Build-A-Bobber - The Beginning

Build-A-Bobber, documenting the transformation of a nearly-stock 2003 Honda Shadow VT750DC Spirit.  The bike was purchased, cash, on 1/17/12 from National Powersports Distributors in Pembroke, NH.  They specialize in dealer trade-ins and have a huge inventory.  All the bikes are given a very thorough check, tune and test ride before they are shipped to customers.  I have never bought a motorcycle over the phone/internet, but it was very simple, and I trust that these guys will deliver a great bike and support any problems.  They are too big to mess around with customers like that.  The bike was $3699, and shipping right to my door was $305.  Total for the bike shipped $4004.  The bike has a scuff on the front fender, but besides that is cosmetically good.  It has about 6300 miles and was owned by a woman in Massachusetts.  Since I am slightly out of their local delivery area, they said shipping could be up to three weeks or a month.  But today the delivery guy called me and set up a drop-off for 10-11am tomorrow!  Purchased a Big Red lift for the bike, $130.

So here's the plan: take a stock Honda cruiser and transform it into a cool little bobber.  The VT750DC is a good stock bike to start with because it's already low, already has pretty cool pipes, and already has drag bars.  Mine has a set of Vance & Hines Cruzer pipes and a K&N air filter, but besides that it's stock.  Plus the Spirit is Honda's bombproof  V-twin.  I'm sick of tinkering with old BMW airheads...I want something that will run forever!  Not that Beemers won't run forever, of course.  I, in fact, ran a Beemer into the ground finally at about 275k miles. But I always seemed to be tinkering.

Anyway, tomorrow the bike arrives!  It will go under the knife pretty quickly, and I think the whole project should wrap up way before winter does.  By the weekend I should have most of the supplies I need to make the change.

I'll give a brief outline of the project.  The bike is now red and chrome with a black two-person drag seat. The pipes look kind of like the stock pipes on this model, but are longer and beefier.  I am going to leave the same bars, but flip the risers 180 degrees to pull the bars up  and forward a bit.  They will then be rotated around a little to give them the "dropped" look.  Black seat gone, replaced by a custom dark brown leather solo with a diamond stitch pattern.  Stock fender, rear lights and license plate holder gone, replaced by snug, custom bobber fender (1/8" aluminum), chrome bullet signal lights, 1930 Ford chrome left-side-mount taillight, and left-side-mount license plate.  The stock mirrors will be replaced by CRG 3" Hindsight LS bar-end mirrors.  The rear fender will be matched to the stock paint (Dark Candy Red).  The head pipes will be wrapped in DEI titanium exhaust wrap.  When I get around to it (money-wise), maybe this Spring, I'm going to set up white-walls, probably the new Shinko 777.  They're supposed to have great grip but short life.  I'd be willing to give them a try even if they did only last a season.

End result?  A cool little metric bobber, chrome, silver, and dark brown.  I could probably sell the end result in less than 24 hours...