BD Customs first build "Bonnebird"

BD Customs started out as a challenge to myself to build a Bobber – one Bobber, that’s all – just to prove to myself I could do it. I didn’t even want to ride it, I don’t even hold a bike license but the challenge was on. Where do I start? What bike do I use? How old should the bike be? Engine size, wheel size, unit, pre-unit? The list went on, I knew nothing.

Research had to be my first port-of-call and I needed to do lots of it. Once I started looking for the answers, information came from everywhere: websites, videos, and best-of-all: individuals (old and new) who are bike enthusiasts from across the globe. Being new to the scene I wasn’t afraid to ask questions, even the questions that made me look a real amateur. This after all, is what I was, and eager to learn at all costs. 

I knew my starting point would be the frame, so I made an online purchase even though I still didn’t know what I was doing, but it seemed luck was on my side. I purchased a 1960 Triumph 6T duplex frame that had been hard-tailed. 

When it arrived I set about stripping it of its paint and filler. This is when I realised it had been hard-tailed badly. I made the decision to take the hardtail off and re-fit it. The main reason being it wasn’t even straight! But who’s going to weld it? In-fact, who’s going rebuild the engine, paint it, build the wheels, fabricate? The list goes on!

When I couldn’t find bespoke items I recalled what an old friend once told me: “If you can’t find it, build it yourself: somebody’s got to” and that has stuck with me to this day, with whatever I’m taking on! So that’s what I did, I decided I would do it all. If I asked enough questions and was happy to learn by my mistakes, then I had nothing to lose. With this in mind I cracked on and two years later I had managed to build my first Bobber “Bonnebird”.