Steve Carr, owner of Samson V-Twin in Samson, Alabama, and builder of our feature bike, has been at this custom thing for quite some time. So, he knew exactly how to cut to the chase when it came time to build a bike for his own riding pleasure. How wonderfully selfish is that? It sounds good to me ─ no customers to go back and forth with, no waiting for payment, and if there is a problem along the way, you fix it. Steve’s way more than capable of building anything from mild to wild like his Boneshaker bike Barnett’s Magazine Online featured six-years ago that still looks bobberly cool today or his more recent golden gem of a Sportster called Oro Fundito. “I have built many bikes at my shop, Samson V-Twin, and have been featured in over 30 magazines world-wide so this stuff is very much in my daily routine,” said Steve.
After getting hold of a 2001 Harley-Davidson Low Rider to use as his muse, Steve explained the idea behind the build. “I wanted a low, no-nonsense Dyna that may in some ways appear at first to be somewhat stock. Then as one looks it over closer, they’ll see it’s far from stock,” said Steve. “I like for bikes to be able to speak for themselves without too much ‘Hey! Look at me!’ type of style.” It sounds like he’s stuck with a bit of good taste to me as that’s exactly the type of bike I appreciate just about the most ─ good looking, good performing and extremely rideable.
The good looking aspect came about by relatively mild, but very effective attitude changes up front courtesy of a set of Wide Glide forks sitting in three-degree raked trees. No necks were lopped off to fit a huge front wheel, just enough so it looks quite a bit racier than stock without screwing up the handling. Speaking of the front wheel, it’s a lovely 60-spoke, 3.5×21-inch black rim wearing Michelin’s finest in rubber and a Brembo caliper four-pot caliper from a Ducati. Out back Steve, intelligent human that he is, chose a reasonably sized and good looking 5.00×18 60-spoke wheel wearing just the right amount of butch Michelin rubber to look serious and not stupid. The stock Dyna rear brake with a change of pads is fine as is and hard to improve upon so OEM is not always O-E-Awful, here it’s just peachy.
Meanwhile, back at the back end, the swingarm gained a good chroming and a pair of very short shocks, you know, back to the attitude thing. Steve’s Low Rider now had a stance and it was a subtle, but very effective change while still extremely pleasant to ride on the back roads of just outside of the huge city of Samson, Alabama, (pop.1,940 – Can that truly even be a city?).
With a rolling chassis in place, Steve got to work completely refreshing the Twin Cam 88. Well refreshing might not be the proper word as he hopped-up the Twin Cam with little things like 95-inches of Motor Company capacity with compression pumped up to 11:1, oversized valves in port and polished heads by Wes Brown at Cycle-Rama in Pinellas Park, Florida, .650-lift gear-drive cams (I love gear-drive cams), a 45mm Mikuni carb inhaling through a lovely velocity stack, high-flow oil pump and multiple exhaust systems as you can see from the photos. Yeah, refreshing wasn’t the best word to describe all this harum-scarum Twin Cam hot rodding, not with dyno readings of 122hp and 108 lb-ft of torque at the back wheel. This Dyna’s ready for some serious inner-hooligan time with those readings and it’s even got a shift light to add to the fun.
Steve kept the profile of the stock Low Rider but with a few changes to clean it up a bit. The stock tank stayed right where it was, but the front fender got ship-canned and the back got a nice new trim to liven things up. That fender haircut brought out the stock chrome fender stay as a much more prominent and somehow better looking piece even though nothing had changed to it. It was showcased better, how’s that? The LePera solo-saddle plunked between the tank and fender fits like that proverbial glove and Steve’s choice of a set of 10-inch mini-apes provides a nice reach from the seat with just the right touch of mini-ape attitude.
You gotta admit the bike has a look that’s pretty captivating without trying to be crazy. The nice visuals you see from 50-feet away were provided by Attitude Custom Painting also in lovely Pinellas Park, Florida, and they’re pretty timeless in the really beautiful heavy flake blue with gloss black scallops outlined with silver pinstriping. To me there’s more of a hot rod look than a motorcycle look, but that’s where scallops originally came from I guess so that’s cool. Like everything else but the busting-ass engine, it’s subtle yet stunning. Oh, it just looks damn good in a simple bad-ass, but classy way.
“Overall, the look of the bike is a simple approach to custom bikes, yet in some ways it far surpasses some of the most custom of bikes by its simplicity,” said Steve. “This bike draws people wherever it is. It hauls ass and looks good sitting still. It’s a really good, dependable and powerful bike.”
So is this bike finished or is it one of those projects that goes on forever? “The picture of the engine with the red accents and open gear chest was the last thing I changed. The bike is finished and lives a retired life in my store’s show room window,” said Steve adding, “Many times per week, new customers will come in and ask about the bike and, as always, I’m glad to answer questions about the bike.” Man, with all those people asking questions about the bike sitting in the window, I wonder how long before somebody asks, “How Much?” If I were Steve, that’s what I’d want to hear.
For more info on Steve Carr’s Samson V-Twin visit http://www.samsonvtwin.com/