Kickin’ it Slavic style. Note the great headlight adornments
The Cold War. A passive aggressive stand-off par excellence between the world’s then super powers that lasted almost 50 years. It was meant to be the ultimate separation of ideals with a bloody great wall through Germany as the ultimate “this is mine and that is yours” gesture; like two kids fighting in the back of the family car. But with nuclear weapons instead of a few pinching fingers. As high and mighty as their egotistical intentions might have been, all it really served to do was flood the East with an obsession with American Pop Culture and flood the west with some pretty lame espionage movies. Spies Like Us, anyone? Thought not. While we’re not sure much Eastern-influenced biking goodness came to the West, we know that at least one really great thing that came/is coming from the East. We’d like to submit as evidence exhibit A, Richard Gordon Faika’s “Charlotte” from his Metric Customs Shop. Na zdorovie!
Dnepr K750 Bobber
Tank emblems subtly match cylinder heads. That’s art, that is
“Richard here. My interest in two-wheelers apparently formed early. When I was 4 years old I gave my scooter a thicker rear wheel and removed the breaks. At 7 years old I swapped a home-made air rifle for a moped. I never really got it to run, but the direction was clear. After the escape of my parents to West Germany, we landed in West Berlin. During school time I built my first moped from a bicycle and a moped engine. At 16 I invented my first engine concept; the Rotary Stroke engine, but the marketing failed due to lack of experience. After finishing my vocational training as a motor mechanic and electrician I was more interested to program computer software and make music. In 1997 I founded my own small software company for web design and programming as a side job. With this money I got my dream car – a 7-series Beemer. Ten years later in 2007 I got a little nostalgic and bought two Russian military motorcycles as scrap. That’s the beginning of Metric Customs – now we make tuning packages and other things like electronic ignition for the fans of this great little flathead boxer.”
Dnepr K750 Bobber
Like two prison cells welded to the side of the bike
“After build I got my hands on a springer fork made by a good friend and great builder, located in Romania. To this time he was to start their own shop and we helped together (I made his website and spruked him whenever I could.) One of his first bikes (the rat) influenced me and his springers and the rare boxer-customs gave me the idea to build “Charlotte” in my complete own style with many nice touches; complete newframe, lots of different old bike parts and my own completely rebuilt and tuned flathead boxer engine while keeping in mind of German Road laws – mostly…”
Dnepr K750 Bobber
“I designed and made the electronic ignition
and it’s running my own programming language”
Dnepr K750 Bobber
B. For “Badass”. Or “Borscht”
“I like the combination of the style from the twenties, brass, black and a little bit of chrome in conjunction with modern techniques like my own indicator control unit or the (not visible) programmable digital ignition system. The ignition system was necessary to get maximum of power from the old modified engines. I designed and made it all and it’s running my own programming language.”
Richard tweaked the exhaust so that he’d never have a dusty rear wheel again
Richard’s also shot us some links which cover off the build and the sound of the bikes. He also pointed out that all his bikes are daily rides, with Charlotte just cracking the 10,000 km (6,200 m) mark. Impressive stuff. We look forward to seeing more of Richard’s culture clashes soon. Nice work, comrade Faika!
Kickin’ it Slavic style. Note the great headlight adornments
The Cold War. A passive aggressive stand-off par excellence between the world’s then super powers that lasted almost 50 years. It was meant to be the ultimate separation of ideals with a bloody great wall through Germany as the ultimate “this is mine and that is yours” gesture; like two kids fighting in the back of the family car. But with nuclear weapons instead of a few pinching fingers. As high and mighty as their egotistical intentions might have been, all it really served to do was flood the East with an obsession with American Pop Culture and flood the west with some pretty lame espionage movies. Spies Like Us, anyone? Thought not. While we’re not sure much Eastern-influenced biking goodness came to the West, we know that at least one really great thing that came/is coming from the East. We’d like to submit as evidence exhibit A, Richard Gordon Faika’s “Charlotte” from his Metric Customs Shop. Na zdorovie!
Tank emblems subtly match cylinder heads. That’s art, that is
“Richard here. My interest in two-wheelers apparently formed early. When I was 4 years old I gave my scooter a thicker rear wheel and removed the breaks. At 7 years old I swapped a home-made air rifle for a moped. I never really got it to run, but the direction was clear. After the escape of my parents to West Germany, we landed in West Berlin. During school time I built my first moped from a bicycle and a moped engine. At 16 I invented my first engine concept; the Rotary Stroke engine, but the marketing failed due to lack of experience. After finishing my vocational training as a motor mechanic and electrician I was more interested to program computer software and make music. In 1997 I founded my own small software company for web design and programming as a side job. With this money I got my dream car – a 7-series Beemer. Ten years later in 2007 I got a little nostalgic and bought two Russian military motorcycles as scrap. That’s the beginning of Metric Customs – now we make tuning packages and other things like electronic ignition for the fans of this great little flathead boxer.”
Like two prison cells welded to the side of the bike
“After build I got my hands on a springer fork made by a good friend and great builder, located in Romania. To this time he was to start their own shop and we helped together (I made his website and spruked him whenever I could.) One of his first bikes (the rat) influenced me and his springers and the rare boxer-customs gave me the idea to build “Charlotte” in my complete own style with many nice touches; complete newframe, lots of different old bike parts and my own completely rebuilt and tuned flathead boxer engine while keeping in mind of German Road laws – mostly…”
“I designed and made the electronic ignition and it’s running my own programming language”
B. For “Badass”. Or “Borscht”
“I like the combination of the style from the twenties, brass, black and a little bit of chrome in conjunction with modern techniques like my own indicator control unit or the (not visible) programmable digital ignition system. The ignition system was necessary to get maximum of power from the old modified engines. I designed and made it all and it’s running my own programming language.”
Richard tweaked the exhaust so that he’d never have a dusty rear wheel again
Richard’s also shot us some links which cover off the build and the sound of the bikes. He also pointed out that all his bikes are daily rides, with Charlotte just cracking the 10,000 km (6,200 m) mark. Impressive stuff. We look forward to seeing more of Richard’s culture clashes soon. Nice work, comrade Faika!
1982 XS650 Cafe Racer. Just completed, almost all the parts are powder coated with either gold or black. Paint is 2 stage gold,dark grey and black, all with metallics. Still tweaking the seat and some other little things but this thing couldn’t run any better. Now i just need to break it in for a while enjoy… Check out for more great bikes!
Arizona-based DP Custom Cycles is making a name for itself with classy Ironhead Harleys. The latest build from the Del Prado brothers is this very clean 1985 XL. It’s one of the last of the Ironheads, so the motor is 1000cc in capacity, and mounted directly to the frame. “We love classic bobbers and cafes,” says Justin Del Prado. “Sure, we could’ve taken this build further with shaved fork legs, more performance mods, and so on—but then our budget would get out of hand.”
This custom was built from a solid and strong running donor, so DP didn’t have to dismantle the Ironhead. However, they detailed it to death and replaced all the seals and gaskets. (“You could eat off any inch of this bike.”) The brothers also spent a ton of time crafting the rear cowl out of one sheet of steel: “It’s easier to make two halves and weld the seam, but this was a fun challenge. The profile is radiused to follow the subtle curves of the tank.” As with DP Custom’s gorgeous 79 Café Racer, said tank is an NOS Italian Benelli—this time lightly worked over to soften the lines. The frame is essentially stock, but cleaned up and modified to allow the tank and cowl to fit. The seat pan is a one-off: “It has a slight arch in the front for comfortable support, and it’s upholstered in old-school diamond stitching.” Everything else on the bike has either been carefully restored or replaced with new parts, and all the wiring, controls and accessories are new. DP Customs also made the clip-ons, using a jig to create a simple design that works well.
The color choice comes from the Del Prado’s passion for old hot rods and muscle cars. “Ford Grabber Blue has always been a favorite of ours, so we went with it. We used pure, bright white for the stripes and a ton of clear, then sanded and buffed it out like a mirror. We finished off the tank with custom made cast aluminum emblems.” The tires are classic IRCs and give the bike a retro touch, while probably being more practical than the ubiquitous Firestones. The result is simple and clean—and no doubt a ton of fun to ride.
[Images by Jed Strahm.]
Canon EOS-1D Mk II | 1/80 sec | f/5.0 | ISO 400 | Focal length 43mm
It takes the average man around 30 days to grow a beard. Not a silly hipster stubbly beard, but a fully-blown Unabomber jobby. American Morgan Spurlock gained 11.1 kilos or 24.5 pounds after eating nothing but McDonald’s burgers for 30 days in his 2004 documentary “Super Size Me.” And it takes 30 days to grow a carrot. Um. Ok, so we ran out of more 30 day things, but it also took Garage Company Customs (GCC) just 30 days to build this rad bike named Negro Pantalones – or Black Pants in English. They don’t usually build their bikes in such a hurry but this one was a special case. “We got a letter inviting us to build a bike for the Artistry in Iron Master Builder Championship in Vegas back in March of 2010″ says GCC owner Larry Pierce. “I thought that maybe they had fucked up and sent the invite to the wrong shop but turns out they didn’t. So we were stoked but broke and really didn’t have the cheese to build another shop project at the moment. So we just went about our business hoping to win the Lotto to fund this thing. In the meantime one of our good customers named Randy Dow hit me up on building a new bike. He wanted something vintage-style but with newer components.”
To cut a long story short, after Randy agreed to let them build his bike with the intention to enter it into the Artistry, they spent the next 30 days building the bike from the ground up. Starting with a Bare Knuckle Choppers Wishbone Frame, S&S Panhead and a HD Repop Springer fork. Nearly everything else was handmade including the bars, pipes, tanks, air cleaner, tail light, seat and even the foot controls. The stunning paint job was done by Blue Moon Kustoms – and yes, Harley Davidson is on the tank backwards.
Sadly, two days before they were supposed to leave for Vegas, Larry got a call saying three of his immediate family members had been killed. “At that point the bike wasn’t finished and I didn’t think I was going to be able to make it in time” says Larry. “Thank-you to Stewie, Nick and everyone else that jumped in and got the bike done when I couldn’t be there so we could make the show.” Unfortunately the bike didn’t win the show but under the circumstances we think they created one sweet ride. Imagine what they could do in 60 days?
[You can view more pics and read more about this panhead over at Chop Cult.]
Dnepr K750 Bobber
Metric Custom’s Dnepr K750 Bobber – ‘Charlotte’ 
Kickin’ it Slavic style. Note the great headlight adornments
Tank emblems subtly match cylinder heads. That’s art, that is
Like two prison cells welded to the side of the bike
B. For “Badass”. Or “Borscht”
Richard tweaked the exhaust so that he’d never have a dusty rear wheel again
Negro Pantalones
