Mad Bros #02 : The splitlane

Mad Bike #02 : The Splitlane

This is my 1993 Yamaha SR500 That I rebuilt from the frame up.
In house made the seat, the upholstery, the bars; painted the metalflake tank a while aho and added the flames later. The rest is the usual stuff : blinkers, headlight (from † http://www.eightysixchannel.blogspot.ca/)  vintage looking rearlight. Longer control cables.
No battery, KN filter … blablabla
Upswept muffler and Hagon shocks.
Kick pedal is home made.
Gonna be racing it at Dirtquake this summer, so I have to change it to “dirt track” mode.
LDN May 6th 2013

 

Mad Max – the outtakes

An outtake is a portion of a work (usually a film or music recording) that is removed in the editing process and not included in the work’s final, publicly released version.

What was done to the bike :

New Parts :

Twisted bars
Grips
Mirror
Cable covers
New rear fender
New signal lights
Front Champion deluxe 18 x 350
Battery bag : vintage military
New mufflers

Fabrication & Paint job :

Exhaust pipes guiding
Footpegs
Shift lever knob
Double headlight mount
Rewiring
Loads of polishing (trees, boots, covers, bars, pipes, risers)
Rear fender mounts
Sissy bar and mounts
Rear light mount
Signals mount
Seat made from a moped seat (welded spring mounts)
Fender metalflake and pinstripe
Tank flames and pinstripe
Hand made pillon, mounts and signpaint.

Extras :

Patience
Anger
Laughing
Time
Faith
Inspiration

I met Max through a common friend.
He mentioned he had a Honda bobber project in his room that was on hold. We agreed he would bring his roller to my “garage” so we could work on it together.
Honestly, I never thought it would take this long, because this was in April. Anyway, I can say that I am pretty satisfied with the overall look of the bike. See I’ve been into bikes for a little while, but my discovery of California Choppers is more recent, and has caused a severe addiction. Here in Europe, it seems like choices reduce to cafe racer or street tracker. I dig it but bikes end up looking the same, and same aftermarket parts are used. My belief is that choppers allow even more personality expression or extension.
The mix of chrome and rust. That’s what it is.

The wiki definition of chopper is :
A chopper is a type of motorcycle that was either modified from an original motorcycle design (“chopped”) or built from scratch to have a unique hand-crafted appearance.

So that means it s a process rather than an style; I thought we could go in that direction even though we didn’t have a panhed or a shovelhead in our hands.
I had loads of fun rebuilding this bike, and Max was the most patient and tolerant guy with me; so thank you man.

J’ai rencontré Max par l’intermédiaire d’un ami commun.
Il a parlé d’un projet bobber Honda dans sa chambre qui était en attente.
Nous avons convenu qu’il apporte son engin dans mon “garage”.
Honnêtement, je n’ai jamais pensé que ce serait aussi long, parce que c’était en Avril. Quoi qu’il en soit, je peux dire que je suis assez satisfait de l’aspect global de la moto. Cela fait un petit moment que j’aime les bécanes, mais ma découverte des Choppers Californiens est plus récente, et cause une dépendance sévère. Ici, en Europe, il semble que les choix se limitent au café racer ou street tracker. L’inconvénient c’est que les motos finissent par se ressembler, parce que les mêmes pièces aftermarket sont utilisées. Ma conviction est que les choppers donnent une plus grande liberté d’expression.
Le chrome et la rouille.

La définition du wiki est:
Un chopper est un type de moto qui a été soit modifiées d’une conception originale de moto («hachés») ou construit à partir de zéro pour avoir un unique aspect artisanal.

Pour moi plus qu’un style, c’est un processus, alors j’ai pensé que nous pourrions aller dans cette direction, même sans avoir un panhed ou un shovelhead entre les mains.
J’ai eu beaucoup de plaisir à reconstruire cette moto, et Max a été très patient et tolérant avec moi, donc merci tête de mule.

Peace
LD

 

The day she got picked up

Trying weird stuff

Started rewiring

Putting some high bars

First sissy bar

What a pain in the ass

Polishing

Tripping

first paintjob (failed on the tank and had to start over)

Diner time

Rear fender

Bungs for the sissy bar

barbecue time

and back in the garage

Polishing stand

 

This cracked us up

love this photo of max and I taking a break at the local diner

Mad Bros helmet prototype

back with another paintjob

The end (of the beginning)

“Garage life” series #1

This is how I wipe my brushes when I pinstripe with one shot paint.

The Roast Beef

The Roast Beef is a 50cc motorcycle project based on the chancy crafting of its seat.
You can read more on : childrenofdecadence.com/
Photos © Louis David Najar 2012

Crushed Cans

This particular story is not about beauty itself. It’s a bout what we see, or what we believe we see.

In the beginning, all soda cans are identical in shape; we just see them as cans, with the purpose of containing liquids we want to spill down our throats. When they get empty, they loose their purpose so we thrown them, in the bin, or in the street.

To make this photo shoot happen, I had to have a different attitude regarding my daily paths. I had to look down and pay attention to the side of the road to find these cans; I had to operate a change in the way I looked at the streets, and it was very interesting realizing that if you change your perspective you are able to find love and beauty wherever you’d like.

These bits of aluminum were all crushed under cars, and they all have their own story. Look carefully and you will notice that they are all different. This is exactly how I feel about humans today : we are all the same, but we are unable to see or accept the differences. We only see what’s in front of us, we only hear what we want to hear; it has become very difficult to be an individual character. People just want to be like the movie stars they admire. They want to look like their references, instead of finding their own personal legend. It is surely easier and reassuring to be like the neighbor. By wanting to look like others, they just want to remain invisible. They want to be seen as acceptable, but really what they want is to be accepted. They try to belong to a group or a society, and they believe that originality comes from outer style. But it doesn’t; being a true original comes from inside the heart and soul. The outer appearance is just a shell.

The purpose of this work is not esthetic, it’s philosophical. If you are able to recognize the individuality of all these cans, you understand their individual story. They were all crushed, and they all ended up on the tar, but still they remain unique.

We all come from the same place, and we’ll end the same way, six feet under. We are all crushed by life experiences. But are we able to look beyond, and recognize our luck in the universe, as being an individual mind with its own choices ?

I sincerely hope that you understand my words as much as the photographic idea of reproducing an image several times in order to demonstrate the similarity and difference between them.

Leica Polo

Children of decadence : One shot at life

you only get one shot at life.
for this reason, I photograph, and for the same reason, Thom and his mate Max both work on a motorcycle custom project. This is the result of 2 days in the garage with them.
Finishing a project for the HUSZ exhibition next thursday in Paris, I joined the “Children of decadence” for a week end, few shots, a bit of help, some beers and a good laugh.
All pictures on Mamiya 645

Au cimetière avec mon pére

(at the graveyard with my old man)

my father asked me to go with him to Bagneux Cemetary – For some reason I decided that I should take pictures that day, so I loaded my Leica C1 with a Kodak Plus X 40 year old film.

I had some issues with the film itself, and had to open the back of the camera several times.

I managed to process the film and scanned the pictures that made sense.

Inside Out

A closer insight to the interiors of my building.