what I mean
to find out oh well oh yeah
I don't have anything from that company
you know the two
I mean
to me social media
is a double-edged sword
I mean I didn't grow up with it
I had to word it
and uh
I mean
it's like instant communication
you know what I mean
news travels fast like
you know I'm sure a lot of yedders said
when she died yesterday
I thought that she was 15 minutes
yep it was all over the place
yeah
that's
least of the bad part
is that somebody can just get on there
anonymously or with a made up name
and like shoot through the lip
and ruin somebody's reputation
yeah 100%
you know not true
you know I hate to use the term
fake news because I don't like that term
but yeah anybody can
get on there and say anything
you know use a piece of shit
well a good example
Richard Rollins
a couple days
well I guess it was the middle of the week
before the rally started
he did a video
hey come to
Gas Monkey garage
come and get breakfast
you know like breakfast dishes out there
cause you come here and eat
cause the rest of this food and this town is shit
yeah
and what happened
I think they were gonna get all the
Frankenstein movies with the lynch mob
with the tortures and stuff and the pitchforks
the town just
well that was insulting
it was yeah it's low class
as a bush league move
you don't tear somebody down to build yourself up
you know
he could have said
I have the best food in town
I mean I just leave it like this
but
like all the permanent restaurants
yeah that's
and I don't blame them
yeah agreed
and see they know it's an out of towner
that came in and made the comment
wasn't like it was one of their own
was an out of towner
and that didn't endear
him to a lot of people
but yeah he's still got people there
I mean there's people gonna come in
I mean with this many people coming into town
there's gonna be people that want to go there
get picture taken with him
his autograph on a t-shirt
you know it did
went over like a lead balloon
and bam it was down
yeah
off of Instagram
how social media you've been
for you like being able to connect with people
and stuff since you've been on it
you know
cause you were on the old message boards
like chopper dogs
message boards and then they
probably did was fight with each other
and I thought well they're not serious about doing
stuff
why should I bother to
try and answer the questions
cause somebody's either gonna tell you you're wrong
or you know they're too busy
fighting with each other
here's my edge
come kick my ass
you know
that's like high school chick stuff
and
I was on
not quite a few
but there was a half a dozen message boards
but
it took me
a while to get on facebook
I just didn't want to do it
cause I thought it was like
my space
I thought it was like for junior high girls
you know
and
I got some business from facebook
cause I had a personal page
business page
which are both still up there but I very
rarely go through
instagram was good
for connecting
with people that I hadn't seen for a while
or
business
instagram to me
is good for business
yeah
I don't do tiktok
and I don't do
I don't tweet
on twitter
and I know there's a couple more out there
but I don't do that
it's too much work
I think instagram is a good balance
of like a place that you can show
you can visually
kind of show people what you do
what you've done
there's enough of a way to communicate
as if it was twitter
I don't want to be on
these sites
like
monitoring them constantly
I've got stuff to do
I actually do have a life
um
but
I don't want to be constantly chucking
like 5 or 6 platforms
I'd rather just stick to
I still have my facebook
account but I very rarely
go there
it's like my email
I might go look at my emails once a week
and everybody texts me
and so
I used to have
my website was up until
about 2 years ago
website
and that and my domain
and all that
and I just got rid of them
I just cancelled
and
I'm not paying
so I'd say it was $60 a month
yeah
it helps it adds up
and I can put that into something else
but instagram I like
to see a lot of people that I know
tell you the truth
this is funny I kind of
if I look at my
I make a post I look at the likes
it's like mainly guys in the business
the shops
stuff like that
which
I mean there's a lot of
I ran into a guy yesterday
I've been following you for years on instagram
didn't even recognize
it's the username
and that's the part about it
sometimes it feels very
it's awkward
because
so many people might know who you are
and follow your work but then you don't have the same
connection to them on the other end
so you don't know much of anything about them
no
it's not their fault but it does feel weird
I try to have like that southern hospitality
of trying to be
when someone comes up to me
and says hey man I follow you and all this
hey where are you from
I want to learn about you a little bit now
that way I can put that face to something
but
I
I didn't know who this guy was
didn't recognize his username
but it's okay
at least he stopped me
I followed you for a long time
which I appreciate
I don't want it to sound like
I don't know who this guy is
I don't know
I don't have time for him
I've always got time for people
I try to understand
these celebrities
I can understand
the paparazzi
but fans and stuff
you're in this business
and you're liking like a fish ball
okay
and
actors and things like that
if
you're not relating to the public
you're not going to go see your movie
so I think you all
like that person that comes up
to you in the restaurant and says
Mr. Schwarzenegger
could I get your autograph
certainly most likely
what's your favorite movie
give him a little
interaction
give him back the autograph
thank you I'm going to get back to my meal
there's a way to do that
but some of these
you know
and I think everybody in this
you should be like that
in the business
like you say hey where are you from
I think you should be like that
yeah I mean
this is like the motorcycle
world
to become
well known and it is not that
tall of a mountain
you don't know what you do
so it's a
a lot of people get a taste of like
a form of fame within this space
and it kind of can go their heads in the wrong way
you know
I've always said
that the work
is important to me
okay and my wife
will tell you she'll say I know
when you have been out there in the shop for a couple of days
you're not
like the same person
you're not satisfied
she said
enough leave it to beaver get out there
and cut some metal
no more highway patrol for you
but she's right
she pushes me
because sometimes I just go
you know I've fucked this
I'm tired of this
but
she's a wonderful
but I do enjoy
still enjoy doing the work
and it's the
you know it's like I was out on the
black bike when I started going out on that
for the first time I forgot
how much fun it was
how enjoyable it was
to start out with a
bare chassis on the
lift and
finish it out
to
ride it
safely
because I'm very happy with this bike
because it goes down the road straight to the narrow
yeah you know
and the geometry on it is really nice
you go into a curve all you got to do is
just push down a little bit on the left
bar the coulter steer just a tiny bit
it goes right into it
you know
unless you're looking over here and then you're going right off to the top of the curve
but
you know
we talked about that the other day
well you know a lot of these guys that are riding up here this weekend
they take that
riding rider course and they think that they're ready to go
and the furthest
they've ridden is to
the starbucks or to the Harley dealer for
bike night you know they just
don't actually ride
and then they're going to come up here
and they're going to cut the
black hills
and the black hills
the roads are
challenging let's put it that way
and some of them are
dangerous
you don't know how to
coulter steer which they don't usually teach you
in the
beginner course
and how to shift your weight in that
you can get in trouble real quick
like a lot of people they get
especially the
rider the one running the bike
they get they start looking off at the scenery
and you know and they don't see that
yeah all of a sudden they're in the gravel
yeah yeah you know on the
side of the black top
they're going down into the
or they get into it they try and immediately
get back out on the road
then they're gone
and then they're all they all want to
travel together you know
all six of them that came up here they all
want to be riding like an outlaw club
we all just away from each other
and somebody
something happens somebody goes down
and four other guys plow into
them you know that happened up near
hill city a couple days ago
I think I've seen a lot
of reports come across
like people say you see this one
wreck that happened today and you know
because they report that shit all over facebook
you know what I mean
then they'll have like a ticket
count DWI count
death count all those
type of things out here
well you know the fatalities
I think they go all the way from
like Newcastle
to and then like
the Sundance because it's all Black Hills
you know they call
that the Western Black Hills
towards Sundance and that
area and all that
areas included you know so
somebody gets killed in Sundance
why it gets reported yeah
but then they do have
statistics like you know in Sturgis
and stuff
but
now I like to say this
carry people yeah
they think that they're going to come up here
and then you mix
in the alcohol and a little bit of this
you know
but you're right
they'll be looking like this
and they'll be awesome
or they don't know how to go through a
corner yeah and
they try to stay up and then they
steer instead of counter steer
and they shoot right
off the top of the curve
well they get they come into a corner
and then they start fixating on the other lane
and they just go right for it
you know target fixation
stuff you know I've seen a lot of
them
that
are doing on their motorcycles
what you used to do
when you first learned to ride a bicycle
where you're staring at the wheel
you know
yeah
and then these
these people are like
they're not slaps footed they're like up on your
tippy toes on the bike
and
they just don't go like this
they don't compensate
it's a lot of drops
in gas station parking lots because they can't
maneuver the big old bikes that they're buying
shit like that yeah
and
you know I understand
people having to buy
trikes because they can't hold up
but they still want to ride
that's fine with me
but you got to do the speed limit
at least
that Ford
last year it felt like
every time we went out to go ride we got stuck
behind trikes
because they're hard to get around
like you said there's a pack of them
there's four dudes on trikes
and they're doing needles
and they don't fit through any of this shit
you know
well you know even on
the Black Hills
they've got a mark
that you know
a lot of the routes they've got a mark
that says
degree of difficulty and a little chart over there
and the red ones
are
exceedingly difficult
white ones are super easy
you know and
they're not kidding when they do that
no needles is not
like for beginners
the last three years I've ridden it
I've gone from
basically
like crazy horse side over to
the back end of it
and literally
once you get to the top and you go through the little
you know little slit right there
man I put it in neutral
and I'm going as fast as
neutral let me go down that whole thing to the backside
damn it
just turned the bike off you know
well like I say I don't
think everybody should do 90s through needles
you know
at least do the speed limit
to their pose
I wonder why they don't
I feel like for like
the weekend of like maybe the first weekend
or maybe the second weekend
like each weekend of
Sturgis they shouldn't allow cars
or anything but motorcycles on those two roads
just to eliminate some of the
congestion with the
because it'll be an RV trying to go through there
a lot of motor homes and
you know
the
suburban's pole
camper trailers
yeah that adds to the congestion
well when is it that they
I guess Friday of
like eight
I think all the cars have got to be off
for the rest of the rally
could have the time
oh yeah yeah I know what you mean yeah
well it's like they lowered the speed limits
yeah
you know
91 for 75 to 65
79
went from
65 to 45
35 miles an hour
all along 34
all the way up to the
ship yeah
you know
I
think that's a good idea
yeah you know because of the congestion
and I know
it leaves
slower travel time
but like the state patrol was saying
you're doing 65 from Rapid City to Sturgis
and you're doing
75 from Rapid City to Sturgis
it's like a three
minute difference
yeah
but
you're going to insist on going 40
65 is that weird
if you have like you know a six speed transmission
or
yeah it's like a weird
speed to be at you know it's almost too high
sometimes for fifth gear
I mean it's really not
but you're just kind of running a little higher than you probably want to
and in sixth gear it feels like you're running way too low
so well I know
on my Instagram and on the Facebook
the South Dakota State Patrol has made posts on their
sites
you know here are the speed limits
for the rally
yep and it said
whoever wrote it
I don't know who wrote it
he said
there's a rumor
going around that locals are not going to
get tickets for speeding they're just going to
get tickets for warning because they're used to
going 75 to 80 miles
an hour out there on 90
he said that's wrong
you will get a ticket
there's no pass for a local
yeah yeah that's wild
well Rich we've done it again
another two hours
yeah
I enjoyed it again
I'm glad you stopped by I'm glad you can fit it in
I'm happy about that
yeah man I enjoy talking to you
and you know like your shops
awesome
seeing your projects that you got going on is
super interesting to me and you know
like I said
I have quite a bit in here
yeah you know
you're hard telling this one you got this fresh pan behind you
that's got to get revived and
you know another project on the
on the chopping not necessarily chopping block
but needing to get taken apart
taking apart an honest way
to plating and paint stuff
and then that
Titan debating
whether I want to keep it and turn it into
my sidecar project
but it's definitely
going to be straight down there's a lot of funky stuff on it
I mean this bike could have gone through
six or seven people
do you know what I mean
each one added their
little fuckery to it
alright
at least there's no lamp cord in there
for the headlights so that's it
no stereo speaker wire
for the taillights
and somebody's going to go oh that's good wire
well
it's not automotive grade
yeah so
yeah man
I really do appreciate it man
I'm glad that people really enjoyed the last podcast we did
and you know it was
the YouTube folks really enjoyed that
and you know the stories and the
I don't know how popular
this one's going to be because we kind of
rambled all over the place and we talked about
stuff probably that's a motorcycle
related but
I just happened when you
wanted to do this I went back and I looked at the
views
on the one from last year
I think we're like over 40,000
I couldn't believe it I was like
shocked
I can't think of the rhyme or reason
why certain ones do go
through the roof obviously
there is the aspect of the guest
and they want to hear from the guest but
it's so weird the algorithm stuff
you got to play a weird game with that
they want it posted at certain times
and it's like
the picture is looking for that type of
content
then they lean into it real hard
because right before your episode
I want to say it was
Josh Kerpius the photographer
for Harley and that one did really well as well
I know Josh
he was in that 10 days
10 days
20 days
21 days under the sky
under the sky
Josh was in that
I think I ran into
when did I first meet
Josh
trying to think
he was taking photographs I know that
and then he got the gig with Harley
but we were at
I was at the moon ice Christmas party
in
California
anyway
at one of the speedway
I can't I can't say
but anyways I ran into
Josh there
and he said here
have this guy take our picture
took a picture of me and him
together and he said
why is it every
time I talk to Rich
like I'm being tested
for a chopper quiz
which I thought
was funny
what he meant was
you know
the knowledge was there and he's never heard of it
and I asked him about something
he wouldn't be familiar
with it you know and then I
explained it
but that's what he says why every time
do I talk to Rich
seemed like that minute
but he should go photographer
he's a great photographer
I mean that documentary
and him and the other
gentlemen that were on that ride were very inspirational
to me whenever I saw that it took me a while
to I mean this
shovel head I'm building is my first chopper
it took me a while to get to this point
but I'm
I've always been one that I don't want to jump into things
I want to kind of like understand it in a different way
well of course you're a good guy
I don't know how
every skill set is good
yeah
no doubt
I don't know
some people are
super easy teaching people
oh he's good
the knowledge is there
but they can't project it
yeah
well I think it'd be different
if I was like hey I've never done this before
at all
so teach me from scratch
but I've always said this
even when people ask me about paint stuff
I'm like it's a lot easier to give you
the nuggets of information that connect
the strain that it is to give you the whole thing
so
if you come to me and you say hey man
every time I'm trying to pallet my brush to pinstripe
it does this
and I'm like do you do this
right here he goes no I haven't tried that
what does that do well it does this and this
bam this whole I fix that gap
for you and now things roll smooth
that's kind of what it is with Corey is like
on the hardtail we did together
you know I
got it I figured it out but now I feel like
I need to go fuck around by myself
and fuck some things up and then come
and ask the questions
well yeah because you bring it
you say well what happened here
yeah
and a skilled person can say oh
okay
you need to bump up on the gas
yeah
slow down
turn the amperage up
and then try that
and then you do it
and you say oh yeah
okay or you go well
it's like what you're saying you know you ask 20
painters about it
something and they'll give you 20 different answers
the same thing with TIG
it's not absolute like
painting is not absolute
you ask 20 TIG welders
and they'll give you 20 different answers
so you have to shift through all that
and figure out what works for you
well the way I see it with Corey
is you know he has a skill set
and he does it in a very
simple fashion
he prefers to use the most
simplistic of tools
angle grinders, cut off wheels, welder
he does have a lathe and a mill
and to me it's like
it's interesting
because it shows me that
some of this stuff is achievable
with like basic stuff that I actually already have
yeah you know
and that opens a big
world of possibilities
in itself
and I don't know man
I just have all the bikes
I've been riding and customizing
over the years
you know I try to
stay true to my desires
and I haven't really ever
had this desire to want to do stuff
but when I got into choppers
and surrounded myself with different people
that had these skill sets
I'm like man I want to be able to
hold my own in this group
or on these bikes or whatever the case may be
you know
I mean
if you look around here and I mean
I don't have
you know
I don't have a lathe that's working right now
I don't have a mill
I don't have a lot of things
but there's a lot of stuff
that I have
but I like to
I get what I need done
well
with a minimum of
tools
and anybody can do that
everybody
always says you ought to write a book
you ought to write a book
and I always tell
them
well you know get a whole publisher
and tell them to call me
you know Steve knows everything
that I know
and his people's champ bike
we cruise it out
I mean
Steven Secagel
Steve Brauels
he said you know he said
Steve's bike is so nice
he said it's really nice
he said but
he looked at the bike and he said I could see you
yeah
and I go I didn't do the work
he says no but I still see you
yeah
that's what happens with
I'm sure that as I
evolve in my skill set in the fabrication
side of things there's going to be a lot of
Corey aesthetic
and element to it because that's my teacher
and it's only as I
progress in the process of learning
and being taught
to get comfortable with the skills
and apply my vision to the thing
and then it'll evolve into my own personal shit
and it might have inspirations from you
and other individuals
in this space
you'll have
something from Corey
on how he did
what how he accomplished what
you accomplished alright
and you might go into somebody else's shop
or see another bike
and look at the same
you go well this
this must have been a process
but wait a second
this is not exactly
the same
so then you talk to the person
and you try it yourself
and you might say
Corey's was good but this is like awesome
and that's how it goes
it's like anything like painting
100% yeah
I mean the paint for me
is
there are still things that I need to learn
in that space there's things I want to get better at
but there's not a lot
there's not as much
mystery in that space
as there is in the fabrication world for me
well I first started welding
I mean that was like
fucking black magic voodoo
you know what I mean
you're melding steel
fusing it together
and I thought that was like part of the black arts
when I first started
because there was so foreign to me
yeah
and
same way with the paint
when I started doing that
that was
about the same way
I thought that was all for me
yeah
I mean this is my opinion
but there's just something to
older bikes
or just
whether it's these old FXRs
or old dyna
there's just something to them where it feels like
they're less of a commodity
and more of like
a keepsake
there's something else there
it's not just a material possession
you know what I mean
well I'm like all for fuel injection
you know
ABS brakes
it seems like that
but they're all controlled by computers
you know what I mean
it's like
the new Harley
might as well be like an electric toothbrush
you know what I mean
turn it on, you turn it on
toothbrush does everything
scrubs
whatever
it's the same way with
I hate to say it doesn't have the soul
but I mean
you're
attached but you're
detached
you turn the key and it
starts up and it runs
what I feel like it does is that
it numbs a lot of the
parts of the ride
that people would complain about
normally but I feel like
when you truly love this stuff
that you actually look forward to that
you know like there's no way
there's nothing
we all want our ass to feel
a little bit better no matter if it's a hardtail
or anything we all want to feel better
but it's never gonna fucking feel perfect
right and so chasing that perfection
I mean I guess that's how
we've always got the advancements we've got
but you know like there's
no one really knows how to
work on their bike anymore no one knows how to
well they can't unless they want to go out
buy a $1500 scanner
yeah exactly
if they're that cheap anymore
you might not be able to get them from
I remember I think Scandalize
is real like a thousand dollars when Harley
started to put a lot of stuff in it
I think they were
you know I think the snap
on one that was compatible with it was
about a grand yeah but
that's the thing you see you hook all this
shit up and you look at it and it says code
23 or whatever and you say
oh okay
23 is a fuel pump
for the pack act
yeah isn't it
you don't have to diagnose it
yeah you say why does
this thing run like shit
you know and you delve into it
well the next way it's going to be
AI you just hit a button on your screen
and say hey what's wrong with you and it
puts a prompt out lets you know what's
going on with it
I don't know
I'm not buying one okay
yeah there's a care if I
have a screen or not yeah
I'm in a love hate relationship
with it where it's
I wrote
any model
baggers that I enjoyed traveling
those things I had a 23
low rider ST loved it
but right now where my
mind is and where my challenges are
is like learning these
things to apply to
you know I've ridden all over the country right and
I've done it on the baggers on the ST
even this back right here
how do I keep making
the ride to California
feel new and fresh and different
you got to change the bike you got to change things on the bike
you know
well when I got my first
my
86 I traded the
79 in on an 86
electric bike and
I
wanted it because it had
it was the evolution motor
you know and it had
gauges and it
had a nice seat it had a good suspension
you know what I mean
but
it's not like
a rigid frame bike
it was nice
and
you know that's what everybody always used to say
all while you know if you're in a car
or a truck or whatever
you know like unattached from the road
you know you ride the bike
you're like in
in the scene
instead of going through the scene
but I think
the newer Harleys
more and more
detach you from
what's going on
and I can understand the appeal
of building
because I've had them both
but I mean building just the bare bones
well that's why a lot of the
guys that were
over the last like eight years that were kind of like
some of the driving force of the
performance bagger kind of push
a lot of those guys
that have started to want to build
older FXRs or even
I've seen a couple of them
getting their hands on some old CFL
frames
and
they're all kind of going to this place
where it's kind of like I am
I have had really cool modern bikes
but now I want to have a bike
where it's not the same
as everybody else's that's passing me on the road
you know I mean
you drive up and down 90 right here
400 bikes
that look exactly the same with the same
accessories
and that's completely cool for that
that's the general population
is going to be like that
but when your whole life is motorcycling
customizing and stuff like that
it doesn't cut it for me to have what everybody else has
I want to have something that's representative
of my
well you want to have something
I think my whole point was you want to have something that you're involved with
both mechanically and spiritually
that makes sense
we used to get in there
and you'd go yeah
but
that's
I think is to go
on more and more
divorce is the Holy Spirit
but see that
I don't even know what
mainstream magazines
all of the magazines are out there
I mean is Cycle World
do they still print it
do they still print Cycle
I think the only thing that's out there now is Hot Bike has come back
yeah
and then
DICE magazine is still good but that's more of a
niche magazine
and I think that Cycle Source is the
only other one
well I as far as
across the street there's usually riders
gets turned around here
with the new owner
and
what I was trying to say was that
well take any magazine
okay
you don't make any money on the news
yeah you lose money
on subscriptions
you don't make any money on the news
to speak of
cause a lot of that gets eaten up
in the distribution
costs
so magazines
are
advertising driven
yeah
but yet they'll use
the subscription numbers
to sell it
how good a magazine is
yeah I mean
the back end of a magazine
like compared to like we
I mean
everything is advertisement based
everything
so the podcast or youtube channels
or social media influencers
about advertising right
the thing is like with the digital side of things
we can show
potential sponsors
way more of the numbers
than the magazines can
but
there's a thing that the magazines do
to those that are willing to take a chance
and read one of the articles
and I think that nowadays in age
I think more people are looking for something different
than just swiping up on their phone a lot
of people want to get away from that
I've seen uptick in people buying books
motorcycle related books
and I think
more people should start making more books
I mean that's my goal is to make some books
you know there was that big push
you know print is dead
okay everything is digital
everything is online, everything is on your phone
your ipad whatever
and
it's like
vinyl records
vinyl records just made a huge comeback
there's a lot of
things, a lot of music being
printed on vinyl again
alright
and you know the same thing
with they say print is dead
but print is always going to be there
but
with the magazine like I say
they're mainly
advertising
revenue driven
magazine
like you said well a lot of guys are going for
the performance bagger and they're looking for
older FXR
they're looking for a CFL free
and
a lot of it
and it always has been
it's steered by the
editorial content okay
so let me see
we're starting to drop down on our
advertising
so what we're going to do
is the next issue
they say
performance FXR is the next big thing
and he said that's going to be
our push then we're going to bring them
advertisers in
because we're going to put a few of their products on our bike
and then we're going to bring those advertisers in
and then when they see the ads
they're going oh that's where I can get that
yeah see
and then when they start to get down a little bit
then it got to come up with the next big thing
like
rigid short wheel based chopper
okay or
performance baggers
all of a sudden they went boom
who would have thought you wanted
a hot rod bagger
right who would have ever thought that
a lot of people out there wouldn't
even have thought about it
they wouldn't have thought about taking the 16 inch
wheels up a bagger and put
18's or 17's
or a front wheel is big
but that's not a performance bagger
well I think a lot of the big wheel stuff
helped us
like the big wheel thing was never as big
in like California
as it was obviously in Phoenix
Texas Midwest things like that
Texas of Florida
yeah big time
and so you have
you have a lot of people like my age
that were riding those bikes that were comfortable being on
baggers and then we kind of got into
dinas and then all of a sudden
hey what if I just take these
bars and stick them on the bagger and I can have
what I was used to so I feel like
on this side of the country you saw a lot more people
go from the big wheel
to the performance bagger because it was kind
of a lateral move as far as
the type of bike they're on
true but then again it was
different way different obviously
the opposite and it was for a while
until like you say everybody going down the
highways get the same thing yeah in
2019 when there's
there was a meetup where all of
us that were kind of into it met up at
the Starbucks in
Deadwood and you know
to this day some of my best friends that
have all we all had these type of
bikes you can almost count on this this
these two hands the people that had T-bars
on their bikes here yeah and then
the next year it was like man they're
seeing passing by and then 2020
2021 now it's everywhere which
I genuinely love
I love the fact that I got to be a part
of something in the early days and it's become a mainstream
thing but because of
that it just kind of you know like
I've had my seven years on these type of
bikes and I'm kind of bored with it and I
want to try some other shit now you know
why it's funny when you say that because
you know that's kind of the joke
is that
you better not wear that at the born free
just next year like everybody's going to be
wearing yeah yeah I mean that's
that's what happens well it kind of
happened with my chopper you know like
when I did this bike
I
I paid homage to the
two individuals that inspired me to do this
bike Al Emerson
and Scott
out there in the Bay Area
he has that that old
chopper what is it um
Paco frame with the tank that says Frisco
on the side of it
old chopper dog dude you know
Scott yeah
Scott
I'll say it was last name
but he
cool bike it is
and I got to sit in his shop over there
in Oakland see the bike
in person do the podcast with
them and photograph it as well
but to me it's like I spent the
time paying homage to that those two guys
because those two bikes they built
inspired me
and I feel like
the uptick in FXR choppers
definitely came after the wave
of what we did on this bike
a couple years ago yeah because
I'm thinking it was hot bike
that Scott's bike was featured in
yeah but Scott's bike was built back in
2012
true yeah I mean it might have been featured
way back then
but it's a
really good picture of him sitting at the top
of the hill in San Francisco
with the bike in front of him
it's the one man full face helmet
and the shield the simpson and all that
stuff and that photo is
iconic to me if I could get my hands on
that or get a print of that it would hang it in my house
somewhere well that's great photographic
composition you know the lighting
was just right the views
and gaps of field everything
yeah I don't
know who took that photo
yeah
you know that's why I always say
you know with your shot he makes
your bike look way better than it is
I'm telling you I don't know how he
does it but I think it's the lighting
or the you know
I want to
find
I needed pictures of
oh when I was going
in the museum I needed pictures of the chrome nun
yeah
and I didn't have any that I really felt that
the committee should get
as a representative of the bike
so
I want to
look at your site and you can go into his archives
and you know see
the bike she shot
right and it
I guess it's got like a quick view
and it says
see full
not file
but something see full
images on my thing yeah
and so you click on that
and
that chrome nun had like
250 pictures
that were all on file there in the archives
yeah you know so I can pick out some really good ones
that's good
and Mike says I don't care how you use them as long
as you don't crop my name off the bottom
of the photo yeah
I said oh I wouldn't do that
it's yours
yeah but he said no you can go ahead
do that yeah you know
he said and he posted that line
if you want he said but I just don't want
he said like a lot of guys do is
crop my name off the bottom
of the photograph
because the photo
he takes are his property
you know it's his intellectual
intellectual
property you know
I don't know have you ever done submissions to magazines
a long time ago
yeah that's how I had to get into the
space you know right so
like you shoot like a hundred images
you narrow it down to twenty
you send those to the magazine
they pick out seven
yeah and
you back the rest or they throw them out
yeah yeah right but
those seven that they pick they hold
those yeah because they're buying them
from you yeah the others
that they didn't choose
still are your property
yeah still are your property
so you can do whatever you want to
so you could just sell
the hot bike and then take the
pictures they didn't use and
sell them the freeway magazine in France
you know perfectly
perfectly as a goal
perfectly legit
and that's how Richard's done it
for years and stuff so yeah
well I guess that's about it huh
it was a good one man
you think so? I think so
alright I appreciate it Rich
alright we'll see you again
in the 86th
are you sure? I'm coming every year
well I'm gonna be here
I might not be able to hurry but you can yell through the window
well first off
I hope you guys enjoyed that
I really really enjoyed
the opportunity that I'm getting
to sit down with Rich
just hear some of his stories from the past
talk motorcycles get some of his perspective
this dude's still building some killer
fucking motorcycles
go follow him I got a link to his
Instagram down in the description below
also down below you can get some links
to all the cool brands that are supporting
this podcast and making it possible
for me to have guys like Rich on
to share some of this past knowledge
and wisdom and gain
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trying to pave the way for tomorrow
so if you want to support the podcast
that's the way to do it
if you want to do it even deeper
deeper I say
go check out our Patreon
another link that's down in the description below
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anyway guys thank you for listening
I got some more cool podcasts
come in our way your way
have you want to look at it next week
so we'll see you then peace
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