Go to the Choppers U.S. website

"J&B-style" stuff, but it all seems inferior, if you're used to real road machinery and its accessorization. Speaking of which, I notice you have something in your list I've been bitching about for years. I could be wrong, but that bullet headlight of yours looks just like the one all the lowrider outlets carry. My magnum opus on bike lighting  starts out with a rant about those damn things. In my opinion, they're totally useless for anything except looking "sort of like" a real headlight.

When those guys sent us their actual Choppers U.S. catalog, it looked like it was time for an interview. The first thing I asked of them was background info; to see what sort of guys were doing this thing. Alan Discount and Rick Haynes are guys who possess serious business credentials, and who share a common background as (moto)bikers. How they happened to choose kustom bicycles and associated hardware and accessorization as a new venture, and their future plans for it, along with discussion of the goodies themselves, will be the gist of our interview with them.

Interview conducted by Jim Wilson

Those who've been with BR&K from the beginning will recall that our primary want has always been for "our kind" of frames and components. For most of our history it's been a case of "Make it yourself", "Pay a fortune for somebody else to make it for you", or "See what's in the Lowrider Bike catalogs". We've wanted somebody in the business world to recognize that there's a serious market for our kind of goodies at reasonable prices, just as somebody once recognized that there was a market for affordable Lowrider Bicycle hardware, and before that, that there was a market for musclebike hardware, in the '60s.

Within the past year, we've seen that recognition starting to happen, beginning with the Schwinn Stingray Chopper and its associated parts catalog. Many of our readers have bought the new Stingrays, just for parts-butchering purposes. We even took a stab at hustling a BR&K line of goodies for kustombike builders. Unfortunately, that would have required serious work of a sort which doesn't come naturally to guys who mess around with bikes as a form of creative activity. No, what was needed was for some business types to use their form of creativity to do it for us. Looks to me like it's finally happened.

Since our last issue went up, we began hearing rumors from our sources about a new player in the game. Somebody sent a link to an eBay page, members of the kustombike boards reported wish-list input invitations, and that sort of signs. Then Marty Eden turned in his latest column, with even more intelligence data about these guys named Alan and Rick who were making those waves we'd been hearing about.

When those guys sent us their actual Choppers U.S. catalog, it looked like it was time for an interview. The first thing I asked of them was background info; to see what sort of guys were doing this thing. Alan Discount and Rick Haynes are guys who possess serious business credentials, and who share a common background as (moto)bikers. How they happened to choose kustom bicycles and associated hardware and accessorization as a new venture, and their future plans for it, along with discussion of the goodies themselves, will be the gist of our interview with them.

Q: Hi guys. ChoppersU.S. looks like it's off to a great start. How long have you been working toward the release of this catalog, and how did you two hook up in the first place?

A: ALAN: Hi Jim, thanks for having us.

RICK: And we appreciate the kind words about our initial release, we are excited about bringing these new products to the chopper bicycle world.

ALAN: Rick and I have been playing on the fringe of the custom motorcycle world for a while - riding and wrenching on custom choppers - and kept kicking new product ideas back and forth over the last couple of years. As that market evolved, and some would argue became saturated, our lack of moving quickly started to close the window of opportunity for us to do anything significant.

In fact, perhaps I should back up a bit. Rick and I met and worked together on our last deal. It was a marketing and printing company that ultimately got sold to an investment group. I was recruited to CA to grow and sell the business and Rick was one of the original founders. We became good friends and, when we left that deal, we were a little disenchanted - we had a few dollars in our pockets (but not as much as we should have!) and were pretty burned out. We both vowed that we would never work for anyone ever again (especially investment bankers), and that whatever we decided to do next, we would like to tackle together, and in an industry we both felt passionate about. We both made a list of areas we felt met the following criteria: - Had a large, but untapped, or still fragmented, market opportunity, - Were in an industry and with people we enjoyed being around, - Had yet to have an 800 pound, market-leading, gorilla emerge. Whatever we do, we like to do it big <chuckle>, - Would allow us to be hands on and creative.

As we reviewed each of our lists, many of the opportunities had knock-out factors - too mature, too boring, too saturated. But the Chopper Bicycle Industry seemed to hit on all cylinders. You see,  I managed a bicycle shop on Long Island as a kid, and I think I still have grease under my fingernails from building custom bikes. RICK: And like Alan, I have always been a bit of a "wrench", even though my professional career would show otherwise. Personally, I have built and raced

ALAN: So with that background, and the explosion of the custom chopper motorcycle world on Discovery Channel, SpeedTV, etc. we felt the mass market was gaining an awareness and appreciation for things on two wheels that also function as art forms. The custom chopper motorcycle industry was saturated, out of reach for many, and feeling the effects of EPA regulations, (especially here in So.Cal) so bicycles had to be it. The rest is history - we agreed that the chopper bicycle world would be the next one to take off. And with respect to how long it took to put our line togetherour initial efforts were all about research. We dug deep to see who the players were and what they were bringing to market.

both dirt track and desert motorcycles and hot rods my entire life. And on the professional side, have always harvested my creativity by designing sales and marketing materials. That combined with the years I spent living on the So. Cal. beaches and seeing the Cruiser craze take hold, and knowing in my heart that the chopper bike world could be the same if not better, drove us to this market. As a sidebar, more recently, just for fun, I decided to tackle a restoration project - an old Schwinn Beach Cruiser - and had a blast. It made me realize that bicycles were the perfect medium for me - a combination of mechanics and creativity.

RICK: And what we found was even more interesting. The best work was not being done by the big name-brand bicycle manufacturers but instead being done by a ground-swell effort amongst garage chopper builders. And many of the Discovery Channel motorcycle builders had nothing on them<laughs>. These guys and gals were cutting-edge and super creative. But they didn't always have access to the right parts and tools to work with. ALAN: So six months ago we took all our research and a stack of garage-built chopper photos and went to work mapping out the product line you see today. Our intent is to accommodate both the complete bike customer, as well as provide basic raw materials such

as rolled fenders and frames to the garage builder. And our approach is definitely unique by another measurement we don't think like the big bicycle companies. We have no preconceived notions about how things are typically done in the bike biz, and basically decided to move forward on new product ideas, borrowing ideas from the motorcycle industry RICK: And as long as we both agree that the end product will be cool <smiles>.

Q: Six months from brainstorm to serious product line is extremely impressive, by anybody's standards. You guys are obviously not the sort of businessmen who do a lot of futzing around with focus groups and test-marketing concepts, huh? Otherwise you'd still be analyzing data or something. Does this mean you didn't go the typical start-up route, with a slick business plan to present to venture capitalists? Within the past year, I was toying with the idea of doing pretty much the same sort of thing you're doing, under the BR&K brand, and had started building a network of people to make it happen. But when it got to that capitalization stage, I was overcome by boredom, and got back into what I consider fun stuff. But, if I'd found that hungry young MBA, who was also into bikes, it might have been different. I suppose this question is: did you guys have money people just waiting around to hand you some of it to back whatever play you felt like making; or did you bypass the usual time frame of a start-up by (shudder) actually using your own money?

A: ALAN: We were fortunate enough RICK: or crazy enough ALAN: True<laughs>to be able to skip the financing step and get right to business. We have both been blessed in the past with successful careers, so the initial capitalization wasn't too big a hurdle to handle on our own. One of the important aspects of selecting this business, which I didn't mention in your first question, was NO investment bankers! <laughs again> RICK: Besides, we liked this industry and product line so much that we didn't want to give up any ownership or control to anyone else, especially if they didn't share the same passion and interest in the market as we do.

ALAN: We have raised lots of capital, probably in the neighborhood of $50 million, in the past, for other deals, so if this gets bigger than we can personally handle, financing our continued growth should not be a problem. And we have lots of ideas for new products and ways to help the chopper bike industry grow to a level it has never seen before.

Q: Yes, that "Investment Banker" bit slid right by me. I thought you meant that you didn't want to be Investment Bankers; not that you didn't want to be associated with Investment Bankers. I can see why you relate well to our audience, who're the sorts who build something crazy, then risk their own necks riding it down a hill. Well, enough about money; I'm getting drowsy. What our crowd's here for, as usual, is to hear about hardware. Since the biggest pieces of hardware you're selling are bike frames, why don't we start there? You have two basic frame designs, it seems, one with a straight top tube, the other curved, with associated differences. Both are available in sizes for 20" and 24" wheels, and in various finishes. From Marty, I learned that Matt Goodsell's team is making them for you. Did you design them yourself, or did you bring in someone else for that? Some hardcore technorotic info about them would be appreciated, as well.

A: RICK: Alan was the guru behind the frames, so I will let him handle this one.

ALAN: The frame is where it all started. While doing our research, we did look at chopper bicycles, but moreover spent most of our time looking at motorcycle designs. As I studied all the various configurations and builder's trademarks in the American V-Twin arena I had a bit of a revelation that ultimately really helped us move from fantasy/concept to production viable designs. The way I see it, there are really 4 major "body" styles in the chopper world. You have: The Classic Bagger or Cruiser ala the mainstream Harley - the Heritage Soft-tail being probably the most well known. These bikes are meant for distance riding and have a stance and riding posture to match that function.

Then there is the Old School or Bobber Style - at some time or another we have all envied the guys riding these stripped-down bikes throwing conformity and rules to the wind with the tall Ape-hanger bars and cool twisted sissy bars and biker bitch on the back. Perhaps the best known builder of this style was Indian Larry, may he rest in peace

The third style is what I would call "Pro Street" - long, sleek and lean with nice clean, curvy lines and lots of muscle. Paul Yaffe comes to mind as the front runner in this area. And finally, my favorite, the full-on stretched custom chopper - the more extreme the better. Lots of rake to the fork, low seat, fat rear tire and radical sheet metal work are all signatures of this style, and my favorite builder in this genre of motorcycle has got to be Joe Martin of Martin Brothers. Oh, and it has to be orange, green or some other color or crazy paint job that screams "look at me!"

Our vision was to hit the market with multiple designs assuming that, as in the motorcycle world, different designs would appeal to different people (not to mention pocketbooks). But building more than one frame, let alone four seemed risky, if not crazy for a brand new bike company. There are lots of up-front costs in prototyping, tooling, die making etc. to consider. So I continued to look at the designs and then it hit me. The frame styles for the 4 models really fit into two categories. One that had Classic lines (built for comfort) and one that had Radical lines (lots of rake and stretch). My idea was to build two frames, and use different parts and accessories to create the four models we now have.

After I created full scale drawings (or should I say 100 different iterations) for each frame and its related components, we built and tested, and refined and tested our prototypes. Then we went to work seeking out a production partner.  When we chose our name: Choppers U.S., we did so with the intent of keeping as much of our line as humanly possible built right here in the good ol' U. S. of A.  But as you probably know, finding a company with the experience, skills and facility to build production bikes here in the U.S. doesn't give you many choices. And we also had to consider supporting the growth we envisioned. We were absolutely thrilled when we found Matt Goodsell and the team at American Legend. Matt and his team are true craftsman, and a delight to work with. If we can design it, they can build it, and they always add value along the way. It is a true collaborative process to ensure we have the absolutely best product, at the lowest price possible. And I don't want to forget to mention that the owner of that company, the legendary Gary Turner (the GT of GT bicycles), has been just fabulous as well. He has done all he could to help us source the best products and introduce us to all the key players in the bike industry. Honestly, without these guys we probably would have been forced to go overseas.

Wrenching with Rick and son Dillon

"Old School"

Rolled steel wide rear fenders.

"Pro-Street"

"Original Chopper"

With respect to the technical aspects of our frames, they are all-steel construction (and I am not supposed to tell you, but we also have an aluminum version in the works as well), with laser-cut dropouts and all TIG-welded joints. They have integral disc brake and fender mounts, machined bottom brackets and head tubes, as well as rake and stretch geometry much more like motorcycles than bicycles. And we have some crazy new frame designs already on the drawing board too, but those you will just have to stay tuned to see.

Q: That would seem to be a very efficient set of chopper frame design parameters- four different frames from two basic designs. I have a feeling that you'll be shipping more of the 24" sizes, since

most of the people playing this game at this level tend to be adults.  Sure, 20" was the basic wheel module during the previous golden age of kustombikes; but that's because it was mostly kids involved back then. Schwinn is sort of responsible for the recent resurgence of 20" donuts, with its new Stingray. That super- fat rear was just too tempting for those of us who were just waiting for some big-ass rubber. Then Schwinn made it worse by bringing out their "Spoiler" with the same donut on the rear. Nice for them, as it saved them from special tooling for their "adult" bike's rear, but bad for everybody else, as a lot of builders got side-tracked into what seems to me, to be a dead end. Let's face it, an adult on a bike with teeny kiddy-size wheels looks like a clown out of uniform. It's nice that you didn't paint yourselves into that corner.

This will probably sound pretty dorky, but the items in your line which really caught my attention are those rolled steel fenders you carry. Fender technology in re: bicycyles pretty much died once BMX and fake-BMX took over the bike industry in the late '70s. And the dearth has continued until now. I usually end up making my own fenders, because of the lack of choice. For a while, those ducktail fenders the LRB sources carry were about all there was. I used fronts on the rear to get a nice chrome bobber, at least for a while. Then the Fat 24 X 3" came along. When I wanted a chrome bobber fender for that size rear, I was reduced to buying a

moped fender and cutting it up. And I didn't get a kickup at the rear edge. My current chopper project, which is also based on that rear size, has a handmade glass fender. So, you can imagine my pleasure in seeing something that prosaic available in that size. Was it a big deal to find a good source to make your fenders? Those look pretty good, in the photos.

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No line is complete without stickers.

A: RICK: Before we get to the fender question, one quick comment on wheel and frame sizes. Alan and I are motorcycle fanatics who are also Fathers of young boys. Even though our sons are enamored with our motorcycles, it is not really something we can directly share with them. Sure we can wrench on them together and they can ride on the back, but they can't ride alongside us on the street on their own motorcycle until they are driving age, which won't be for some time. We see the chopper bicycle as a catalyst for Father's and sons (or daughters for that matter - we don't want letters from the ladies!) to spend quality time together, having a pair of chopper bikes, accessorizing and wrenching on them together, as well as riding them together.

ALAN: The NBDA has been stressing that the industry needs to get kids back into riding to generate the customers of tomorrow. We think Chopper bikes are the ticket that just may get kids re-engaged and back on their bicycles. And if the Dad is involved too, we stand a chance of getting them to look beyond the WalMart-quality bikes and into real high-quality bikes. After all, compared to low end motorcycles, high-end chopper bikes are still a bargain! RICK: On the fender question, we don't mean to sound like a broken record, but once again, we went outside the normal bicycle channels for producing parts.

ALAN: Since we don't necessarily think like bicycle manufacturers, we looked to non-conventional sources. Once we found a company that had the right equipment, getting the fenders built to our specifications was fairly easy. RICK: Not to mention that we think the fender allows perhaps the biggest area of customization possible on a chopper bike. By starting with one of our "blanks", a builder can chop, sculpt, weld or do anything they want to give it their own personality. It is like a blank canvas. We can't wait to see what your readers do with our fenders!

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Wearable accessories.

ALAN: Another important part of our fender line is how they are mounted and supported. We have created a line of interchangeable fender struts and sissy bars that are not the flimsy stamped sheet metal braces everyone has seen for years, but instead super strong and attractive chrome-plated struts that look like they came off of a motorcycle. Our Sissy Bar mounting system is so strong you can even tow a friend on the back using our optional bitch/buddy pad and passenger pegs. Q: You've definitely got the right idea with those fenders; and getting out of the usual bike-industry vendor pool for product sourcing. Most of the stuff you see in bike parts and accessory catalogs is cheesy, flimsy junk. The lowrider parts have better chrome plating than most of the typical

"J&B-style" stuff, but it all seems inferior, if you're used to real road machinery and its accessorization. Speaking of which, I notice you have something in your list I've been bitching about for years. I could be wrong, but that bullet headlight of yours looks just like the one all the lowrider outlets carry. My magnum opus on bike lighting  starts out with a rant about those damn things. In my opinion, they're totally useless for anything except looking "sort of like" a real headlight.

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Our kind of bikers are the ones who'd be inclined to take a night-time cruise, assuming they had some serious lighting gear that didn't look like it came off the landing craft of the Starship Enterprise. We need lights which look like those bullets, but actually work, and are sturdy enough not to fall apart the first time you hit a pothole. I've had to use those things in the past, for the same reason you have them in your list, I assume: because that's all there is that looks right on our kind of bikes. But I ripped the guts out and put in a krypton lamp a quantum leap more powerful, and powered it with a separate battery ten times as powerful as the pair of AA penlight batteries it normally uses. The light on my wish list has those

features, looks like that, and is made of metal twice as thick. And good chrome, of course. You could do a lot worse than the light on my current chopper project. It uses an array of ultra-high-power white LEDs inside a conventional-looking rounded rectangular-lensed shell, in bike scale, which has a rounded profile. It runs off a 12-volt system, and is as bright as most motorcycle headlights, while drawing very little current, compared to a conventional bulb that bright.  Pricey as hell, of course....

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Back to the positive, I like the look of those seats of yours. There's a lot of the bicycle aesthetic I prefer to the motorcycle aesthetic, but saddles are a big exception. Most bike saddles look pretty dorky, compared to almost any motorcycle's, even if you put flames on them, and chrome springs and a crash rail. Yours look just right for a chopper bike. Is there an interesting story behind yours?

A: RICK: Jim, lights have been a personal project of mine- and a similar pet peeve. We had searched all through the market and found the same issues you raise. We thought our only recourse was to go to the Taiwan or Chinese manufacturers and spec exactly what we want - heavier duty metal, quality chrome and gleaming lights (i.e. halogens) but as you know that is a time consuming process.

ALAN: Not to mention counter to our mission of keeping as much of our product sourcing and manufacturing in the U.S. as possible. RICK: So we would love to know your source for a better solution... ALAN:  With respect to our line of seats...our vision here was driven by a few factors...(1) the Schwinn seat looked just plain goofy, (2) We wanted something that followed the curve of our framesets and hugged low to the frame like a chopper, (3) was comfortable, and (4) was still compatible with conventional bike hardware. You will also notice it is fully adjustable and nice and wide for comfort.

Serious seating. Directly above is "bitch pad" passenger saddle.

Non-serious headlight "replica".

RICK: And it had to look cool. ALAN: Again we couldn't find anyone in the bicycle industry who could make what we wanted here in the States, so we went outside that industry and teamed up with a well-known hot rod and custom motorcycle seat upholstery shop to get ours done. We offer both leather and vinyl models, with and without stitched raised insets. We made sure we used the highest quality materials. I also had a vision for branding the leather seats, so we had a large electric brand of our logo fabricated. When it is burnished into the leather it almost looks like a Paul Cox (of Indian Larry fame) hand tooled leather seat... RICK: ...without the thousand-dollar price tag!

Q: It's those little details, like branding the leather, which make all the difference. That sounds like something I'd do, being a fiend for detail and all

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Now this is what we call a real line of handlebars!

I've heard favorable comments about your handlebars from someone almost as cranky as me on the subject. I like them all, actually. I especially like that your ape-hangers aren't cartoonishly tall, like some I could name. I hate being poked in the eye by a grip when I'm standing next to a bike. My current chopper project sports a pair of mini-ape-hangers I pulled off a kiddy bike I found in the trash. It looks very old-school chopper. Those scalloped bars are really tasty, too, as are the swept-back ones. Are your bars made here too, and who's responsible for the designs?

A: RICK: When we looked in the marketplace for the right bars, the closest we could find were either cruiser bars or some crazy BMX designs. And since we wanted our designs to flow from the lines created by our frames and front ends, we knew we had to create our own.

ALAN: I would love to say that we sat down and systematically drew out what we wanted, but in fact, this was one of those tasks that had to be seen in 3 dimensions while literally sitting on the bike. So we had an intense R + D session in our machine shop. We took all sorts of shapes - short curves, straight bars, longer bends - cut them up and just began tacking them together until we had something that looked and felt right. That's not to say we didn't have a picture in our minds of what would look right for each model, especially since there are so many designs of motorcycle bars out there to borrow ideas from, but the final designs came from doing actual fabrication. The toughest one to get right was the chopper bars - as your readers know, getting those compound miters just right is not easy - but once we did, we fabricated a series of jigs to make sure the bars were perfectly symmetrical and consistent every time.

RICK: We have lots of other bars on the drawing table and in R + D too. ALAN: Yes, we are playing with some crazy paint, powder coat and awesome plated finishes, as well as a dozen new shapes that are unavailable anywhere else - including designs that use real motorcycle type risers and flow right from the fork legs. This is the stuff we love, it allows us to roll up our sleeves and really get into it. RICK: Absolutely. And with regard to where the bars are produced, yes, they are made here in the U.S. - at least for now. If we get some designs that really take off, it might be more cost-effective for us to go overseas ALAN: which we are still leery of, but would allow us to get the cost to the end customer way down too. The pricing on our handlebars is a little higher than we would like, but keep in mind they are made from high-quality materials, and have a far superior show-chrome finish that is hand polished in between plating steps, which is tough to get from Taiwan or China. Our hope is that people will recognize that.

RICK: We know knock-offs will show up in the market pretty quickly now that we have put these unique designs out there. Buyers should make sure they look at what they are getting very closely. Who wants to ruin a project that they have put countless hours and lots of blood, sweat and tears into with crappy components?

Q: I can relate very well to your handlebar design process. There's nothing to compare to actually playing around with the metal to work out designs in "real 3D". Sure, CAD programs are great, but they're actually slower than just chopping stuff up and playing with the pieces. Maybe some day that'll change; but at the moment, "eyeball engineering" still rules, especially if you don't have a lot of lead time. Knock-offs will always be with us. The trick is to get there first with the most, and let the imitators rush to catch up to you. By the time they do, the creative guys will already be ahead again.

I like your range of forks. It looks like you've got a good balance there, from entry-level to high-trick.  And the high-trick springer has a very nice price on it, compared to others of a similar nature out there now. It's easy to price it to the limit, if you have no competition; but as soon as the market is shared with others, comparison-shopping enters the picture. Makes it tougher for you, if you're competing for the consumer's dollar, but it's great for the consumer. We consumers have waited a long time to have this kind of choices available. Did existing market competition play a significant part in the design and pricing of your forks?

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Some of the wide range of C.U.S. forks.

A: RICK: Wow, I guess we are leaving money on the table, eh? <laughs>. But seriously, we are glad you like our line - we worked hard on creating it and it was actually one of the most complex components to engineer, due to the number of parts that go into an assembly like a springer. ALAN: Not to mention that our goal was to still allow people the flexibility of adjusting the product to fit their unique needs. We strive to make everything we do oversize so the end user can customize it to meet their application. So you will see features like extra long legs and head tubes that can be cut down, adjusting bolts and jointsanything we can do to make the product work for the broadest audience. And when we looked in the marketplace to see what else was out there, we were indeed surprised how costly (and complex) other springers were - that is once you found them. Of course, the most prolific springer of all is the cheap knock-off single spring fork patterned after the old Schwinn Krate bikes. But I wouldn't put that in the same category of what we are producing. Our stuff looks like fine jewelry, but can take the beating of everyday use too. We CNC machine parts out of thick slabs of 6061 aluminum and polish each piece by hand. And we show-chrome all our steel parts.

But don't let our high-end processes and materials fool you. When you produce these components in quantity, you get economies of scale. And, we agree that we need to price our stuff keeping in mind that competition will start to copy us as soon as they see our designs. We are not looking to make a  quick hit in this business and move on. We are in it for the long haul and want to show our customers that we have their best interests at heart. RICK: And be sure to keep an eye out for our version of single spring and girder forks coming out soon - we think it will blow people away.

Q: I can just imagine you guys plotting your next forks: "Let's see 'em try to beat this one, heh, heh, heh!" This stuff is fun, eh? I'm looking forward to seeing your take on both the single-spring and girder themes. I have a sentimental attachment to the Schwinn springer knockoffs, because for so long that was all we had to work with. But most of them are pretty junky, and the originals are way too expensive, and scarce, to mess with. I think we've covered the hardcore stuff pretty well. How about we get into the more "frivolous" aspects now?

I like your fake tanks a lot. I also like your addressing the fact that a lot of people disagree with the concept of sticking a "gas tank" on a bicycle without an engine. I must admit that, in theory, I'm against vestigial tanks. When I see something with a gas tank on it, I expect to see an engine down there under it. When I don't see an engine, it feels like there's something missing. That said, most of my recent bikes have tank forms as part of the design. Let's face it, on any

piece of kustom machinery, the paint is one of the most important aspects of the thing. You just can't do a really spectacular paint job on a vehicle unless it has a decent amount of surface area to decorate. Frame tubes by themselves just don't give enough surface area for interesting paint schemes to happen, unless it's done on a teeny scale you can't see at a distance. That's where tanks and fat fenders enter the picture. I've seen kustom motorcycles  which use the frame tubes as the fuel reservoir, and they just don't cut it, visually. It's tough to beat a big fat tank up there, to serve as a canvas for paintwork.

Should you want them, they're here.

On my current project, the frame design refers back to the classic "tanker" bikes of the '30s and '40s. I added a curved middle frame tube, just to be the basis for a pair of oversize "tank panels", which I made from fiberglass. As an interesting twist, one of them is hollow and has an actual fuel filler cap and petcock fitting. Since I'm a motorhead at heart, my thinking at the time was that I might want to stick one of those little Chinese bike engines in there at some point; and if I did, I'd have the tank already in place. Unfortunately, being a guy who doesn't always think far enough ahead, I didn't do any actual measurement in relation to an engine. Later, I did the measurements and the math, and realized there's no possible room in that frame for an engine. Maybe I'll fill the tank with brandy or something. Not that I recommend boozing and pedalling, kids; it's a conceptual thing! I presume your dummy tanks could easily be made functional, since they're glass, and probably hollow. Have you given any thought to the possibility of sticking one of those little engines in your frames? And did you do any measurements in relation to that possibility?

A: ALAN: Yes, our tanks are hollow; but the ones in the catalog have been cut out underneath to slip over the top tube for easy installation. Even though they are purely cosmetic, the toughest part of this kind of product development is designing the shape and creating the molds, and now that we have those produced in multiple lay-ups, we could easily build tanks that are sealed and functional. RICK: We actually envision people using the tanks a different way. Since glass is a fairly easy medium to chop and alter, we figured some people might get super creative and do things like add a clock or satellite stereo system with speakers, or TV (but no watching while riding please!) and hide the working parts in the tank. Or perhaps hinge them for storage. Or inlay materials like exotic leather or diamond plate. The ideas are only limited by your imagination.

ALAN: And we have a line of themed tank and fender decals in the works too. Aside from the tanks, we are working on a couple of concept bikes that utilize small gas engines or electric power. The buzz in the mainstream bike world is all about electrics. The big problem is where to store all the ugly componentshey, I knowhow about inside our tank! <laughs> We also have been playing with other types of bolt on "sheet metal" (or glass) such as oil tanks for the area under the seat and in front of the tire - another great place to hide or store things that typically goes unused, and could really help shape the lines of a chopper.

RICK: Suffice it to say, we will put a power-assisted solution in the market but not without making it easy to install and operate, and without compromising looking cool. ALAN: Absolutely, including a comprehensive installation kit that makes it easy for the end user to install is key. Otherwise, some people may be intimidated by this type of project. And to answer your question about measurements, our frame triangles have plenty of room. Oh, and one final thought on the subject - we are taking a different approach to mounting the engine by designing our own line of universal motorcycle style mounting brackets.

Q: Yes, that "oil tank" location under the seat is a great place to tuck batteries. I've used it for lighting battery concealment on my current one. And my tank panel without the filler cap could easily hold a fair amount of batteries for drive purposes. But, I don't know how many amp-hours it would hold, without experimentation. A typical bike electro-motor runs most efficiently on about 36 volts, and you'd probably want about 12 amp-hours capacity, if you used the motor a lot. That represents a pretty fair amount of volume. Some nice fringed saddlebags would hold lots of battery power, though. Speaking of fringed saddlebags, I didn't see any in your catalog. But I'll bet you have them on your list, eh? You seem to have the rest of the biker accoutrements pretty well covered, though.

At first, I assumed you wouldn't have thought of something else on my list. But then I found it. I should've known you'd have it, since you guys are obviously pretty sharp. All those leather accessories, do-rags and tattoos and stuff play to universal biker fantasies, and would add to the fun of riding a chopper bike for a lot of people. But, in my opinion, the most primal chopper bike fantasy is this one: "A cool chopper bike is a great tool for picking up chicks". Whether this is within the realm of possibility for everyone is another matter, of course. But assuming you did pick one up, where would you put her? Sure enough, you've got that "Bitch Pad". Brilliant! Of course, when you buy that full-page ad in Boy's Life, you might want to call it something else. In polite society, I call mine "the pillion saddle". It's so much more genteel-sounding, and it's a French word too, so it conveys sophistication, oui?

By this time it's probably obvious that I could go on for hours raving about the stuff in your first catalog; but we can let our readers browse through it and do their own raving and drooling. So I should just stop browsing it now. Oh, what the hell, one more rave won't hurt, I suppose. I LUUUV that bicycle-sized license plate holder and the blank plates you sell! I've had to make those damn things every time I've built a bike, since no one else has ever had them for sale, and that's one of those little vital details that make such a difference. Muchas gracias for thinking of that one, amigos, you've saved me a lot of future work. So, how about if we just go free-form from here on? What haven't we covered here that you'd like to tell us about? And maybe something about your wish-list for ChoppersUS? Without getting into too much detail, of course. Now

that you've shown the way to do it, I predict you'll have some people following your marketing cues pretty closely. What the hell, you can even ask me questions, if you want. Over to you, guys...

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A: RICK: Well first let me just say, and I know I speak for both of us, that we thoroughly enjoyed meeting you and spending time taking about what we are doing. As you can see, we are very committed and passionate about this industry, and it is extremely rewarding to hear people, who have been doing this a lot longer than we have, compliment us on our initial efforts.

ALAN: Yes! That's a great idea. You see, we have been thinking about the wheels that are available in the market since the day we started our research. And we were hard-pressed to find anything that met our profile of the perfect chopper wheel- at least by our definition. Given the maturity of the wheel industry, we were hoping to find the same flexibility and selection you have in the motorcycle industry, but, and this is a big but, at a reasonable price. In our opinion, the ideal wheel would include the following:

Q: The wheel deal is definitely where the action will be happening next. Billet wheels are great, of course. Nothing better than a big chunk of 6061 carved into a wheel by a CNC mill, then polished until it looks like chrome. And, if you've got the dosh and the patience to wait for it, you'll have something great and unique. They'll weigh a ton, of course, but high-buck show bikes don't build up a lot of mileage anyway. But for most people, including myself, something which looks different from regular wire-spoke wheels or those radial-spoked "Baby Daytons" is plenty good enough. George Barris proved that it was possible to make a cast-alloy mag-style bike wheel for a reasonable price back in the '60s. The same technology still exists, and has probably improved since then. The later MotoMag wheels show how intricately-designed such wheels can be, and how sturdy and lightweight. A cast-alloy wheelset for under $200 is what's needed to cause a landslide business. A set of vacuum-metallized injection-molded plastic wheels for $100 will capture the youth segment of the market.

Ultimately, outfits like WWW, Quickspeed, etc who do billet wheels will make their money from very limited-production, or even one-off designs. The CNC machine doesn't care if you're making one or a thousand; all it wants is a CAD file to work from. And CAD files are easy to generate, presuming you have the software and the design skills to use it well. Aside from the cost of the machinery and the metal stock (6061 aluminum is very expensive) the biggest cost factor is finishing and polishing. That mirror finish is where half the money goes.

In my opinion, a set of cast wheels for $200 in semi-matte tumbled-finish would capture the adult segment. A half-dozen different designs would suffice. Back in the golden years of hot-rodding and kustomizing, there weren't hundreds of wheel choices to choose from, it was the rest of the vehicle which was emphasized. Unpolished is good, because all it takes to get that mirror finish, presuming you want it, is some time, elbow grease and a corded electric drill with a rag wheel for final polishing. I can do that job just as well as some illegal alien in Arizona, or some Chinese entrepreneur's nephew, offshore; and I can spend the money I save on other goodies. Most people doing this stuff consider it a hobby. A hobby is a constructive way of spending spare time. There ya go, hobbyist, put that time into

Those are interesting questions you posed, Alan. I think I have the answers. (1) Do I see anyone else emerging in this space who might give you a run for your money? Of course I do. Merely by going into the business the way you guys have done virtually guarantees that you'll have competition. Unimaginative and timid people always wait for somebody else with balls and smarts to do it first, and they use that as their business model. That thinking applies to everything in any business. There's at least one company already out there doing something similar to what you're doing. It's an offshoot of an existing lowrider bicycle parts source. The difference is that you're doing it in a more visible, creative, and cohesive way. This, if anything, will ensure success. All those other, less daring entrepreneurs out there will notice that success, and want a slice of that pie they didn't even know had been baked yet, until you took it out of the oven.

(2) Do I think product innovation is enough of a competitive weapon to keep ahead of the overseas knockoffs? You bet. Product innovation and quality will always keep you ahead of the pack. "Overseas Knockoffs" is a bit of a misnomer, though. What you're referring to is American knockoff-oriented guys imitating you, and having extremely cheap stuff made offshore and wanting to beat your price by a little bit with it. The Chinese are capable of manufacturing stuff just as good as us or the Japanese. I know this for a fact, through business contacts I have over there. But those knock-off guys want the huge markup they can make with junk, so they have the Chinese or Taiwanese factory make the stuff as cheaply as possible. That sort of thinking is as natural as breathing to those guys. Stroll through Harbor Freight Tools or WalMart sometime, and you'll understand the concept very well. It looks sort of like the good stuff, and it's quite a bit cheaper. Not as much cheaper as it should be, though. Milwaukee, Stanley and PROTO, among many others, are still doing very well for themselves, making well-designed quality tools, in spite of all the junk alternatives to their products. And so will you, if you continue bringing out quality things people like our readers want, at a fair price.

(3) Is a bonus answer for the question you didn't ask. Yes, I think you're on the right track, and will do very well for yourselves with your current approach to the kustom bike market, and your attitude toward quality and value. Having said that, let me go a bit further with some caveats. For the long haul, you'll need to broaden your marketing viewpoint considerably. Kustom culture is presently in its fifth decade of recognized existance. And it's bigger than ever now. All through that time, kustom motorcycles have been a minor subculture within the larger one, as have been kustom bicycles. I won't get into kustomized refrigerators and outdoor barbecuers, but they're in there too. That's a very big tent, with a lot of practitioners and wanabees milling around inside of it. Currently, chopper motorcycles are a very popular entertainment subject; although discerning kustom culturatii despise those OCC clowns and their cosmic build budgets for silly product-themed products. Everyone loves Jesse, though, but that's because he's the real thing, no matter what he feels like building. You may not remember this, but Ed "Big Daddy" Roth caught considerable flak from hot-rod and kustom purists back in the day, when he switched over to motorcycles as the basis for his show machines. But people were basically cool with it, as he was Big Daddy Roth, after all, and everyone knew what a cheapskate he was. Hot rodders appreciate cheapness; it's practically a core belief with them. That's why they like bicycles so much, and why their kids sport such interesting rides.

Basing a bicycle and accessory product line on a popular TV subject will work very well in the short term; and we kustombikers are so desperate for differently-styled components and accessories that we'll keep your inventory rotating like a turbine, at least for a while. But after a couple more TV seasons, chopper motorcycles and any other associated products will be considered sooo 2004, among the mainstream. My advice is to prepare for that certainty now, so when those knock-off guys are trying to unload their unsold cheapo "chopper motorcycles without engines" and related accessories onto Big Lots, you're still being successful by catering to the wants of all those other people in the big tent. Kustom bicycles are so much more than motorcycles without engines. Keep that in mind, and you'll thrive.

Before I step off the soapbox, I should point out again that I'm a major motorhead, and my next kustom bike project is something which will look like a bicycle with a 1980 250 CC Honda Elsinore air-cooled 2-stroke motocross engine transplanted into it by a maniac, then styled by Ed Roth's corpse. I love a roomy tent, don't you? Any more questions? Actually, I wanted to address something Rick brought up earlier. At the time, I wanted to throw in a few dozen "Right-On, Dudes", but I'd already filled my blather quota for that time slot. It was your envisioning fathers and their kids doing this thing we do, together, Rick. That's exactly been BR&K's agenda, from the very beginning. I think I still have the wrinkled cocktail napkin from 1998 which has our goals scribbled on it in Sharpie marker. Goal #1 was "Glamorize the creation and riding of bicycles to kids, in order to save the world!" I believe #2 was "Take over the friggin' world! But that might have been #3, after "Pick up a hot babe by using my bitch-padded bicycle as bait". Thanks a lot, guys, it's been fun for me, too. Any closing remarks?