Trikes
Keino Sasaki and Paul Cox have been the driving forces behind Indian Larry Legacy since Larry’s death in 2004 and have been working to protect his classic chopper style for the last three years. They’ve done a great job of keeping the spirit of Larry’s customs alive, but they’re not exactly known as trike builders. “The owner of Wild Thing is Ed Hinkle, and he already owns a few of our bikes. He had just bought a trike from another custom builder and he wanted to see I.L.L.’s version of a three-wheeler. We were excited to do it because it would be a little challenging — we’d never built one before,” Keino said. The Indian Larry Legacy crew started with one of their standard rigid frames sporting a steering neck raked 30-degrees with a twisted single down tube lengthened two and a quarter inches. Then they chopped the rear section off the frame once they got their hands on a Santiago Choppers’ trike rear-end. The solid axle rear features a Brembo 2-piston caliper that squeezes slotted steel rotors on either side of the CNC machined, cast aluminum differential gear case. Instead of using springs to cushion the rider from the horrible road conditions in New York City, Paul Cox used an airbag seat cushioning system he invented called the Rigidaire Pneumatic Motorcycle Seating System that absorbs bumps underneath Wild Thing’s seat. In the front of the frame a Kiwi leaf spring front end is complemented with a Storz steering damper secured to the left side with a Heim joint and a custom bracket. Bolted to the legs of the front end is a Custom Cycle Engineering spool hub 21” front wheel and a pair of Coker 15×6” spoke wheels were mounted in the back. According to Keino, they spent about a month and a half designing and building the chassis, taking their time to insure that their first trike would handle properly when released on the streets.
The crew ordered a 93”SH motor from S&S to power the machine because the future owner specifically requested a Shovelhead. The alternator/generator motor was assembled with cast pistons machined to create an 8.2:1 compression ratio. Fuel and air are mixed by an S&S E carburetor and lit in the combustion chamber with lightning provided by a Morris MM74E Magneto. Exhaust is released from the motor by a pair of two-into-two custom I.L.L. pipes further customized with a leg guard that mimics the frame’s triangulated girders. Power transfer is handled by a Bandit Machine Works 2” open belt drive that rotates a polished compensating pulley and Bandit clutch with a polished spring plate. Behind the clutch is a Tech-Cycle starter connected to a Baker 5-speed transmission modified with a handy Mamba reverse gear.
When looking at this trike it looks complete and nothing appears to be missing, but there is hardly any tin to be found. There are only two bits of sheet metal on the entire bike, an I.L.L. dimpled, barrel-style oil tank and gas tank with dished sides. Instead of extensive sheet metal paint, the frame, gas tank, and rear legs of the front end were molded and given a green metal-flake basecoat with twisted flame graphics by Robert Pradke at Custom Auto Design. The owner was looking to further the embellishments on the bike with Rat Fink etching on some of the polished aluminum surfaces and sent the differential gear case and air-cleaner cover to Tay Herrera Engraving in California for the extensive task. After about six months of work, only a few notable parts remained to be installed before they could call Wild Thing a completed machine. Paul Cox made a hand tooled and stitched leather seat while the rest of the crew constructed the hydraulically operated custom forward controls.
Unfortunately, this is the first and last Indian Larry Legacy trike (see sidebar). But anyone familiar with Indian Larry’s style and Ed Roth’s design genius would agree that Wild Thing would make both iconic custom builders proud.
| SPECIFICATIONS | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
This bike feature originally appeared in Barnett’s Magazine issue #61, April/May 2008.
