"The Man" in Maricopa

 On the off chance you aren't familiar with Shorpy, it is one of my all time favorite Internet time wasters. Flathead Rob pointed out this photo.

Phoenix in 1953. "Photographs show teenagers, mostly male, participating in the Maricopa County, Arizona, programs for teenage delinquent drivers. Includes boys working at Juvenile Farm; teens attending Attitude School; policeman with boys and their hot rods; teens driving on Phoenix streets." Photo by Earl Theisen for the Look magazine assignment "How to Tame Teenage Drivers."

Bubblevisor Wheels & Waves

Forgive me for reposting but I absolutely loved the photos from this Bubblevisor post. BMX, old motorcycles, all the cool stuff.

For the record - this is everything a motorcycle is supposed to be

Re-read the caption above

You know your motorcycle collection is pretty killer when your '51 Triumph Tiger is background fodder

This may be the single coolest MC photo I have ever seen!

Douglas World Cruiser - Seattle II

Vaughn got me out of bed too early on Saturday morning, primarily so he could ride in Flathead Rob's 1933 Plymouth Sedan. Rob had arranged for some old car friends to bring a few cars down in support of the christening of the Douglas World Cruiser - Seattle II. There is no shortage of cool things to do on summer weekends in this area. Still, my favorite part was Vaughn's ride in a 1915 Model T. Pretty cool day. It's really nice to have Rob's wife taking real photos so you get a break from some of my shitty cellphone photos.

Oops!

When was the last time you got together with a bunch of buddies and crashed your priceless pre-war Knucklehead in front of a big crowd?

It may not seem like a big deal but imagine falling off your front porch into a pile of old motorcycles.

Ran When Parked

1936 Indian Chief - Original paint with just the perfect amount of crustification. A motorcycle can't get much cooler than this.

Cossacks

Sorry the pre pre-apprentice wasn't able to make it.

Pre-Unit

Duplex T110 Factory Rigid

A recent conversation I had with Flathead Rob got me think about modifying a factory rigid rear section to fit my '61 T110.  The following is a photo of a Duplex with an earlier rigid attached.

Studying the photo above got me questioning if the seat-to-dropout tube is stretched.  These are stock.

Are they the same or not? Anyone know of a clever way to derive approximate scale  dimensions from a photo?

It's also got me thinking about jigs. Obviously the length of the one below is not stock but I like how the engine plate mounting holes were used to tie the frame to the jig. Crime Scene Choppers has a pretty nice blueprint for a frame jig available on there website. I'm concerned the material required to build a jig might not be all that much cheaper than paying someone that knows what they are doing handle it.

The cop out option would be to buy a Unit hardtail from Acme choppers. I like the stock looking axle plates. They claim to build custom hardtails too.

Seattle Cossacks 2013

The calendar on the team website is out-of-date so I thought I'd post a more current version for reference.

Native

Emma is now a full-fledged Seattle native.

Shell Blue Sheen

I finally found the right first race car of Vaughn on Bring a Trailer. My first car was a Sprite Should I have to help out with the maintenance I already have a intimate knowledge of every f@#king nut and bolt on the car...

Since I have the uncanny ability to turn nearly anything back to the subject of motorcycles I couldn't help noticing how close that color is Triumph's Shell Blue Sheen. Shell Blue Sheen is possibly by favorite factory paint color (for the Pre-Unit era for sure). It's the color I've been most strongly considering for my '61 project.

 

I spotted this bike on the Zon blog recently thinking I really liked the color. I wasn't til I saw it side-by-side with with Shell Blue that I realized how close the colors really are.

Turbine Powered '32 Roadster

Flathead Rob, Vaughn and visited the Lemay Marymont Museum last weekend. One of the most captivating cars there was was this turbine powered '32 roadster. It's not really that surprising it was built by a Boeing engineer. What is a little more surprising is that he routinely drove it to work for a while. Word is Boeing reserved a special parking spot for him because because the car has no reverse.

I got curious about it and went looking for any historical references on it. There are plenty of details here. Now I just need to track down some video footage of it running.

Ran When Parked

1937 Harley Davidson ULH - I'd make a little room for this one.

Ran When Parked

1947 Triumph T100 - This roller would make for the start of a super cool project,