So, when I run into a sweet little Softail like this one captured at a rally by Barnett lens man Jack Cofano, my heart skips a beat or two. I don’t know who built this bike or why, but I do know I really love this bike’s glossy black badness especially with that power-thumping turbo hanging off the side of the Twin Cam B engine. This is one fine looking custom that makes me want to get on it and ride the pee out of it as well as look at it. As it sits, I don’t have a complaint about anything the mystery builder did and only give whoever it was two big editorial thumbs up for having great taste and restraint in building such a rad machine. 

   I guess I’ve always been partial to bobbed Harleys as that’s what I grew up with as a young kid and that favored profile has stuck with me to this day. I love the traditional fat tire spoked-wheel look front and rear, bobbed fenders and stripped down look. What we’ve got here is a very modern interpretation of that old look updated using a modern platform and aftermarket parts along with a heavy doses of good taste. It would be so easy to muck things up with some bad lines or not satisfactorily working around the stock frame incorporating the new elements. There’s more than enough, but strangely not too much. 

   The frame may be stock but how it now works is far from it. One look as it’s sitting dead on the ground, straight up and down, let’s you know this is no Motor Company twin shock Softail suspension. On board, the stock shocks have been replaced by air suspension from Legends Suspension and the same goes for the front too. You don’t get down to the ground on rear air alone. Plus, you probably noticed that the stock swinger is gone replaced by a nicely machined beefier unit. It’s a nice choice as the flat pieces definitely compliment the flat swingarm pivot area of the main frame. After seeing this one I’ve lost all interest in the stock tubular style which I didn’t think too much about previous to seeing this. Now I’m spoiled. 

  The front end has been cleaned up and I’m still not exactly sure what this bike was built from as I can’t blow up the VIN enough to read. Hey, the Softail platform created quite a number of different models and with a Softail anything can usually be made into anything else Softail. There are elements of a Fat Boy around the headlight and nacelle area as well as the forks although there’s not a solid wheel in sight. That’s okay with me as I like the wires so much better especially wearing that chucky modern Dunlop rubber which just looks so ready to take on whatever’s dished out on the road. OEM brakes are retained all around and I’ve got no beef with that at all. Not everything has to be custom and some aftermarket custom rotors just look too busy drawing too much attention from the overall look. Sometimes expensive ends up looking cheap. 

   The stock tank resides right where it began life and that’s okay with me. The design is a classic and it still looks as good to me today as it did as a kid. The rear fender’s been replaced by something soother, wider and a bit more voluptuous. There’s not a fender stay in sight and the end result is a visual treat of a fender that looks like it should have come that way in the first place. No need to change the stock horseshoe oil tank as it fits in with this build without the need fabricate or buy something for the hell of it. 

 

   One thing’s for sure, the venerable Twin Cam V-twin is not pumping out a stock 60-ish horsepower at the rear wheel. The engine, not the transmission, is on maximum overdrive with that unnaturally aspirating CMP Turbo hanging off the right side with its air cleaner sticking so far forward it looks like it might interfere with turning the front wheel. Obviously it’s far enough away to clear or who’d ride this thing? It just caught me off guard when I first saw it. Between the Screamin’ Eagle heads and whatever else has gone on inside that engine, this bike should be just a blast to ride. It’s not a million horsepower bike, but it’s got way more than enough I’m sure in the current stripped down condition it’s in. Just the act of holding onto those apes when the throttled gets twisted to the stop has got to add a good 20mph of imagined drama. That’d be a good fight both ways fighting the wind with horsepower and it’s got to be a hell of a lot of fun. 

   Strangely, the lovely gloss black paintjob that just couldn’t look better than right here was sprayed by a company more known for their extremely flamboyant, extremely intricate, extremely realistic and sometimes extremely bizarre paintjobs on baggers built by some of the most famous bagger builders. Here, Sinthium Custom Paint of Phoenix, Arizona, nailed it with an all black paintjob with a few red graphics (or should I say highlights?) that somehow break up what might other be a boring stoic look otherwise. If you can figure out what it says or is supposed to be on the tank badge, please let me know. I’m stymied. With all the other black bits throughout the bike it pulls itself together without looking like another tired old black paintjob (like my bikes) because you couldn’t commit to anything else (me). 

  Between the shape, the sound, the power and the color choice, someone out there is my new hero. This should be a distinctive, powerful and usable Harley-Davidson Softail custom that anyone would be proud to own. It looks mean as hell and fun at the same time. Plus it’s a real world Softail custom that’s run like a regular old Softail you see all the time ─ just a hell of a lot faster and meaner. Tell me, what’s not to like about that?