Motorcycle news

I think a lot of people in and out of this industry underestimate the Sportster. I got my first Harley, a ‘93 Hugger, and right off the bat people who didn’t know any better deemed it a girl’s bike. It was real funny that with some minimal motor work and creativity I had a bike that would run right next to the new Softails and look twice as cool. There is a reason why they are called Sportsters, and that’s because they are the hot rod bikes of the Harley-Davidson line-up. To this day, people refuse to give Sportsters or Sportster-based customs the credit they’re due. Look at Arlen Ness. Almost no one can refute the fact that he is the king of our custom industry; he was one of the originals. If you look at many of Arlen’s first bikes, like his double Ironhead, supercharged monster named Too Bad, they were all Sportster-based.

In the ’70s, the chopper craze was hitting its first peak, and everything you read was all about the chopper. There must have been twenty or thirty magazines back then, and if you looked in any of them most of the bikes were Sportster customs. Heck, it seems like at one time in history, the Sportster was the motorcycle to own. Sportsters were the original outlaw bikes in the Bay Area because they were fast, nimble, and inexpensive. Evel Knievel jumped Sportsters back in the day. I bet people never told him that he was jumping a “girl’s bike.”

The Sportster has always been the affordable base unit for custom bike builders and garage mechanics. I think while the new generation is coming into the motorcycle culture, the $60,000 bike fluff is wearing off and we’re getting back to what started this whole customizing craze. Even Harley-Davidson sees the importance of the Sportster family. Just flip through their catalogue today and see how many styles of Sportsters there are to choose from in the ‘08 model line. The new addition of the Nightster and the always-popular 883R shows that Harley, through their diverse line-up, has embraced the Sportster as a key element to their line-up.

The Sportster holds its own in the Harley family by representing about 20% of their overall sales, and is typically an entrance into the American V-Twin market, but it is also revered by riders as an easy-riding bike to rocket around on.

To date, I can name at least 25 close friends that ride Sportsters, and at one time we were all tired of not being able to find custom parts for them. When I started Led Sled, all the market had to offer Sporty riders were some risers, bars, and exhaust. Everything had to be made by hand or adapted from the Big Twin aftermarket. We set out to break the mold and have aftermarket parts readily available for Sportys. If you were lucky enough to find the rare custom part for your Sportster, it usually stemmed from a Big Twin. You usually had to choose a frame to stick your Sportster motor into, and then you had to figure out all the components like the forward controls, etc. It was like a damn puzzle. Now we make frames that are based from Sportsters so the customer can use as much of his/her original components as possible. Styling is another key factor in the frame department. You can usually tell the builders that started designing Big Twin frames and then later decided to convert their design over to accept a Sportster powertrain. They usually don’t capture the right lines to cradle the Sportster motor and give it the right look.

So Led Sled Customs stands firmly on the mission today that it was founded on-giving the working man major creativity in a manner that makes it easy to install in his home garage. Much of the guesswork out is therefore eliminated. We keep in mind that like us, the average customer today wants a good product at an honest price, and we do our best to accommodate that. That may have been the whole reason why I taught myself to paint; well, that and not having much money for a professional paint job, but that’s the point. We’re entering a time of stock modification rather than so many ground-up customs, and for that purpose the Sportster is perfect.

Sportsters have always been the garage builder special, and that’s where our whole industry started, in the garage. Heck, I’m just a glorified garage builder myself. That’s why I like to keep my shop small and tight, so I can keep the feel of being in my garage, creating custom parts for me and my buddies. So go get a Sportster. It’ll be OK if your friends see you on it; just tell ‘em you borrowed it from me.

Photo Gallery: Led Sled Customs – Sportsters – Busted Knuckles – Street Chopper Magazine