Clunkmeister

If the British accidentally designed a good looking aircraft, (despite photographic evidence to the contrary, one did occasionally sneak past the Ministry of Ugly), the addition of a radar pod in the nose generally fixed the issue. (See Sea Hornet vs Mosquito). I expect early on, the British had the problem covered with the Defiant. The almost vertical heavily framed windscreen, and the bloated pimple of a gun emplacement left very little additional design work required to satisfy the quotient of ugly necessary for immediate serial production.

Underneath my seat. And I know where each and every wire goes! I now run aftermarket sparky box and pickup coil, so no chasing obsolete parts. The box is crammed in there in front of the battery, and nobody has a clue how much wiring is involved in a modern bike. Harley does it so neat, and me? Kinda looks like it was worked on by the Unabomber on an acid trip.

I guess we just can’t leave well enough alone. I love old cars and I love old bikes, and an old customizer’s touch was to install 59 Caddy tai.ights, so for me, why not? The Heritage Springer was ostentatious when new, looking like a brand new 1948 Harley in 1997, so I’ll just go one step further. Cheap brainless therapy, but it certainly looks different. Starting to look like a Tijuana Terror! A real “Garbage Barge”. That’s what we called loaded down bikes when I was young. We were tearing all that crap off them back then, and now as oldsters, we slam it all back on. That cheese grater rear bumper is a genuine 1948 Harley rear bumper. Yeah, it’s a bit much, but a sign of the times. NOBODY in the US leaves their Harley stock. Nobody. I think Europe is the same way. A Harley is a blank slate, and I think Harley makes more money selling bits for them than they do on the bike itself. There’s a fundraiser for a local musician who’s a recovering stroke victim, so she’ll be out and about after Sunday Worship. Took the time to set belt tension, align the rear wheel, and shine it all up. Saturday I’ll wire up the new lights, put the bags and seat Mack on, and go for a rip. Then, back on the bench

If you’re going to kill yourself on a bike, a Sportster is right up at the top of the list of bikes that’ll gladly help you so so. They haven’t changed much in 50 years, and still give you the chance to have a GREAT big engine in a tiny little bike. They were never fast from the factory, but Harley would gladly sell you everything you need to turn a fun bike into a holy terror. A 1250cc Sportster is the ONLY bike that has ever tried its level best to kill me graveyard dead, all while you having a stupid fun time doing so. They corner better than any American bike ever has, and around town, they have got to be the most fun motorcycle ever built. if a Sportster could have as good of highway manners as it does city manners, I’d own one. My ancient Springer is an 80 year old anachronism.

I expect they are “functional”, right?

They’re called murdercycles around here, because there have been several cases of a biker being involved in a fatal supposed single vehicle accident with no obvious cause. Bikes don’t “just crash” any more than cars or planes do. There’s always a reason. Cops think someone’s doing something. Running them off the road, laser pointer, who knows. But I ride in a small group, pay attention to those around me, and don’t ride stupid.

Mike, we look at your work and are all blown away by your work. Brilliant work, Sir! Like many here, I have this kit in my stash, waiting it's turn for me to do my typical hack job on it. I'm quite thrilled to see you building it, because I didn't know how to treat the thick airfoil portion compared to the thin warping areas. Now I know, and now I'll try. I even have the correct Aviattic fabric in stock. Yippee!

Martin, I agree, the Iron Sportster is one fun in town machine. But, it's utterly brutal on the highway and beats you to a bloody pulp. if I only needed to black around town, that Sportster is THE bike of choice for anyone who has any kind of beating heart. That Kawasaki? What a puffed up pile of junk. Same with Goldwings. They're cool, and a bit better thought than the Venture, which is just puffed up Marshmallow Man mobile

For WW2 stuff, how close is Tamiya XF-71? Tamiya claims it to be right. it doesn't seem grey enough to me, but what do I know? thought?

A bit of added wiring and busying up will do wonders here.

Time spent with proper nippers will yield beautiful parts. Cockpit detailing is outstanding.

I really, really need to do this. I need to take a brand new kit, fresh off the press, and be one of the first to give it a shot. The detail on this is absolutely incredible, and is exactly what we’d expect from the fertile mind of Peter Castle. Positively brilliant execution of a simple master plan: to bring the 1/32 community probably the only 1/32 scale Defiant we will ever see in our lifetimes. The prototype needs no introduction at all, as it is a bit of an infamous machine that first caught the Luftwaffe napping, and once it’s weaknesses were figured out, we’re slaughtered completely enough that Fighter Command yanked them from all daylight ops. it sprang from the drug addled minds of the glue sniffing planning board that gave us such gems as the Hawker Henley, the Blackburn Roc, and probably the Blackburn Blackburn Blackburn Blackburn Blackburn as well. The Defiant was rather an attractive machine, especially when put up against any of the aforementioned Blackburn and Hawker jobs. The kit is nice. Very nice. Superlative. And a quick initial check finds us with a real large scale crate.

I’m not the only one wondering what that big red monstrosity is. Good LORD it’s ugly! My old Harley is lost in comparison My wife really doesn’t like the look of the 1948 twilight. I wonder why?

One thing I’ve done in the last 3 weeks is to gather Sponsors for a cause many of us here really believe in here, and that’s the identification of and treatment for Veteran suicide prevention. I managed to convince enough businesses that I’m wholly capable of piloting this old relic of a motorcycle for 300 miles per Saturday for 1 month, that if I can do this, the donations per Saturday will come to $10/mile, or $3000 per day, just from my contribution. The cool thing is that the money is staying local and going directly to the caregivers and facilities, not disappearing into some corporate bank account where .02 on the dollar coughs down to the Veterans after all the greedy 10 million/year CEOs get their cut. In other words, we’re not falling into the Goodwill store trap. Doing the math shows this to be $12,000 for me giving up a month’s worth of Saturdays. From one person. For the cost of some oil and petrol, plus some food, of course. I’ve done 2 Saturdays already, and 2 more to go. The two pictures below are from last Saturday, and yesterday. The pic from the arse end was last Saturday, and yesterday is the front view. Joy tells me my bike looks like a Siberian Yak, with all the fringe hanging off, and she’s gonna give it a haircut afterwards. In no uncertain terms, NO!

I'm a sucker for the old stuff with an art deco look to it. Obviously I'm big into cosmetic enhancements, which is good because my two favorite colors are black, and chrome 😃 So a bit of extra chrome here and there, along with some gold leaf where needed, and away we go.