Josh shot our friend Scotty's bike while we were on a trip up in Nor Cal last year and somewhere along the way, I lost 'em. Not long afterward, I heard that Scotty wrecked the bike. Eventually I found the images and pieced together a story and the trusty Shovelhead has been rebuilt into a totally different machine. We'll have to shoot it again next time we're up north!

Engine, year and make, model, modifications: 74" -Spare parts in S&S cases built 2006 for EDR '07 by my pop and I. I've had the flywheels and heads since '89. 8.5:1 compression, B grind cam, weisco pistons, mag fired, rented push rods. 

Frame: 1966 HD

Fork: late 40s-early 50s 45 springer

Tire/wheel size and style: 16-21

Favorite thing about this bike: The baldness of the tires.  

Other mods, accessories, cool parts, etc: Kinda proud of the reinforced narrowed fender/fenderstruts-oil tank mount bidet assembly. 

Any building or riding story or info you'd like to include: Trippy tank story: a few months back I'm at this local mc swap. There's always that one person selling who looks out of place like they didn't understand it was for motorcycles. This one was an old lady- probably late 60s with just a few weird items draped around her shitty old datsun pickup. Dogs playing poker blanket, empty easter baskets, some belt buckles, etc. But in a box next to a small stack of old easyrider/car crafts is this tank. I pull out this crazy flat bottomed hummer tank and literally blow the dust off. 

"Yeah, that was on my old mans bike when he could still ride (he died last year) but pulled it off before he sold the bike so we could make rent one month."

Me- WOW! I seriously dig it. What kinda bike? Did you ride with him much? 

"Fucking everywhere on his rigid panshovel.  Thank god for that tiny tank too or else my ass would be in even worse shape."

Me- mam, I'd like to purchase your tiny ass-saver. 

"Umm, is 20 too much?

Me- how about 80 for the tank and this Kansas belt buckle.

"haha! god bless you son!"

On my next pass down that isle, she had already packed her shit and split. 

And a little update from Scotty post-crash...

The crash was pretty gnarly but to put it plainly, I got very, very lucky. About 20 of us were heading up to a small mining town called Belden on the feather river to camp for the weekend. (Mike D went the year before) We had just left a little lunch spot and were climbing over a pretty twisty pass..

Long story short, I have chalk the crash up to my own vanity AND stupidity! I wanted to run an older HD internal throttle mated to a super E carb because I liked the way it looked. It looked neato and I convinced myself that even though it was designed for a solid wire cable, the return spring on the carb would handle any shit the throttle gave me. It had stuck earlier in the day, I had just fixed it with quick slap to the carb. Thats when strupidity told me to just keep going.

Anywho, heading towards a corner and in the moment that I needed to get off the gas and into brakes, it stuck and no mater how hard you press on the brake, a juice drum wont even slow a revved up shovel. Left the road doing about 50, missed a few boulders but found a nice young pine tree to plant the forks into. I landed a good 15 yards in front of that with only a few bruises and a nasty case of poison oak. The bike didnt fair as well as myself. Dented tank (mural intact), ripped all the spokes out on one side, a severely twisted OEM springer (already fixed) and a healthy slice of humble pie.