Bobber (motorcycle)
A bobber, originally called a bob-job from the 1930s through 1990s, is a style of custom motorcycle. The typical construction includes removing the front fender, shortening the rear fender, which is "bobbed" (as in bob-tail), and stripping excess bodywork as well as all superfluous parts to reduce weight. History The bob-job evolved from an earlier type of American custom motorcycle, the 'Cut Down', which appeared in the late 1920s, and which was based on the Harley-Davidson 'J' series v-twin. The cut-down was created to modernize the appearance and improve the performance of the aging J-series Harley-Davidson. By removing the front fender, shortening the rear, and removing all excess accessories, the motorcycle was significantly lightened. The cut-down was also characterized by a modified frame, in which the seat tube was lowered and the wheelbase shortened, resulting in a lower, shorter machine, with a sweeping diagonal line between the steering head and rear axle. In ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Custom Motorcycle
A custom motorcycle is a motorcycle with stylistic and/or structural changes to the 'standard' mass-produced machine offered by major manufacturers. Custom motorcycles might be unique, or built in limited quantities. While individual motorcyclists have altered the appearance of their machines since the first days of motorcycling, the first individualized motorcycles specifically labeled 'Custom' appeared in the late 1950s, around the same time as the term was applied to custom cars. In the 1960s, custom artisans like Arlen Ness and Ben Hardy created new styles of custom bikes, the chopper. In the 1990s and early 2000s, expensive customs such as those built by Orange County Choppers, Jesse James's West Coast Choppers, Roger Goldammer became fashionable status symbols. There are also companies that are bringing back pin striping, such as Kenny Howard (also known as Von Dutch) and Dean Jeffries from the 1950s, with a continued effort to keep pin striping alive. The choppe ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Chrome Plating
Chrome plating (less commonly chromium plating) is a technique of electroplating a thin layer of chromium onto a metal object. A chrome plated part is called ''chrome'', or is said to have been ''chromed''. The chromium layer can be decorative, provide corrosion resistance, facilitate cleaning, and increase surface hardness. Sometimes a less expensive substitute for chrome, such as nickel, may be used for aesthetic purposes. Chromium compounds used in electroplating are toxic. In most countries, their disposal is tightly regulated. Some fume suppressants used to control the emission of airborne chromium from plating baths are also toxic, making disposal even more difficult. Process The preparation and chrome plating of a part typically includes some or all of these steps: * Surface preparation * Manual cleaning to remove dirt and surface impurities * Removal of remaining organic contaminants using emulsion cleaning, alkaline cleaning, anodic electrocleaning, or solvent cle ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ratbike
Rat bikes are motorcycles that have fallen apart over time and have been kept on the road and maintained for little or no cost by employing kludge fixes and improvised repairs, with little or no consideration given to appearance. Rat-Look bikes are motorcycles that have been deliberately styled to look like ratbikes. Survival bikes, often confused with rat bikes, may look similar but are different in purpose from ''rat bikes''; they are modified for stylistic reasons to represent a post apocalyptic vehicle. Rat bikes The concept of keeping a motorcycle in at least minimally operational condition without consideration for appearance has probably characterized motorcycle ownership since its earliest days. The essence of a rat bike is keeping a motorbike on the road for the maximum amount of time while spending as little as possible on it. This calls for adaptation of parts that were not designed to fit the model of bike in question. While the origin of the term rat bike is unclear ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Chopper (motorcycle)
A chopper is a type of custom motorcycle which emerged in the US state of California in the late 1950s. A chopper employs modified steering angles and lengthened forks for a stretched-out appearance. They can be built from an original motorcycle which is modified ("chopped") or built from scratch. Some of the characteristic features of choppers are long front ends with extended forks often coupled with an increased rake angle, hardtail frames (frames without rear suspension), very tall "ape hanger" or very short "drag" handlebars, lengthened or stretched frames, and larger than stock front wheel. To be considered a chopper a motorcycle frame must be cut and welded at some point. I.e. the name chopper. The " sissy bar", a set of tubes that connect the rear fender with the frame, and which are often extended several feet high, is a signature feature on many choppers. Two famous examples of the chopper are customised Harley-Davidsons, the "Captain America" and "Billy Bike", seen i ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Honda
commonly known as just Honda, is a Japanese multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate automotive manufacturer headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Founded in October 1946 by Soichiro Honda, Honda has been the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer since 1959, reaching a production of 500 million . It is also the world's largest manufacturer of internal combustion engines measured by number of units, producing more than 14 million internal combustion engines each year. Honda became the second-largest Japanese automobile manufacturer in 2001. In 2015, Honda was the eighth largest automobile manufacturer in the world. The company has also built and sold the most produced motor vehicle in history, the Honda Super Cub. Honda was the first Japanese automobile manufacturer to release a dedicated luxury brand, Acura, on 27 March 1986. Aside from their core automobile and motorcycle businesses, Honda also manufactures garden equipment, marine eng ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Von Dutch
Von Dutch is an American multinational fashion brand posthumously named after Kenny Howard, a.k.a. "Von Dutch", an American artist and pinstriper of the Kustom Kulture movement. After Howard's death in 1992, his daughters allowed Ed Boswell to produce items using the Von Dutch trademark logo. The trademark rights were sold in 1996 to Mike Cassell who, with Robert Vaughn, used the logo for an apparel line named Von Dutch Originals. French designer Christian Audigier helped popularize the brand in the early 2000s. Von Dutch was repurchased in 2009 by Groupe Royer S.A., through its Luxembourg subsidiary Royer brands International S.a.r.l. In 2024, WSG (White Space Group) purchased the global rights from Groupe Royer S.A. The clothing brand gained popularity in the US and attracted the attention of celebrities such as Paris Hilton, Whitney Houston, Madonna, Britney Spears, Justin Timberlake, Jay-Z, Ashton Kutcher and Eric Church. History Kenny Howard Kenneth Robert Howard was ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Upholstery
Upholstery is the work of providing furniture, especially seats, with padding, springs, webbing, and fabric or leather covers. The word also refers to the materials used to upholster something. ''Upholstery'' comes from the Middle English word ''upholder'', which referred to an artisan who makes fabric furnishings. The term is equally applicable to domestic, automobile, airplane and boat furniture, and can be applied to mattresses, particularly the upper layers, though these often differ significantly in design. A person who works with upholstery is called an ''upholsterer''. An apprentice upholsterer is sometimes called an ''outsider'' or ''trimmer''. Traditional upholstery uses materials like coil springs (post-1850), animal hair (horse, hog and cow), coir, straw and hay, hessians, linen scrims, wadding, etc., and is done by hand, building each layer up. In contrast, today's upholsterers employ synthetic materials like dacron and vinyl, serpentine springs, and so on. H ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pin Striping
Pin striping (or pinstriping) is the application of a very thin line of paint or other material called a pin stripe, and is generally used for decoration. Freehand pin stripers use a specialty brush known as a pinstriping brush. Automotive, bike shops, and do-it-yourself car and motorcycle mechanics use paint pin striping to create their own custom look on the automotive bodies and parts. Motorcycles Pin striping can commonly be seen exhibited on custom motorcycles, such as those built by Choppers Inc., Indian Larry, and West Coast Choppers. The decorative use of pin striping on motorcycles as it is commonly seen today was pioneered by artists Kenny Howard, Kenny Howard (a.k.a. Von Dutch), Dean Jeffries, Dennis "Gibb" Gibbish, and Ed "Big Daddy" Roth. These artists are considered pioneers of the Kustom Kulture lifestyle that spawned in the early 1950s, and are widely recognized as the "originators of modern pin striping".St. Antoine, Arthur. "Interview: Dean Jeffries, Hollywood ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Metallic Paint
Metallic paint, which may also be called metal flake (or incorrectly named polychromatic), is a type of paint that is most common on new automobiles, but is also used for other purposes. Metallic color, Metallic paint can reveal the contours of Coachwork, bodywork more than non-metallic, or "solid" paint. Close-up, the small metal flakes included in the paint create a metallic colour, sparkling effect mimicking a metal surface. Description Metallic paints, or just metallics, generally consist of a base coat with a clear "lacquer", usually a transparent acrylic polyurethane top coat, for protection and extra gloss. "Flop", or "flip-flop", refers to the difference between the amount or hue of light reflected at different angles from a metallic paint surface. The differences are caused by the size and reflectivity of the flakes in the paint, and also by their orientation and the degree to which they are all oriented in the same direction. Historically, it was difficult to achieve a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hot Rod
Hot rods are typically American cars that might be old, classic, or modern and that have been rebuilt or modified with large engines optimized for speed and acceleration. One definition is: "a car that's been stripped down, souped up and made to go much faster." However, there is no definition of the term that is universally accepted and the term is attached to a wide range of vehicles. Most often they are individually designed and constructed using components from many makes of old or new cars, and are most prevalent in the United States and Canada. Many are intended for exhibition rather than for racing or everyday driving. The origin of the term "hot rod" is unclear. Some say that the term "hot" refers to the vehicles being stolen. Other origin stories include replacing the engine's camshaft or "rod" with a higher performance version. According to the Hot Rod Industry Alliance (HRIA), the term changes in meaning over the years, but "hot rodding has less to do with the veh ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fender (vehicle)
Fender is the American English term for the part of an automobile, motorcycle or other vehicle body that frames a wheel well (the fender underside). Its primary purpose is to prevent sand, mud, rocks, liquids, and other road spray from being thrown into the air by the rotating tire. Fenders are typically rigid and can be damaged by contact with the road surface. Sticky materials, such as mud, may adhere to the smooth outer tire surface, while smooth, loose objects, such as stones, can become temporarily embedded in the tread grooves as the tire rolls over the ground. These materials can be ejected from the tire's surface at high velocity as the tire imparts kinetic energy to the attached objects. For a vehicle moving forward, the top of the tire rotates upward and forward and can throw objects into the air at other cars or pedestrians in front of the vehicle. In British English, the fender is called the wing. (This may refer to either the front or rear fenders. However, in mode ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the world's countries participated, with many nations mobilising all resources in pursuit of total war. Tanks in World War II, Tanks and Air warfare of World War II, aircraft played major roles, enabling the strategic bombing of cities and delivery of the Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, first and only nuclear weapons ever used in war. World War II is the List of wars by death toll, deadliest conflict in history, causing World War II casualties, the death of 70 to 85 million people, more than half of whom were civilians. Millions died in genocides, including the Holocaust, and by massacres, starvation, and disease. After the Allied victory, Allied-occupied Germany, Germany, Allied-occupied Austria, Austria, Occupation of Japan, Japan, a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |