Bonneville America Forums Forums Technical Forums Custom Corner Custom Triumph chopper

I went to a chopper show at the River Center in St Paul today. I saw some very nice bikes. Most of all I was impressed by some of the frame inovations those guys come up with. I'd guess 90 percent of the bikes were V-Twins. Saw a Kawasaki inline four chopper. Saw one chop with a Yamaha vertical twin, probably from an old 650 Special. I only saw three Triumphs, one restored Bonneville, a clean, unrestored X75, and one Triumph Springer Chopper. I have to say though, that someone could go in there with a halfway decent Triumph bobjob and blow everyone away. Check out the link to the Triumph Chopper

See what I mean? Made me want to start building bikes.

John

Its true. A nice Triumph bob job would take home some trophies. Unfortunately not a lot of the new school choppers fans would appreciate the Bobbed Trumps. Older chopper fans who can remember the heydays definitely give the new Triumphs their props. But the New Orange County insta-chopper fans don't even look twice. They also say, Triumph, huh? Who makes them? Kawasaki? Its funny because most of the new choppers built don't have Harley anything on them. I'm talking about the big $$$ bikes. They use custom frames, Motors from S&S or Revtech, trannies from Baker, etc. Oh, well. Glad you brought up the fact that more Triumphs chops or bobs should be built. I am with you 100%.


Fryguy

Tomorrow night on discovery channel,on biker build off a builder is doing an old triumph chopper to compete against a v twin.This one should be worth watching!(Tues. night 10:30)

I went with Ed (biker) to a MC swap meet here in town yesterday and was pretty disappointed. All HD rusty parts and several new choppers, all HD. The choppers all looked the same and were all just throw together & bolt on kit bikes, no individuality at all. And they were all $30K+. Man, I could throw parts on a bike just like they do and sell them too. Wayne County choppers motto: "Look at me, I'm a custom HD builder!" Every one had the same front end, same seats and the only real difference was the paint jobs. Big deal.
No talent whatsoever, what's the world coming to?

Some of us dare to be different. Our "custom", while not a "chopper" or a "bobber" is a blend of the best of all three camps. I agree, most "H-D choppers" differ only in the paint. Our bikes have garnered their share of attention and we haven't even entered a show yet!

Cody,

Check out this chopped Trump.

-BT

Bikerthug,I love that bike!Now thats what i call a vison.You can tell alot of thought went into that bike!

Really nice custom bike. Original.

That bike was the one I referenced in another post where the article said "It is powered by a triumph. See we told you this bike is crazy."

In today's chopper world, it's all about having 100 hp plus even though the bikes seldom get ridden out of town. If you want to look into the world of old school, where it doesn't matter if it's a an inline 4, vertical twin, or a knucklehead, check out Back Talk.

They're real open-minded and pics of of all the above plus cafe bikes get posted nearly every day. I've only been visiting Back Talk for a month or so, but already I've collected quite a few pics and put them in this album.

For the new Triumphs like ours, I think there hasn't been many builds because of the cost. Most of the guys who do this kind of work are looking for cheap engines and rolling chassis to work with. Some of them horde the old Hinckley stuff and use that to chop and bob. It's cheaper than the new Triumphs, even a wrecked BA or Speedmaster.

Hey BikerThug,
Yeah, that's a cool bike. I especially liked the seat ornament in pic #6.

John

bikerthug -

now that is a Triumph chop!! totally original, functional & i'll bet she flys like a scalded dog!!

thanks for the shot of a real one.

thanks sal -

you made my week! i'd say my day cause i keep an album too & every day i find a chop, bobber or streetracker i figure my days been made . i picked up 8 from your album i didn't have & i picked up about 5 shots of bikes i do have but you have them from different angles!you found some beauties there - especially dig the one with the Amen Saviour frame.

thanks for the site reference as well- i'll check there regularly .

Jeff,

Nice to help out a fellow member. I've got more, but they're on another hard drive that isn't hooked up to a computer at the moment.

WARNING: You have to watch out on Back Talk. sometimes they sneak in Not Safe For Work pics, and often there aren't any warnings when they do.

Was dissappointed that the show last night didn't even get decent sound attetion to the motor on that Triumph, I still thought that ended up looking rather tight. One of the pictures in that link above was from a BA memebr the "Bruiser", I can't recall his BA name, but I know he had it on the old forum.

ed

That was Mark/caseml's bike on the old forums. I believe he is registered here and his username is Case. Yup, that's him. Found a post by him where he put up a link to this website.