Choppers
Jonathan never intended to take so long building it and little things like ready cash and a broken leg among other things kept him from meeting his original time schedule. Not a bad thing, though, as he changed a lot of the initial direction of the bike until he ended up with this copper beauty you see here. “It was just a dream in my head and I wanted to see it come to life,” said Jonathan. “I wanted to do one by myself and get really into it and that’s when I came up with this crazy idea to copper it. It’s been a lot of work hence the name Affliction.”
Luckily for him, he had a mentor and best friend, Kip Hagget, who not only helped him with advice, but provided a place to construct it. Armed with a tax refund, Jonathan began to buy parts to begin construction starting with a Carolina Customs’ rigid frame. “My buddy bought a chopper with a Carolina Customs’ frame, I sat on it and it was a nice frame and I liked the way it looked. I wanted a single-downtube frame and I thought, ‘That’s not a bad frame,” he said. The frame’s 41-degree rake and 4” up and 4” out dimensions were exactly what he had in mind so he ordered one and the stage was set.
Making sure the preliminary mockup would be heading in the right direction for handling on New York’s twisty back roads, Jonathan spent the time to make sure his rake and trail were correct and that involved a lot of research on his part. “If you look at it, the frame sits 100% level to the ground. I knew what I needed to do, but until you actually do it, that’s when you’re like, ‘Hmmmmm . . .” he said. I got a book on it and I started looking at how to make it come out right.I went through a lot of trial and error to get the rake and trail right.” What he ended up with was an additional 6-degrees of rake in the Tribal Trees and a 13”-over fork.
Some of the other stuff Jonathan bought or acquired for the build initially was an engine and wheels, both of which would never see the light of day in this bike. “I already had black and chrome Harley engine that was beefed up and pretty decent,” said Jonathan. “I also bought wheels, 50-spoke rims, but as I started to mock it up I realized I needed to go a step further. Actually, I decided to go crazy with this one.”
Crazy in this case was not just about what parts to use, but deciding to copper plate the frame and other pieces for a look sure to capture peoples’ eyes. “My buddy Jack owns Deco-Chrome in Ormstown, Quebec, and I told him that I wanted copper as thick as you can put on there. He said that every hour in the tank puts a thousandth of an inch on so I said I wanted it in there for eight hours,” said Jonathan. “”When he called me and told me my frame was ready, I went there all excited and when I saw it, here’s this big green gobbly sh*t on it instead of copper and I said, “What did you do to my frame?’ He told me not to panic and showed me how to polish it. When I got through, it looked better than a new penny! After that we clearcoated it with a regular clearcoat, DuPont I thinkl, and it’s hard as a rock and nothing’s come off it.” All of this work to get to this point gave him a newfound appreciation for polishers. “I got a lot of respect for polishers ‘cause that’s tedious work. Jack made me polish the frame for maybe 18 hours and then he told me the bare metal has to look like it’s chrome plated before I can even think about dipping it,” he said.
In the meantime, Jonathan ran into a deal on a 100” shiny RevTech engine he couldn’t refuse along with a BAKER 5-speed and a set of Ultima Lethal Weapon wheels. The old parts he’d bought or pulled down from shelves were headed back in that direction with each passing year. “I had it in my mind what I wanted it to look like now and just kept going,” he said. “I got a lot of stuff that was new and different at the time. Of course stuff changes every other month, in a year it’s obsolete.” I guess he’s saying that staying current on a long build can be expensive in the long run.
You can’t help but notice the details like the drilled-out bars he got off eBay and the matching sissy bar he made. “Nobody liked the idea of a sissy bar, but after it was finished and chromed, everybody was like, ‘Wow! Where did you get that sissy bar?’” said Jonathan. “It was a lot of work.” Or the copper-colored cables and lines he had made when there was none available. “I took all my clutch cables and stuff and sent them to a company called NAMZ Custom Cycle Products. I wanted to have them coated in copper, but they had questions about doing this and I just told them, ‘C’mon, you can do this for me,’” he said. “Finally they called and said they were going to start right and fresh and make some new ones for me. These ended up being the first ones made of what is now a regular product they offer. Actually the pictures you see online on their website are my cables. It really made the bike come alive.” Other details were things like the seat and pillion pad that Jonathan had Rich Phillips Cycles and Leather whip up for him, literally. “I had the seat delivered to me within five days. I couldn’t believe it, I mean, who does that?” said Jonathan. “His prices weren’t high and he treated me really well.”
When it came time for paint, Jonathan took this on himself and once again drove his friends crazy when he told them what he had in store. The idea of Burnt Orange and Root Beer with copper flake caused dissention in the ranks of his friends once again until they saw the finished product and gave him another thumbs up. That wasn’t the finished job he had in mind, though, as he wanted to try his hand at copper leafing it. “I had never done that before and it is not that hard to do and actually it was fun. Yes, it was tedious, you can’t even breathe when you touch that stuff,” said Jonathan. “It looks like it’s almost 3-D. I’ll tell you that if you saw it in real life, you wouldn’t believe it.”
Apparently those that see Affliction in the flesh can’t believe it either as Jonathan said, “You wouldn’t believe the crowds it draws. If I park it anywhere, they just walk up to it. I was at a show where a guy had a bike he claimed had a hundred-thousand into it and people were all over my bike, not his. It stole the show ‘cause it just stands out.”
With all said and done on the multi-year build, Jonathan’s not only happy with the looks, but the ride as well. “Boy it rides really nice and cruises right along with no problems whatsoever. It’s quite comfortable and it’s forgiving,” said Jonathan. Possibly the best part of this build is that it’s now for sale to fund another project, so if you’re interested you can email him at jonathan.garrow@gmail.com.
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