"When someone opens a shop in small-town South Dakota doing quality work and building clean custom bikes, word travels fast." This was the response Mark Puterbaugh (the owner of the bike you see here) gave when asked how he hooked up with Brian Klock and the Klock Werks "krew" (the builders of the bike featured here).
Flash back to several years ago, and we find Mark and his wife Gena living in Huron, SD, 50 miles to the north and about 3,000 heads fewer than the 15,000 residents in Mitchell, where Brian had just opened Klock Werks. It seemed as if everyone within a 200-mile radius who owned a motorcycle was talking about the work the company had been turning out, from paint to full-blown customs.
"I had a '98 Fatboy at the time," Mark recalls. "I thought that was my dream bike-all it needed was a custom paint job. So I headed down to Klock Werks, met Brian and the guys, and they took care of me."
After a few more trips to Klock Werks, Mark began to take notice of some of the full-blown customs they'd built or were in the process of building. Then the thought entered his head that maybe he wanted more than just a Fatboy with flashy paint. However, before he could act on his custom impulse, Mark and his wife moved 610 miles away from Mitchell to Pekin, IL. A few months after Mark moved into his new digs, the Fatboy got totaled. Call it a fortunate misfortune, but it was just the push Mark needed to make his new dream bike come true. So he jumped in his car and made the nine-hour trip back to Mitchell. Most likely he passed a dozen or so motorcycle shops along the way, but Mark knew he wanted Klock Werks to handle the build.
"I'd like to think that Klock Werks is different from most shops in the way we handle our custom builds," says Brian. "This shop isn't run like a dictatorship; everyone has input. We consider ourselves a design team, and we all work together to meet a common goal-building good-looking customs."
When Mark sat down with the KW team, it quickly became evident they were all on the same page for the build. Mark really liked the look of War Eagle's Conqueror 280 frame with its smooth lines, single downtube, 2-1/2-inch dropped seat pocket, and massive swingarm. The KW design team agreed that it would the perfect basis for a head-turning custom. Once they hashed out the major details, Brian appointed Tim Wagner (the guy shown riding the bike) to take the lead role for this project. "Each project we take on has a different lead guy who is responsible for making sure all the parts are ordered and everything is on schedule," said Brian. "This was Tim's first project as the go-to guy; he handled all the metalwork, with Dan Cheeseman serving as his mentor."