Editor's note: If you really work your connections, utilize your skills, and take advantage of any opportunities that come your way, with a little finesse you too could have one helluva beautiful Road King (or bike of your preference) like this and still maintain a reasonable budget. Jevon Lau of Pickard USA says it cost him less than $15,000 total to build this bike. After dropping the initial $7Gs on a wrecked bike, making some smart trades, and doing the labor in-house, it only took a couple grand more to get the bike to show-quality status. Here's Jevon's story on the build.
Mitch and I sketched a rough...
Mitch and I sketched a rough design of what we wanted and let Joe come up with the rest.
The "Cadillac Pussy" started as a salvaged '03 100th anniversary Road King. We bought it from an auction for $7k, knowing we would strip it down to the frame. All the body parts and sheetmetal were damaged, but all we really needed was the frame and motor. My business partner, Mitch Pickard, sat down and designed the overall layout and style of the bike. It was going to be a long, low, and clean bagger. Since everyone was customizing Street Glides and Road Glides, we decided to do something not as popular. We decided on the Road King, hoping it would still be something everyone liked.
We wanted to get a few manufacturers and dealers involved to help showcase their parts along with ours, so we called Derk and Jacob from Bad Dad and talked about doing some horse-trading. We swapped a set of wheels for their stretched bags, fender, nacelle, and fender spears, and began the mock-up process. During this time, Joe Martin from Martin Bros saw a set of wheels he liked and wanted to do some trading as well. He was about to build a shop bike for the ROT Rally, so we traded a set of wheels for his Bag Daddy pipes and a killer paintjob.
Jevon designed the stretched...
Jevon designed the stretched dash to be as clean as possible, which meant no exposed mounting hardware. The dash is held in place with really strong magnets.
These floorboards are sort...
These floorboards are sort of a prototype. For the production units, Jevon plans on making them a little longer and wider, but still feature the Cyclesmiths rubber and rivets.
The next trade was with Mark Adams of Adams Precision Concepts (APC). Adam came into Pickard USA to buy some wheels for a custom build he was doing for Travis Pastrana and Nitro Circus. We ended up becoming good friends and he ended up building his bike at our shop. Mark did all the motorwork on the RK and I did the sheetmetal fabrication on Mark's bike. Mark installed a Feuling cam plate, S&S gear drive cams, Feuling hi-flow oil pump, and new pistons into the stock 88-incher. He had a set of Screamin' Eagle heads laying around, so he ported and polished them and mounted them to the cylinders.
For the sheetmetal on this bike I stretched a Street Glide tank to get rid of the two gas caps typically found on the Road King tanks. I welded in a flush-mount cap and made a custom dash to cover it. As you can see, there are no gauges, ignition, or any components on or around the tank and handlebar area. All switches have been relocated on the panel under the seat area.
The next step was the frontend. The neck was cut and raked out 7 degrees and our head machinist, La Prom, designed and machined some prototype FLH-style raked triple-trees. La doesn't like to buy parts, so he insisted on making the trees and a bunch of other trick billet parts in-house. He designed a couple sets of trees to ensure the proper trail and finally nailed it. We used a set of American Suspension billet bagger legs with one of our 23-inch High Rolla wheels bolted in between to prop the front up. We fabbed up a set of beach cruiser handlebars and set them up with internal throttle, brake, and clutch lines.
Mitch and La also designed the floorboards, which were supposed to be one-off for this build. We decided to have Cyclesmiths install the rubber and rivets, which are also found on its banana boards. Because we got such a good response on these floorboards at the Cincy Expo, we are going to begin production on these.
At the rearend, we decided to stuff a 180 Avon into the stock swingarm. We used a narrower belt and offset the hubs to get it to work. We also lowered the rear about 1 1/2 inches. Bad Dad supplied the stretched bags and fender, and we put in the flush brake light and license plate holder.
Once all the body parts were fitted and mounted, we had to reshape the seat to get the front to fit around the stretched tank. We tore the cover off the Badlander seat and reshaped the foam to fit tightly around the tank. The seat was then re-wrapped in real leather, none of that cheap vinyl crap!
Now that it was time for the bodywork and paint, Joe came over and picked up all the parts and started working on the bodywork. Mitch and I sketched a rough design of what we wanted and let Joe come up with the rest. When he brought back the finished pieces, we were all in awe. It was one of the cleanest paintjobs we've seen, and it was flawless. Joe added his signature touches to the design and kept it real clean and classy. Even though Joe is known for his intricate airbrush work, he can also do some clean yet catchy paintjobs as well.
This bike was barely finished for the 2010 Cincinnati V-Twin expo. We got all the parts installed and rolled the bike into the trailer and hoped everyone liked it. It was a big hit in our booth. Thanks to everyone who helped with this bike; without them it wouldn't have turned out the way it did.