“My wife wanted something legal,” said Todd Silicato of Todd’s Cycle. Todd is a nondescript builder’s builder. He’s not a celebrity type. He’s a biker who works his ass off building anything from modified stock bikes to world-class customs and billet products, to speedway racers, and now he’s tempted to roll to Bonneville. He’s also […]
First Ever Speed King Read More »
The man with his creation. Bob Carrillo is the quintessential bike builder: part renegade, part Renaissance man. He is a man of many talents. Trained as a stone mason, Bob’s family hails from the East San Fernando Valley area of metropolitan Los Angeles. Bob started riding dirt bikes at a very young age. His grandfather
Maybe it smacked you at a local bike night, maybe it occurred at a bike show, or maybe you were out for a ride. We all run into bikes that stick in our brains like the first touch from a gorgeous woman after a hazardous tour in Iraq. In this case, “Peckerhead,” the motorcycle, slapped
The Peckerhead Wins Read More »
Lodi, CA~August 24, 2009 – Bryan Schimke, the immensely talented custom bike builder and owner of TPJ Customs out of Lodi, CA and his good buddy Satya Kraus, owner of Kraus Motor Co. from Cazadero, CA, hit the road for Sturgis this year on badass custom steel with a pocket full of optimism and a
TPJ Custom Sturgis Delivery Read More »
Click on any image in this feature for a chance to win this beauty. Have you ever wanted to roll on the throttle while riding down the twists and turns of a back country road on a pure American classic — say a pristine 1947 Harley-Davidson Knucklehead? Easy question, right. What if I told you
Wheels Through Time Lucky 47 Read More »
This all began 38 years ago on the Big Island of Hawaii. Chris Calicdan’s dad, a phone company lineman, rode a raked-out Panhead at the time. Chris, at 2-years-old, stumbled into the garage as his father’s engineer boot kicked the starter lever and that rigid, with upsweeps, fired to life. It was the first time
Drop Seat Sporty for Kristie Read More »
As I was preparing for my trip to Sturgis, for the rally, I decided I needed a new helmet. Besides the normal reasons I wanted to upgrade to one that handled rain better. I had been using a full helmet with a snap-on, flip-up face shield, and it just was not doing what
NEW HARLEY BOOM AUDIO HELMET Read More »
Editor’s Note: We are going to work with S&S, Baker, BDL, Compu-Fire and other Bikernet Sponsors, on their most asked tech questions. We’ll try to deliver the info you need access to. The following came from Howard Kelly, the former editor of HOT BIKE, and now an S&S tech editor. “We take tech calls all
S&S Shorty Carburetor Adjustments Read More »
The Sturgis Shovel has seen its share of LA Harbor town back alleys in the eight years of pounding the streets around Wilmington, California. The exhaust is really starting to show the effects of the road and weather. Originally these hand fabricated pipes were painted with barbeque paint found lying around the Bikernet Intergalactic
Sturgis Shovel Gets A Wrap Read More »
Lone Star Rally 2010 This years’ Lone Star Rally was much like Sturgis in the crowd seemed to have grown from the past few years. Whoever said we are in a recession forgot to tell the bikers, because they were out in force at this years’ rally. I would estimate at least
Lone Star Rally 2010 Read More »
This industry is quirky, full of scoundrels and outlaws. A couple of guys from Bassani Exhaust took me to lunch recently to discuss advertising on Bikernet. Did they advertise, no. But they talked me out of the Salt Shaker, tempting me with a tall tale about some buxom blonde who could be my girl for
Bassanis Exhaust Steals Salt Shaker Read More »
This is a wacky year. I’ve blown through half it, and now I need to scramble. At times, I feel like I’m wading through mud, and it brings me down, then something minute happened and I was reenergized. So here’s the deal for June: Valerie Thompson is flying out next weekend for a final
5-Ball Racing, Bonneville 2010, Part 9 Read More »
They call it a “mid-life crisis”. I’m not a big fan of that term, but I guess it describes the situation as well as anything. It’s the conflict a man encounters when he reaches that point in his life where he arrives at a crossroads; continuing to provide for his family in a manner to
Saddle Tramp Part 1: Read More »
A blue finch sang merrily from atop a gargoyle leering from the roof of the long, squat, black warehouse. The silver Special Agent Zebra Express, a tricked-up Thunder Mountain Custom Cycles 240 Blackhawk, rumbled outside Bandit’s sprawling lair in Wilmington. I sat patiently waiting for the tall iron gates to part, occasionally executing zesty throttle
Ill-humoured, Danny awoke. Not to a cold dawn dodging the misty drizzle and ghost-lighting the tent's shabby interior, nor yet an obdurate lump of Grampian rock digging into his shoulder through a leaky air mattress.No, Danny awoke from a dream. He'd had a Highland wildcat by the tail; its body squeezed under one arm and
As he stood in line waiting for his order to be taken, Jack couldn’t help feeling frustrated about the day. Just an hour ago, his boss was getting on his ass about some mundane chore he had not completed. His wife had called him halfway through the day bitchin about money. His ride to work
Some Days Are Better Than Others Read More »
The Dutch sure know how to live, Tinker decided, tipping his chair back against the half-panelled wall. A litre of fresh draught Heineken in one hand and a glowing cone-spliff in the other was proof positive. His latest ride, shining through the coffee house window on a street barred to cars, confirmed it. One of
My plan was to take off from the Boston area on Wed morning and head down to PA to the Delaware Water Gap National Park for some sightseeing. From there, I was going to shoot down through Delaware and Maryland and then into VA to check out the Chesapeake Bay Bridge/Tunnel. After that, no definite
Dusty Daves Memorial Weekend Run Read More »
After finishing my second beer, in the smoke filled bar, it was time to move on, unless something good was happening. I held myself to a strict code, two beers and time to roll. I had the circuit down pat. It would eventually take me to the ocean were I would end up at the Sand Bar, a quiet local hangout
Paradise Springs was a dying town. I'd never been anywhere near the place, but I'd seen enough little shit-holes just like it to know the drill. It was Mayberry by way of the Twilight Zone, the kind of place where good people worked hard and died young and the bad ones grew fat and lived
Illustration by Chris KallasPart 1 Evan sat at his bedroom window and stared at the night sky. It had been a strange day for him indeed. He thought about what happened and smiled. Today was a turning point. A day when he summoned all of his courage and made a decision on his own, against
It was a South Texas spring, and the roadside along Highway 59 was a sunlit sea of bluebonnets, brightly-accented with dandelions and glaring red wildphox. The colors ran together in a psychedelic mosaic as they whizzed past Ringo on his Shovelhead. The old Harley was loaded down like a pack mule, with bedroll and bags
Lefty felt the vibration of his old Pan's engine tingling in the small of his back. “Man I'm getting old,” he thought to himself heading out on a lonely desert highway. “The bike's running good,” again thinking to himself. He had experienced some electrical problems recently. The electrical system was almost fifty years old. He
Illustration By George FlemingTinker was up at sparrows fart; the persistent dawn chorus of “we want worms” could normally be ignored, but this weekend was the Hawg Wallow. That wasn’t really the name, but the first year was a washout that left Harleys mired to their hubs, and it stuck. He wasn’t a pretty sight
