Like any motorcycle has the possibility of, something will burn in your motorcycling soul about certain models or a specific color on certain models that nobody else might understand. The proverbial dream ride people often refer to doesn’t have to be practical, the V-twin norm, or whatever else struck your fancy at a certain point in time. Dreaming always leads to perfection, but reality always takes a break from that. Not everybody can build their dream machine like Milwaukee, Wisconsin’s Richard Becker did with our feature bike, but it’s nice to be able to dream anyway.
Richard isn’t quite as stuck as Rodent was on a dead stock bike as you can obviously tell, but hey, each to their own. Matter of fact, about the only thing still snortin’ Norton on this custom board tracker build is the Norton engine and gearbox as basically everything else you see was fabricated. Richard’s dream bike certainly required a bunch of one-off stuff with a side of imagination and hard work. That’s no fabled Norton Featherbed frame or even the late rubber-mount version, it’s all custom fab from the word go. There’s a bit of chassis whimsy going on here with curves that have curves along with the occasional straight line. Imagine trying to jig that all up after the long bouts of bending. Oh yeah, I forgot, winters are long in Wisconsin.
And, it’s not just a custom frame as the curved-tubing leaf-spring front end is something you won’t find in an aftermarket catalogue. That’s all one-off stuff just for this build from the legs to the axle fastener that looks like a bicycle quick release to the curved bars growing out of the top of the fork. I can’t help but like what Richard’s got going on here. One of the reasons for this fork is the large diameter board-track wheels front and rear that have their height magically enhanced with those always wild-looking perimeter brakes. Plus the rim-mount rotors somehow look properly vintage in this application. With the narrow footprint the tall Shinko tires have, the single pot calipers used both front and rear are probably more than sufficient in case this bike ever hits the road.
One thing you can be assured of with any Norton from the ‘60s or ‘70s is that the engine’s going to need a refresh. It always seemed to me like they were finally put away after someone did something dastardly to the engine even if they weren’t trying to. Obviously this thing has been completely refreshed with only some run time showing on the chrome part of the headers. There’s been a bit of neat stuff done to it like those aforementioned headers that culminate in a gloss black sleeve with billet ends on each side of the engine. Or, the nifty looking open belt primary with just enough of the original primary cover left to do what it has to and that’s it. Pretty stylish looking bit of kit there. I appreciate Richard stayed with twin carbs instead of the often-used single Mikuni carb conversion, it just looks properly bitching this way.
There’s not a lot of bodywork, but, what there is, is really lovely to look at. The saddle tanks bolted to the curved top tube bring their own bit of drama to the board track idea with a built-in sense of movement. The really cool oil tank looks like it might be out of some 1920’s single-cylinder Brit racer, but the word on the street is that it’s actually another bit of nice fabrication. Maybe original board track racers didn’t have fenders, but this one does and it looks mighty nice to me in a take-off of European-style ribbed fenders.
Of course, covering just about everything you see other than the engine/gearbox and a few minor pieces in a glorious glossy coat of black will win my heart every time. Yes, black bikes do matter and Richard’s surprising, but elegant choice of keeping the paint simple so the build doesn’t get lost in the paintjob was a wise choice. Yes sir, wise enough that Richard took first place in the bobber class at the 2016 Daytona Rat’s Hole Show. That’s about as good as it gets in the show bike scene so hopefully he’s gonna get some road time in. I think he will too as I can’t imagine he’d put all the time and work into that simply gorgeous cantilever shock-mount seat with leatherwork by Rich Phillips. With every other box checked on Rich’s dream bike list, the last one is getting the hell out and riding it. Check the box Richard, check the box . . .