CHOPPER

Kevin Gleeson

The Beggining

• When I first started thinking about this project it took me a while to get a clear idea of what type of bike I would fabricate. I wouldn’t be a big bike enthusiast but I have always admired they way that they are built and when you see a nice bike they generally are a serious looking machine. What finally made my mind up for me was when I was on holidays in Las Vegas during the Summer. The hotel I was staying in had four choppers on display from the Cris Angel collection. These bikes that were on display were just works of pure art. From then on I have looked up different types of chopper designs on the internet and have come up with a design that I hope will keep me inside the specifications for this project.

Influences

This was one of the bikes on display in the hotel, they were all inside glass protective boxes. As you can see my photo taking skills are pretty bad.

Research IdeasThese are just some pictures I have come across on the internet, I have based my bike on this type of shape. One thing that might cause some design problems is the 600 max wheel centres specification

What I love about the chopper also is the raw look that it achieves compared to your standard road and race bike. I love the polished steel look and the way they utilize the look of the frame to make it stand out and show the real work that goes into the making of these bikes. This for me is why I prefer the chopper over any other type of bike

Chopper design blocks• The first problem I believed that I would encounter with this type of

bike was keeping to project specification. There is a max wheel centre of 600mm, and as you can see the chopper is the type of bike that needs plenty of room. This would be the decider on whether the chopper would be achievable or not.

• The only way to find out if the chopper design would work was to sketch it out. I sketched out a full scale drawing using the max wheel centres dimension and drew up a frame as best I could. I was happy with what I came up with and it does resemble the look of a chopper. This drawing is to the max, so when I am fabricating it I will have to make sure I don't exceed the measurement.

• If I was to reduce the wheel centres any more I feel that it would be moving away from the whole chopper look.

First sketch

SketchingThe next step I took was to start sketching out some ideas and maybe how the bike might look

and play around with different colours. After a certain amount of time sketching I was fairly happy that I had achieved a design that I could work on.

Engine

• Before I began to draw out my frame I got my self an engine so as I would be aware of the space needed in the frame to accommodate it. The frame is going to be pretty tight for room as a lot of the required distance is taken up getting the front forks and wheel at a nice angle. I originally had the angle of my front forks at 30 degrees but I felt that I was losing a lot of important space around the frame so I brought it back to around 35 degrees which improved the area I had available now in the frame to fit the engine.

Engine

I got this engine out of an old strimmer. I stripped it down and cleaned it up as good as I could. If needed I can still strip it down a bit more, that's if space is going to be tight inside the frame.Across the bottom of my frame I will weld on a plate that I can bolt the engine too. I will have a small bracket to fabricate for the engine so as I can then bolt it to the plate on the frame.

Frame• I found the internet a help when it came to researching ideas for

the frame. A frame of a bike was new stuff to me so it helped a great deal to see a few frames on their own.

• I have decided to design my own frame and use tubular steel to fabricate it. I will incorporate 16mm and 20mm tube in the frame.

This is my working drawing for the frame, it is at a scale 1:2