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The voice of the australian biker

Eddie Munster Tribute Chopper

Mexic

an St

yle He

ritag

e

Slaya Chop

’59 TRIUMPH THUNDERBIRD BOBBER

$5Winter

Special

’59 TRIUMPH THUNDERBIRD BOBBERCameron decided to have this bike built

as a memorial to his grandparents…

’59 TRIUMPH THUNDERBIRD BOBBER

Oz Biker 6

’59 TRIUMPH THUNDERBIRD BOBBER WHEN IT CAME time to start on Cameron’s bike, he delivered me at PopBang Classics the

1959 Triumph Thunderbird engine, gearbox, original frame, and a mountain of boxes full of everything I needed to assemble the bike. Pretty much all of the original parts got scrapped as they were too far gone. Out of the complete engine, I only used the cases and the gearbox, which was surprisingly good.

Cam sourced a Factory Metal Works frame and a Factory Metal Works front-end to start the build off.

The guards are aftermarket blanks that I modified and profiled. I custom made the struts for the rear guard.

The tank is an aftermarket Sportster style. I shallowed the tunnel to get the tank sitting up level with the backbone and repositioned a new filler cap and neck that I made up on the lathe. I then put the two taps at the base to get maximum use of the tank.

Every single nut and bolt on the bike is stainless steel.

The front wheel is off a Yamaha vintage dirt bike, not sure exactly what model. The rear wheel is a custom 16 x 3 inch wheel. I turned up the polished spacers for the front and rear wheels on the lathe as well. I went with Avon Speed Master tyres, 21 for the front and 16 x 5 for the rear.

The pipes are an aftermarket Triumph option. I had to modify them to fit the frame then made them into slash-cuts. They have baffles fitted inside the pipes and have been heat-proof powdercoated and wrapped with standard heat wrap.

I modified the original rear brake and gear levers to take some brass pegs I made on the lathe to match the foot pegs that came with the frame.

I fabricated the small electrical box that the key barrel sits in. It’s a full batteryless electrical system, the bike runs a Podtronic regulator rectifier powered by a Wassell high output stator with a capacitor for good luck. This setup supplies more than enough power to run the headlight and taillight and give the plugs the spark they need. I kept the bike tidy from wiring looms by running all of the wiring internally.

When I pulled down the engine it had obviously been butchered by someone who had no idea what they were doing and was pieced back together to get rid of. It had new barrels with knackered pistons put back in. The rings were rusted to the barrels so the barrels were shot now as well. One of the valves was

Photos b

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Story b

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lassics)

’59 TRIUMPH THUNDERBIRD BOBBER

MUSA DECIDED to buy a bike

in kit form from the USA and

assemble it here at home; and

the bike he chose was a Bourget Bike

Works (BBW) Python after watching the

movie The Expendables in which the

Python had a starring role as Sylvester

Stallone’s whip.

There are several models in the

Bourget Bikes Works range and all

of the components are custom made

in-house.

Musa’s Slaya comprises of the BBW

rigid, patent oil-in-frame, drop-seat

chassis with 47 degree rake; and BBW

springer front-end with billet shock;

seven-inch back-bone, six-inch down-

tube stretch; 330 radius arse-end and

front air dam.

The power plant is a 113 cube S&S

with BBW shorty style exhaust. It’s

also fitted with a Baker six-speed

transmission, Primo Brute IV three-

Slaya

Words & pics by Chris Nilsson

Oz Biker 21

SlayaMusa is one of those characters bigger than life, so it was no surprise when he told me he was building a bike that would blow me away, and true to his word, the Slaya was born.

Nathan had wanted a Mexican LA-style bike for ages, so when his mate bought a Heritage softaIl, he could see the possibilities…

Mexic

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Oz Biker 49

MY BUSINESS is Livin Loco Garage. We build bikes from scratch, from start to finish; we

do full fabrication, paint work, insurance work, normal paint jobs, complete rebuilds.

My business partner is Luke. He does all the metal fabrication at the shop, and he did all the tin work on my bike. Ha has always been doing metal fabrication, but he got to that point where he was sick of working for everyone else, making everyone else’s name big, so we thought we might as well make our own name, try something for ourselves.

I‘ve been doing airbrushing since I was 14-years-old. I do all the paint work at the shop: airbrushing, pinstriping, gold leaf stuff, metal flakes and candies.

This bike started off as a Heritage Softail. I bought it off one of my mates. It’s the kind of bike I wanted for ages, and I just bugged him for months and months until he ended up selling it to me. I pulled the whole thing apart straight away and started rebuilding it.

It’s an Ultima frame and it’s obviously got every bit of chrome on it you could think of.

The tanks were cut out, and I took the right-hand-side and put it to the left-hand-side, so it becomes concave. We had the tanks in primer ready to paint when a mate put the badges there as

Words by Nathan BilsboroughPhotos by Rod Cole