New work: Aluminum Overdraft custom FXR

Hey out there - it's Jeremiah. I have received some emails asking for more bike building images, specifically of the Marlboro Man custom FXR Black Death 3 replica. Jay is on a road trip for a few weeks, also on an FXR, so these pics have been painter heavy. I know for sure Jay has more images of the building process for this next beauty: Aluminum Overdraft. I promise to share as soon as I get them in my painty little paws.

I want to invite everyone to comment on the posts you read here on TRANSMigra. We would like this to be a place of erudite discussion, spam, trolling, petty arguments, flaming, one-sided debate, and unrelenting purism. Ok, maybe not everyone. But if you know bikes, love bikes, ride bikes and have thoughts on our work we want to hear you.

This concept ride stems from some old fart's fascination with WWII aviation. In designing the tank art, I learned quite a lot about military graphic design during this period of killing-people history. Please allow me to bore you to death with it:

These are Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombers, bombing the Hell out of some poor area of Europe. Don't worry - they deserved it, just read any history textbook or watch Dr. Strangelove. On the closest aircraft pictured above, note the military aircraft insignia, a modified roundel we officially call the Stars and Bars Roundel. I know, with only one star and arguably only one bar, so some also call it the "Star and Bar." This insignia, used from 1943 - 1947, is one piece of the inspiration.

One B-17 bomber was called "Aluminum Overcast." It was shot down over France in 1944. A restored B-17 now flies under the same name, in commemoration of the bomber that survived 33 successful missions. It has some impressive nose art:

 The lightning bolt is the next component of our design.

Finally, there was "Bad Check."

Why named Bad Check? A bad check always comes back. At any rate, Bad Check went MIA in January 1944 . . . While building the bike, Jay joked that we were going into debt in polished aluminum and so the name "Aluminum Overdraft" was born. When Jay gets back I can have him 'splain y'all why polished aluminum is much better than chrome. I styled the lettering based on the sans serif military stencil sheet.

And here she is:

 

 

And now for a little bit of Harley history. Jay chose a pivotal year for this custom rebuild: 1984. This is the last year of the shovelhead engine (seen above), as it was replaced by the evolution. It is also the beginning of the softail era as Harley Davidson introduced a rear suspension system in place of the traditional rigid frame. That makes this vintage the only softail shovel in production. Of course this bike is far from production: much of the build is custom modified or even fabricated from scratch, down to linkages and struts.

There will never be another like our own Aluminum Overdraft.

Fuel tank swap for BD3: TRANSMigra early works Pt III

Our Canadian client sent us this picture of the softail fuel tank from the custom Harley Davidson FXR Black Death 3 replica:

 The S, O, and N of Davidson were scuffed at some point between shipping, unpacking, and assembly by our client's mechanic.

He is clearly still very happy with his purchase. You can also see he is a big fan of the shiny, as he had the distributor / dealer slap on some brighter-than-heaven chrome pipes in place of Jay's true-to-the-movie dark matte. Looks damn hot either way.

At any rate, he decided if the tank was going to travel all the way back to us, why not have us build a brand new shiny tank, minus the creative defects Jay intentionally worked into our original? Once again, Jay was fond of his original weathered piece, so we agreed to another swap out. Jeremiah was happy to push it to the next level and seek a truer representation of the replica.

You can imagine our dismay when the good ole USPS delivered a box that looked like this:

Well, they probably had to drag it behind a team of horses through muddy gravel to make sure it wasn't a bomb . . .

 Truth is, we weren't at all surprised to open it and find this:

Clearly this tank was carrying some bad juju.

Images of the tank rebuild from a classic softail tank:

(pretty little FXRs all in a row)

(brand old softail)

(stripped down softail takes a test ride)

(above you can also see the fender rebuild just before painting)

Again, painting be upon us.

 Stenciling this time was in yellow and brushed on. We have the same 85% accurate font issue, but gave more space around each letter to apply corrections, seen in the black outlines below

 

 This time painting was over clear, which adds drying time and requires painting in thinner layers. Avoid this at all costs. The emblem is outlined with paint marker before covering with 1-Shot enamel paint.

 That is not orange juice.

 The rough-in is rough as it gets roughed in.

 With lettering complete, the emblem can be fleshed out.

 

Wait, fleshing out a skull? Oh, never mind.

After applying the final clear coat, the happy fuel tank basked in the mid-afternoon sun.

 And again, with a sexy chromed dash assembly.

Back in the workshop, it was very hard to pack this thing away, even after the final clear coat. How do you resist the urge to put just one more brush mark here, or maybe there?

(these are the penultimate pics with the crappy camera)

It was packed very well this time with foam scraps from a kayak mod we had performed several weeks prior, plus we opted for an insured shipment via FedEx. And off went the black space egg into the far northern reaches of icy Canada, where we hear they treat packages with far greater respect.

the end

New fender art for BD3: TRANSMigra early works Pt II

It turns out that the land far away, new home of our BD3 replica, was actually Canada. The new owner found my other blog and contacted me about some additional work. One of these projects was new artwork on the fender. Jay was fond of his original endeavor there, so we swapped out the seat pan at the cost of painting labor and shipping.

Jay brought it over to Tim Dixon at Gas Axe, who had helped him build the "original" replica seat pan. Below is the rebuild, along with another rebuilt softail fuel tank.

Jeremiah received design approval for the top and bottom rocker banners so painting was upon us. The client wanted to galvanize the phrase from Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man : "It's better to be dead and cool than alive and uncool." Classic.

Banner outlines and lettering were freehanded from a scaled print of the concept illustration. Layers of pencil, pen, and then paint marker were used before applying final coats in 1-Shot enamel paints.

 We sure do miss that crappy old camera.

Above is the final paint job with several layers of clear coat. The skull on the fender is just under three quarters of the size we painted onto the gas tank, so it presented an extremely tedious task.

Fender artwork with replica grip tape detailing and Jay's insanely well crafted custom seat pad.

Black Death 3 : TRANSMigra early works Pt I

A bike fabricator in East Tennessee met an artist in Asheville, North Carolina. That's not us; it's a movie poster.

Our first collaboration was a replica of a cult classic bike - the Black Death 3 from 1991 smash hit Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man. Above is a screen grab from the flick, the bike ridden by Mickey Rourke. He played the title role of "Harley Davidson" alongside Don Johnson as "The Marlboro Man"

 This is allegedly one of the Black Deaths in an aged state, perhaps the original Black Death 1 transferred from Mickey Rourke to Chuck Zito for restoration. These bikes were built by Gene Thomason of Bartels Harley Davidson in Los Angeles. The artwork provides quite a challenge as the hand painted lettering with skull and cards emblem is both iconic and unrefined.

 As you can see, many have tried to create replicas but have missed the mark.

Our bike builder Jay is not one to miss the mark. Here the bike is shown near completion, with the modified softail gas tank bearing only stencil outlines for the painter to do his magic.

 

Here we also enter into the mysterious relationship with this gas tank and multiple washing machines . . .

Our painter is also a perfectionist in his own right, and found the lettering to be a bit off. The biggest challenge was to add some meat to HARLEY DAVIDSON with very little breathing room in the letter registration.

Not bad for our first attempt . . .

Somehow Jeremiah managed to cut himself with a paint marker.

 In the early days, a crappy camera was involved to ensure authenticity.

We were able to reach that elusive zone between unpolished roughness and iconic presence.

Jay put his heart and soul into matching every detail of the bike within his control and the availability of parts. With the bike complete, it was delivered to an anonymous distributor and sold to a mysterious buyer in a land far away.