People's Champ Contestant - Duke Markowski

What have you done?
Started out with the frame from my old cone shovel chopper that I started building back in 2016, at that point I did the hardtail and some smoothing and molding so that part was mostly already there, this time around I did some more smoothing, shaved the toolbox mount, and added some polished stainless moldings. The motor in this thing is a 51 FL which i had Baisleys performance do the machine work on, still havent had the time to assemble it completely but it will have a polished linkert on it and a Morris mag, but its mostly a stock engine with a bigger cam. The paint was done by me, a bunch of suuuper late nights over the last couple weeks, the color is called "jackass purple pearl" it has some fun simple patterns and a panel on the tank in the swoopy thing that kinda matches the crushed velvet on the seat. For the tins I chose a early sportster style rear fender that I narrowed 5/8", and a low tunnel peanut tank which i silicon bronzed on some polished stainless trim and molded in. For the oil tank I used a stock style horseshoe and made a recessed swooptydo shape on the pullmax and welded that in to flow with the exhaust. The wheel set is a 18/21 polished Borrani setup, smoothed and polished hamburger drum, with parts supplied from Buchannan. For the front end i refinished a early style sportster/superglide 33.4 with a bunch of shaving, polished and chromed. I've pretty much tried to make everything I could on this bike including the bars, the stainless tail light assembly, the frame mounted license plate bracket, the pringle tips on the pipes, headlight mount, shaped aluminum seat pan, all the stainless fender struts and mounts, and theres probably more. I was trying to follow the 60s theme and keep it as traditional as possible so im using all hex head polished hardware, cloth wire etc. Some other fun little parts for the 60s show bike hot rod theme are the hurst shifter with refinished mini 4 speed knob, and the use of the GM guide b-31 headlights, white letters on the rear tire, and the frame is raked a little which gives it a little bit of a showy hotrod stance. 

What do you have left to do?
The bike is in a very very loose mockup stage, I dont think theres one component on the entire bike thats truly finished. If you look too close at pictures you might notice parts trying to fall off. I might have to repaint the frame due to some burn through. The tins arent really cut and buffed yet, alot of the stainless parts arent fully polished or blocked out yet. The top end of the engine needs to be assembled. It still needs wiring. I havent totally decided on controls or if im even going to run any kind of foot pegs. Wiring of course. Still plenty of parts to buy and chroming to be done. Going to be adding some striping and other fun paint on some of the parts nothing too crazy. It may look half ass complete but it in fact is not haha

Any problems so far?
Mostly time management, taking too long on some parts and not enough on others.

Favorite part of the bike so far?
Im digging the overall shape and stance of the bike, has the 60s showbike hotrod vibe going on with it that was kind of the original vision when I first started on this thing.

Favorite part of the competition?
It's been fun to see the camaraderie between all of the competitors, everyone has been super supportive to each other and willing to give constructive advice and input. Less like competitors and more of a team thats all in this together.

Want to give any shout outs?
Joe rizzo -seat upholstery

Chris Willis -sponsoring paint supplies

Troy Sicilia, Pacific northwest plating -chrome

Keith Higgenson -polishing

Mark Gohlmamn Bangerkingtattoo -photos

Byron Kiernan -Glass