Back Issues Feature Bikes In The Magazine

Deadliner

January 1, 2011

Article By: Chris Callen

Photos By: Jeff Cochran www.speedking.com

Daytona marked a change in the way the cats at Papa Clutch were doing business. They had been primarily a Sucker Punch Sallys’ dealer from Iowa but when they rolled bikes out of the back of their little Scooby Doo van at Bike Week, you could see that there were a lot of changes going on. They had a bitchin’ Shovel and a cool- ass little Pan that were both new additions to the family since the last time we had seen them. Little did we know at that time that they had this sweet ride lurking in the background.

It started with an obsession of sorts; the best way I firmly believe to build a bike. For two years, the Pan motor sat on top of the bench in their shop and waited to find the right home. Tim Anding, Papa Clutch himself, wasn’t in a hurry to build the bike and had the idea that whatever it turned into, he wanted to make sure the motor was the star of the production. They found an old ’69 Adjust-A-Glide frontend with the brake on the right and matched that to a hardtail frame, and just like that it was a roller. It sat for another year in that condition before the heat would get turned up on Tim to finish it.

Everyone around him was talking about the upcoming Dice release party that was going to be held at Jeff Wrights’ “Kung Fu Tap & Taco.” They all had wild aspirations of what they each would build for the event. Tim knew this would be the opportunity to bring out the Pan but waited to get started as everyone else set upon getting their gear in order. They brought in Jeff Gray specifically for this build and decided to really stretch the realm of what the shop had done on any build before. They hand made fender struts and a headlight mount from stainless. A buddy named Jim Brown owns a steel yard and luckily has the hook- up for them on the good metal. They picked the open spaces of the right side of the frame that the drum brake leaves to run the handmade pipes; a feature that keeps the bike looking super clean and narrow. And talk about clean, on the left side they replaced the stock primary with a 2 inch BDL and even had enough space left over to hide the coil. The bike was really taking shape but with so much fab work into it, Tim didn’t want to rush it to paint and decided they would end up going to the Dice gig in raw trim.

Winter came and went and the event date drew closer. About two days before the party, Tim and his crew went into overdrive to get it done. This would be deadline number one and they would barely make it, but they did. It was a running son-of-a-bitch, and Tim decided to keep it up and running just as it was to really get some miles on it. That was until he realized that Sturgis was coming and Papa was going. Of course they wanted their latest and greatest on hand for the biggest bike party in the world so deadline two was slated. The goal was to tear the bike down and get it in paint with two weeks before they had to leave. Scott at Underground Art laid the finish down on this old girl and man, it’s like a piece of glass. This cat is all pro and it’s no wonder why he’s done work for a bunch of the big names in the business like Billy Lane. The paint was so fresh by the time they rolled into South Dakota that they left it in the trailer to dry for an extra day. This was no easy task either, since during the reassembly, Tim came down with fluid on his lungs and was out of commission part of the time. He asked long time friend, Justin from Sucker Punch, to come in to lend a hand to Jason and Jeff, and the three man crew made it happen.

Sturgis was a blast and the Pan was like a magnet. Everyone dug it, man but the glory shine wouldn’t last since during the rally the frame broke up by the neck and Tim realized it would need repaired back home. So fast forward a few months, and the Limpnickie Lot gets invited to join Easyriders’ Bike Show Tour. Tim decides to take the Pan out to the second stop in Louisville, KY but still needs to fix the frame: another deadline. In one week’s time they managed to rip it down, fix the frame and had it ready for travel. It seems that these cats have pushing it to the limit down to a science. One thing’s for sure, when it comes to building old bikes with class, they sure have that on lock.