SHOP VISIT: SEE SEE MOTOR COFFEE CO.

By Wesley Reyneke | Rather Be Riding

Thor Drake owns Portland’s finest custom motorcycle store. He is also improbably tall, and his name is pronounced ‘Tor’ with no ‘h’. You could say he’s the living embodiment of the city’s unofficial slogan: “Keep Portland Weird.”

If the name sounds familiar, that’s probably because Thor runs The One Motorcycle Showand organizes the 21 Helmets exhibition, both regular fixtures on the US custom calendar.

But most days you’ll find Thor at his See See Motor Coffee Co. establishment, which is the kind of business we’d all like to run. It’s essentially a motorcycle café that also sells cool gear, books and magazines—and has a couple of workshops tucked away at the back.

When did you start See See? We’ve been in action for seven years. I started it with Drake McElroy and a loose idea: that a dirt bike would be a good platform for a café-styled bike.

We grew up playing in the dirt, and wanted something fresh and new to work on. So Drake built a YZF450 and I built an XR400. We built bikes that looked good and performed well, with some classic design cues.

Where did that logo come from? I had a strange dream about the logo, and built a name and brand around it. The logo was a hat tip to the fact that motorcycles make me very happy. A lot of stuff at the time was all about skulls and being ultra tough: we just wanted to make something different.

We came up with the See See name to be less motorcycle-centric, but it also refers to the style of bikes we like: metric or “cc” bikes. The “See See” also comes from the eyes on the logo.

When did you open the store? On 10 June, 2010. It was a small shop on the industrial north side of Portland. We were one of the first Poler Stuff and Biltwell dealers.

How did you pick your location? Our location found us—we don’t have deep pockets, and that was a huge factor. We’ve now moved to central Portland, on one of the main roads. But we’re pretty isolated as far as businesses go, there’s not much around us.

My partner George Kassapakis assured me it would be a good spot, but I didn’t see it at first. But after we gutted the building I saw huge potential. It was four months of 12-hour days just getting the coffee side open.

What’s it like inside? When you walk in the door you will notice 130-year-old barn wood. The front of the coffee bar is sheet metal I used in my last workshop as flooring. The whole back wall is stuff I pulled down during the renovation. The uprights on the bar are old frames, and I even used my old coin collection for covering ugly hardware.

George and I built the whole place, and I’m damn proud of that.

What do you sell? Premium Stumptown coffee, breakfast pastries by Roman Candle Bakery, sandwiches made in-house, and other tasty treats. We have hot dogs for lunch, and they are damn good. Some say the best. We have a couple of craft beers, wine and domestic lagers too (like Rainier Beer).

We also sell motorcycle parts, helmets, jackets, safety gear and lifestyle clothing. It’s a curated mix of big and small brands—such as Icon, Bell, Biltwell, Brixton and Danner. PlusChrome bags, Electric Sunglasses, and stuff from Loser Machine and Busch Bros. And even Deus ex Machina.

We have an expanding in-house line of See See gear too, and make a few parts of our own—like mini switches.

What are the workshops like? One side is a tiny machine bay, and the other is for tuning and assembly. We don’t mess around with any maintenance, with the exception of our own bikes. We do about four customer bikes a year.

We always try to build motorcycles that are fun and different. We just did a custom Rokonfor Danner Boots—I was real excited to do that one. Somehow we’ve got labelled as café-style builders, but we have only done a few. And even those are pretty different from the standard café style.

You sound busy. It’s a careful balance. You need to make it worth your time, but you don’t want it to be too much like work. You see a lot of builders get burnt out by trying to make motorcycle building their main business. It can turn from a hobby to a poorly paying job pretty quick. Someday I want to be old and still excited to build motorcycles.

I don’t get to spend as much time as I would like in the shop itself. I think about it all day long, but business work (i.e., emailing) takes up most of my time.

Has See See lived up to your expectations? We are still open. I think that deserves a high five! But it’s been mountains of work.

Running a small business in the USA can be tricky. It requires a ton of balance between work and pleasure, and most of the time the lines are blurry. I would say 70 percent of the time I’m doing work that’s just like any industry, across the board. If you want to own something nice, you have to clean it and take care of it—and that’s not glamorous work.

But I wanted to add to the motorcycle scene, something I enjoyed. Growing up as a skate rat in skateboard shops, you learn to foster your community. I’ve always wanted to be inclusive and open, showing people like myself a little knowledge and acceptance.

But, as you know, the motorcycle world is pretty quick to judge, classify and discriminate. I never understood this.

What kind of people visit See See? This is the best thing—we have no specific type of customer. If I had to categorize them at all, I would say they are all nice people.

We get a lot of young families, older enthusiasts, and lots travellers who stop in on their trips. On the motorcycle side we get it all as well. We love all types of motorcycles, so we cater to all types of bikes.

What’s it like being based in the hipster capital of the world? Well, if you like motorcycles, good food and the wilderness, and you don’t have millions of dollars, Portland is a pretty damn good place to live.

I lived here before the word “hipster” was the common name for young people. The word is too broad for my taste—I don’t even know what it means. Maybe it’s someone born between 1975 and 1987? Or is it a haircut? I have heard a lot of talk about skinny jeans, but punks wear the same style. So do cowboys for that matter.

What bikes do you ride yourself? Oh boy! Dirt: ’14 KTM 500 XC-W, ’75 Husky CR250 and a ’86 Honda CR250. Flat track: ’78 Trackmaster Yamaha TT500, and a ’74 Framer Yamaha MX250. Street: ’74 Cone shovel FLH Harley Davidson, ’10 Triumph Scrambler 900, ’79 SR500 (owned since I was 17 years old), and a ’99 Ducati Monster 750.

We’ll come and visit. When are you open? We’re open seven days a week. Sometimes we have night events. I love having night events.

See See Motor Coffee Co., 1642 NE Sandy Blvd, Portland | Facebook | Instagram

Photos by Michael Antonovich.

via BIKEexif

PETER’S GPZ750

Peter rode Sportsbikes, Peter had one too many close calls, Peter stopped riding sports bikes. A change of approach was required and one beery night trawling through ebay the solution presented itself. Dutch’s big Zed Thou was a machine that had many admirers (indeed the first time I met him was after I had chased it up the Camden Road) but it was Peter that secured the big beautiful beast.

“That summer riding the ’78 z1000 brought back everything that made me first fall in love with bikes as a teenager. The noise, the smell, the wayward handling – all those things which can be so clinical on modern sportsbikes. There was one itch however which had not been scratched. I had not built the Big Zed, and I really wished that I had.”

“Built not bought” is a phrase that encapsulates the shed dwellers dreams. The sense of pride as you ride in the knowledge that the nuts, bolts and heavy metal singing away beneath you were combined by your own hands is reason enough for the hours spent skinning knuckles. For Peter it was a feeling he craved that the big Zed just could not sate and so he set about planning his own build.

“It all started with the tank. Someone on the Z1OC forum had it in the classifieds. I’d always loved the shape of those ‘70’s Kawasaki tanks and this one was from a z900 LTD. I just had to find something that I could put it on.”

Keen to look beyond the usual pool of donors that are starting to command silly money Peter decided to seek out an old flame, the Kawasaki GPz750,

“I once pushed a GPz unitrack 3 miles along a dark motorway in the rain. Despite this I kept a soft spot for these mid-‘80s Kwaks because I had one as my first ‘big’ bike. It was great until the bottom end gave up resulting in that damp trek.”

After investigating the measurements of the top fame rails Peter was convinced his prized tank would sit well in this new home, so he again took to ebay, hoping for the same luck that found him Dutch’s Zed.

“I bought a tidy looking, but non-running ’85 GPz750 unseen. The seller assured me that it had been fine the previous year, but upon awaking from it’s winter slumber it had refused to run right and the brakes were seized. It was the kind of price that I didn’t have to think twice about. On the way home with it on a borrowed trailer I went right past another eBay GPz750 that hadn’t sold, so I stopped off, offered beer-money and came home with the pair.”

“A strip and clean of the carbs brought the non-runner back to life so I rebuilt the brakes and put an angle grinder on my birthday list.”

With the birthday request met, Peter set to work de-tabbing and tidying the rear frame. To install the classic rear frame loop he sought the assistance of a local engineering workshop who also assisted with the welding of new tank mounts.

“The tank itself went on with some minor modifications (repeated blows to the underside with a heavy mallet).”

Peter was very conscious that he did not want to build a clone of the Zed he already owned, the best way to achieve this was of course to use his own hand made parts. He used sheet aluminium and wood to form the seat base before carving foam of various densities into the desired shape. He had the seat cover stitched up by a professional. The minimalist mudguards were fabricated from generic aluminium units and were dispatched to the powder coater, along with the frame and swing arm, for a layer of satin black goodness.

“I fabricated a new battery tray by folding aluminium sheet and set about modifying the old wiring loom to suit the new layout. Spending time in the bike shed is the perfect antidote to my desk-bound job in I.T., but working with decrepit wiring must stretch anybody’s idea of fun and this was definitely the low point. It was eventually finished however… and done properly because this is one area that I do have some experience with.”

The stance of the bike was improved by cutting the front forks down about an inch and fitting a second hand pair of CBR600 clip-ons that set Pete back a measly tenner. The top yoke is drilled and fitted with LED warning lights, a small speedometer rounds off the tidy cockpit. The chunky oversized tyres are Pirelli Scorpions.

“Then, just as suddenly as it started, it was finished and I was taking it up the road on a shakedown run. That itch had finally been scratched.”

Peter completed the GPz within a tight budget creating a fabulous machine which he can proudly declare as “built not bought”. Aside from the few hundred hours of his own time, the bike set him back no more than £1000 including the cost of the donor. And what of that second GPz? Well it is still in the shed and Pete has some ideas for it….

via The Bike Shed

Royal Enfield 350 ‘Nevermore’

Written by Ian Lee.

On the streets of India the cycle of choice tends to be the Royal Enfield. Reliable, easy to work on, spares aplenty, there is little that is not appealing about the retro motorcycle marque. Except if you want to stand out that is. Rolling out of India’s top new custom workshop, this bike is an idea executed with the mindset of a truly different bike being created. Scratch built around a late model Royal Enfield engine, Mean Green Customs have shown what it takes to stand out from the crowd, with their stealth bike concept. In a sea of Royal Enfield bobbers, this hard tail is something else, the mechanical engineer who created this masterpiece yearning to build something unique – and a chance to put his home made frame jig to use.

On deciding to undertake a build, Aditya Green decided he needed to create something different to the current trend of bobbing Royal Enfield bikes. Being a mechanical engineer by trade, the Indian builder has the skills to scratch build a lot of components, allowing him to produce a bike in a style that is all his own. Starting off with the mainstream Royal Enfield engine, Aditya decided the standard OHC powerplant would suffice for motivating the machine. Slight performance mods are found the fitment of K &N pod filters on the air intake, and a custom block hugging exhaust system.

With the desire for a stealthy look to the machine, the frame was built with ‘low and sleek’ in mind. With the custom frame draped so low over the engine, the 18 inch high wall tires utilised on the build hardly increase the height of the bike. The triple trees and fork setup has been made in house at Mean Green Customs, with the speedo housing as part of the top plate. Incorporated into the top plate as well are all the necessary warning LED units. Built into the front levers are LED units, to be used as front end indicators.

Continuing the sleek lines of this sweet ride, the tank and fairings have been fashioned from bare steel, with the rear fairing taking a few attempts to get to the finish Aditya wanted in the build. This was mainly to follow the lines of the tank and seat, plus incorporate the two shocks mounted under the seat. Incorporated into the seat pan are the brake lights, covered in mesh to hide them when not in use.

To keep the bike looking tidy, a cylinder was fashioned up and mounted on the frame. The cylinder contains all necessary electrics and the ignition switch for the bike, ensuring there is no messy harness showing on this rolling work of art. To keep the battery hidden away, a stainless casing was fashioned up and mounted.

With two very different ideas working against each other – that of stealth versus standing out – Aditya of Mean Green Customs has managed to create something which is the best of both worlds. Utilising his engineering skills, he has shown what is possible with the right tools and mindset on a build. We’re pretty sure this bike will stand out on the streets of India – or any street in the world for that matter.

via PIPEBURN

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