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Home / Features / Chops |
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Home / Features / Chops |
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Well, I hope that by now you’re getting my drift. It’s okay to chop a Chief. Really! The sky won’t fall on your head, you can save money compared with being a slave to originality, and in many ways you can end up with a vastly improved, better-looking and better-performing Indian Chief. Provided of course you’ve no hang-ups about doing things differently from the way the little elves and pixies in The Wigwam used to do things. Mind you, I will probably win only a few converts among the VI community, or else will be preaching to the already-converted. Just remember, I don’t necessarily advocate that you take an already-stock Chief and butcher it, though if that’s what you want to do then it’s entirely your own business. I merely want to raise chopping/bobbing as another restoration option, one that’s often overlooked by people when they start off with an incomplete basket or sorry heap of knackered old parts. For those of you who still think that turning out same-old-same-old catalogue-spec restorations is the only way to go, consider this! It’s been said (by somebody a lot more famous than me) that America’s three main contributions to western culture in the 20th Century have been (1) Jazz, (2) Musical Theatre, and (3) Choppers. Although I speak as a jazz-playing chopper-builder, I think I’m not completely biased in saying that two out of those three ain’t bad. Ain’t bad at all. So come on, people! Lets get more cultural here! As it turns out, my own personal tastes in choppers lean more toward the bobber end of the spectrum. I guess I just like traditional-looking motorcycles. Or maybe I’m turning into a boring old fart? I dunno. I’ll let you be the judge. It will be instructive, though, if this month we take a look at just what types of things the Chief chopper spectrum can encompass! I will present to you, for your discernment and amusement, a series of stages in Chief chopperisation. Just like those engine hot-up manuals that present progressive stages of performance increase, from Slightly Peppy right through to Honda-saki-uki-ha-Stompin’ Totally Insane Freaked Out On Drugs type performance, I will show how one can take one’s Chief frame and running gear from Mild-Mannered Reporter through to Superman (or Superperson, to be appropriately gender-neutral about it). Stage 1: Bob the fenders |
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Prior Episodes of Tim's
Part 1 "Why Indians" Part 2 "Why Not Choppers" Part 3 "Form vs. Function" Part 4 "Chief Likes & Dislikes" |
| Indians have massive fenders. And I’m not just talking about post-war Chiefs. The Briggs Weaver fenders of the ‘30s are so voluminous, they can be upturned and used as a cradle for a decent-sized infant. Now there’s a merchandising idea for VI! Even the fenders fitted to the military models seem capable of stopping armour-piercing bullets. The first step in an Indian weight-loss programme, then, is to junk the stock fenders. Except that nobody now junks anything to do with stock Indians, even if they aren’t wanted. And rightly so, too. So, store your original fenders in the attic, or sell them to someone who will appreciate them, and then go and do what these people did. |
full-size viewing |
| This is Mild-Mannered Reporter Stage One, the first step toward an improved Chief, which is to fit “bobbed” fenders and slimmer chainguard. Apart from that, everything else is stock. I don’t like the headlight, though that is a matter of personal taste. I am uncertain about just what performance advantages are conferred by the seat tassels. Maybe it’s a modification for the Australian outback, to keep the flies away from the lunch you packed under the seat. |
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| Another Chief which has taken the first step along the road to improvement. All they’ve done is remove the front fender and fit a cut-down rear fender. In days of old, the Briggs Weaver front fender would probably have been removed, sawn off to shorten it, and re-fitted the other way round as a rear fender. The world is now a different place, so it’s more probable the front fender of this bike was sold intact to an antique restorer for megabucks. Part of the money thus earned was then spent on a cheapo fits-anything rear fender from a swapmeet, and the rest of the dough would have gone towards financing the engine rebuild. A good strategy if you’re not an originality fetishist. |
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| Another example of how a mainly-stock
Chief can, with little effort, be made to look slimmer, lighter, and carrying
less garbage. A girder-fork example this time, but again all they’ve
done is remove the front fender and a section of chainguard, and add a
slimmer rear fender.
Stage 2: Bob the fenders, fit a better Indian front end The next stage of wildness is to get rid of the stock Chief leaf-spring or girder front end altogether, and fit something better from one of the other Indian models. There was much debate on the VI Digest a while back about which Indian front end is best. Both leaf-spring and post-war girder front ends have their devotees, and their detractors. Personally, I don’t like either. There are other Indian front ends better suited for a bobber, namely the late-model Chief telescopics, or 741 military forks (which are 2” longer than Sport Scout forks). |
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| The owner of this bike, a member of the Dutch Indian Club, has (in my view, most sensibly) dumped the post-war Chief girder front end in favour of military 741 forks. It looks great! As I mentioned, my other choice of Springfield front end would be the ’50 – ’53 teles. However these are kinda thin on the ground, and are valued way beyond their intrinsic worth by virtue of the fact that they were stock fitments to that Holiest of Grails, the at-times mythical ’53 Chief. On the other hand, 741 front ends are relatively thick on the ground, especially in Europe and Australasia. As recently as 1994, I was able to buy a 741girder blade for US$40. From a dealer, no less! |
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| Other mods include different springing
for the seat, slim rear fender, jockey shift, Junior Scout tanks and separate
exhaust pipes. Clearly built by a bobber purist, if that’s not too
much of a contradiction in terms.
Another bike from the Dutch Club, and in a similar vein. 741 girders, upswept rear fender, twin pipes, jockey shift, and no seat springing. Lets hope the plunger suspension works freely! Maybe that’s the owner in the background, restoring his aching buttocks in the plush upholstery of that conveniently-placed sofa. |
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| This looks to me like a set of the ’50 – ’53 Chief teles, though the picture is not very clear. Either it’s a genuine ‘50-’53 Chief, or its an earlier Chief that’s been retro-fitted with the Chief teles. Possibly the latter, as most people with genuine late-model Chiefs keep them very stock in order to maximize any return on their investment. Either way, this bike has still got a reasonably acceptable chopper look without causing too much drama or angst among the restoration crowd. Trimmed rear fender and twin exhausts is pretty much all that it took. This bike looks wilder than it is. A Mild-Mannered Reporter, with spectacles removed. |
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| Step 3: Bob the fenders, add some chopper
“features”
In this phase of development, the main elements of the bike (frame, forks) are left stock, but the chopper “look” is added to it by choosing from a range of common chopper clichés like apes, lowered seats, or fancy pipework. This bobber Chief features a performance modification for riding in flood-prone areas. Maybe the owner is concerned about El Nino? Apart from that, it’s very stock. They’ve just removed the front fender, then fitted a thicker seat, slimmer rear fender and a set of the ubiquitous babe-getting apehangers. |
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| This bike is also very stock. Too stock, and I don’t like it much. This was the end result of a series called Project Indian that ran in several issues of Iron Horse back in the late eighties. The bike’s builder was a chap called Mr Hat (first-name Top), and Technical Consultant was a very youthful-looking and at that time relatively un-tattooed Indian Larry. In 1995 Dean (one of the 6th St Specials staffers) and I were looking over Larry’s shoulder at his own copies of these Iron Horse issues, and Dean, looking up from the photos of Larry in the late-‘80s to the living specimen before us in the mid-‘90s, exclaimed “Man, you’ve deteriorated!” It was true, he looked like he’d aged about thirty years in the space of eight. Mind you, he’s probably packed about thirty years worth of living into the space of eight. I guess that’s life in NYC for you! |  |
| Anyway, back to the bike. I don’t like the rear fender, I don’t like the 21” front wheel, I don’t like the apehangers, and Top Hat’s girlfriend went on record as not liking the tiny “peach perch” (or “leather-covered sanitary aid” as she called it). But hey, it’s not my bike, so who am I to be critical? | To Page 2 of 3 |