74 • GARAGE BUILD • ISSUE 419A Car Mechanic
Builds a Bagger
He continues, “The owner must’ve
also ridden wheelies and bottomed-
up. The front looks like it came down
real hard.” But the frame, engine, and
drivetrain were functionable, so Gordon
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home because he’d found it online in
New York and the bike was in Florida.
He ended up calling the owner to get it
shipped up north. “I have a friend who
lives about 10 minutes from the seller, so
my buddy looked at it, and I bought it
over the phone,” he says.
Luckily, Gordon found a kit with re-
placements for every part that fell victim
to wheelies, lid cutting, and rain. But he’s
really lucky to have gotten anything. The
manufacturer was notorious for charging
for parts but never shipping them (which
is probably why they’re out of busi-
ness). Unsurprisingly, the components
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parts store coached me,” Gordon says.
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so the store printed him the required
temperature and humidity levels. “I had
to be a chemist for a couple weeks,”
Gordon adds.
Gordon also became an “architect.”
He “built” a paint booth by hanging
tarps from his garage’s overhead doors to
contain the dust when applying the tri-
coat, a process that claimed the lives of
two Harbor Freight gravity spray guns.
Luckily, each gun was just $14.95.
Gordon also installed a Chubby han-
dlebar, D&D exhaust, Screamin’ Eagle
brake, and Vance & Hines tuner, but had
a friend fabricate a longer stud to screw
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Some engineer friends might also
convert the air ride into a hydrau-
lic coil-over shock. See, the bike is
ridable (which is why Gordon only
installed a 21-incher) just not for long
distances. We caught Gordon the day
before he rode out to California with
some buddies. Gordon is riding his
2013 Road Glide Ultra, not the Cus-
tom. “It’s just not a bike you can take
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I’m good,’” he says.
At least she’s no trailer queen! GBThere’s no way Gordon Overturf would ever do to a car what he later
did to this 2010 Road Glide Custom (customize it in his 32’ x 32’ garage).
But not because he can’t (i.e. he’s been a car mechanic for 27 years).
It’s because he’s been a car mechanic for 27 years.
“I have a rule of thumb,” Gordon
says. “I won’t work on cars at home
because I work on them all day.” Luck-
ily, motorcycles are nothing like cars;
they’re easier to customize, especially
since this bagger was in rough shape
when he found it. “The bags looked like
somebody cut big circles into the top of
the lids and put a car speaker inside,”
Gordon remembers. “When it rained,
water would get into the bags.” (Gordon
later installed a Kenwood head unit,
Garcia amp, and Hogtunes speakers.)BACK PAGE^ • By Steven BlackburnShe’s no trailer queen. She just can’t go cross-country yet