Some Indian owners insist on originality while others are motivated to modify their bikes. The aim may be to build a better racer (e.g. a flat track or Daytona Scout, a Chief hillclimber), or to have a tourer with more comfort and carrying space, not to mention more lights and chrome rails, or to build a chopper just for aesthetics and to look tough to impress your buddies, girls and especially yourself. (The late Steve McQueen's favorite ride, and he owned many bikes, was a '46 Indian Chief chopper.) In this chapter are shown a few examples of each, and I invite any readers who have an Indian racer, decker or chopper to send me two photos for possible future inclusion here.

A fourth -rare- motive to modify is to have a reliable Chief engine in a lighter, better handling English rolling chassis (with hand clutch and foot shift to boot).A very few people have squeezed Chief engines into Matchless and Norton frames. One is not sure if the origin was that the owner of an English bike got fed up with breakdowns and blowups (Matchless twins and Norton 750's were notorious for this), so after blowing his stock engine mounted a reliable Chief in the frame, or whether an Indian rider got fed up with the poor handling, braking and acceleration (compared to an English twin) and wanted to improve his Indian by putting the engine in a "Limey" rolling chassis. (The second theory sounds weird, but the Harley Sportster and its K and KH precursor was an American V-twin squeezed into an English type frame/gearbox/wheels. In fact the Sportster was developed to compete with the British twins of the 1950's, so maybe some Indian owners decided to make their concept of an Indian Sportster.) The result is ugly but functional. Below is a photo of a Nortian or Chiefton, actually a '68 Atlas with a Chief engine. (Photo credit to Allan Lowson.) Apparently it is very fast. According to my rough calculations it would make the same power as a Norton engine but would be smoother and more reliable.

Next on lower left is a 1957 AJS (probably originally with a 550 or 600 c.c. mill) with a Chief mill very carefully inserted. It uses the Limey primary drive. Not a centimeter to spare but it fits! Bike probably has same power output as before (meaning clutch can cope) but engine will last forever instead of a few months. Less vibration too I'd expect. The bike must be at least 150 pounds lighter than a 47 Chief, so faster. Also it has a Burman 4 speed and having owned a '50's Matchless I can say they shift very fast, partly because its 1 up and 3 down. Large AJS tank carries about 5.5 US gallons and the lighter weight = better fuel mileage and with that big seat (rare on a Brit bike, but stock during the '50's) one could cruise longer than a stock Chief. I am sure owner James Clark enjoys it. It was offered for sale recently.

Bike on right is a 1960 Matchless with same setup, once owned by Indian Don. Note how big the normally insignificant Chief left cylinders look in the smaller frame.(Also love that 1958-68 Matchless primary cover -they look ace when polished.) Grafting a Lucas alernator onto the left side of the Indian crank shaft and case to copy the Triumph and BSA stup would be a major engineering feat, but that's what was done on the bike below right. Seems this was a one off special put together by the boys at the factory in 1960, using a new Matchless/AJS rolling chassis and left over Indian Chief 74 parts. I am informed the factory also assembled two other specials based on the English brands they were then selling under the Brockhouse label, but I do not think they used American engines. One or both of those were destroyed in a fire.

Speaking of specials, in New Mexico Jim Mosher builds very fast and reliable Scouts and Chiefs; bobbers would be the best rubric for them but there is hardly anything stock left so they are more Moshers than Indians. Or you can just send you engine to Jim and he will rebuild it for you, making it as fast as you want. You can also buy his special carburettor kit and a crankcase ventilation kit and some other goodies if you prefer to DIY. What really impresses me about Jim is that instead of just using old recipes that Indian fanatics have been passing down for ages, he does experiments, dyno testing and measurements on graphs like an engineer, to come up with the best results. His scientific approach has exploded some old ideas (which can now be called myths) and has confirmed the worth of factory engineers (e.g. it is hard to beat the factory's Bonneville cam setup). Professor Jim (my nickname for him) has found some interesting things about performance cams, the upper valve train, and ignition timing with today's low octane fuel. For more info and some nice photos visit : Professor Jim's web page

Next is a nice clean modified '47 Chief owned by Rob Buczynski of Reno, Nevada, USA. Strange, I thought it was all hot and desert there but the photos show snow, anyway - Mods include Borrani rims, E-ignition, King clutch, Dellorto carb, etc. For details and ultra sharp versions of these photos visit: Rob's site

Below is an ex-army model 841 that has been customized with Chief fenders and a custom sheet metal headlamp nacelle. The other changes are just paint and chrome, but it turns the ugly duckling into a swan princess. It would have been easy for Indian to make a bike just like this. Instead they sold the remaining 841's (the army cancelled the contract when the Jeep became popular) for "peanuts" and turned their back on it.They were probably smart not to market it the way it was as it suffered from a weak gearbox and weighed 550 pounds and the flathead 750 mill even if in Sport Scout specs would not have given acceptable performance. It was expensive to make (shaft drive, different gearbox) so would have been competing with BMW. I say if they had marketed a bike like this with an improved gearbox and enlarged engine, e.g. stroked to 950 cc via Chief crank and rods, they would have given BMW a run for their money and Indian might not have gone bankrupt.

Here is a photo-montage of another civilian-ized 841, this time owned by Dave Schultz (whose other beauties can be seen at www.krummsindian.com/Photos.htm )

Still on civilianized model 841's here is a stunning beauty exported from Canada to Australia and superbly restored and civilianized by Pete Ypatidis, (who has been restoring Indians for 30 years). I believe it was sold for about A$50,000. It is a real work of art and craftsmanship. The original military 841's were a bit ugly but here we see a Cinderella transformation.

Next is a Scout which at first looks much modified but really just has a bobbed rear fender and a disc brake on the front. (Plus a non-stock paint job.) The bike looks real fast and racey. I never get tired of oggling this fine example of craft and art. Would the owner please let us know who he is and what mods I may have missed. Underneath, photo courtesy of Zippy Lowson, is a West Coast Scout bob job. Again will the owner let us know who he is to take a bow?

Below we see a shot of Indian dealer Chuck Myles on his Indian hillclimber in the mid 1990's. To the right of Chuck is a shot, courtesy of Zippy Lowson, of an early Scout hillclimber with Edison-Splitdorf magneto and the usual chains on the rear wheel.

A few words about Chuck - interesting guy. He used to be a teacher (phys. ed. and sociology), then started his Indian service, sold parts and rode competition (hillclimbs), built specials etc. Years later he had some problems with the law (falsely accused of stolen property, resisting arrest). He sued public officials, acting as his own counsel, and eventually won! Later he ran as a judicial candidate and won, becoming a judge. I believe he has since retired from that profession and is still selling Indian parts etc. I was flattered to meet him at Rhinebeck NY in June 2007. He hardly looks older than he did when I previously met him in at a hillclimb Heidelberg Ontario 30 years earlier!

Below left is a 1943 military model 741 that has been turned into a bobber. Below right is George Routelier's flatracker Chief:

Next is Allan "Zippy" Lowson of the Laughing Indian Riders club racing and posing with the club's Scout in the mid 1990's at a track near Vancouver. Note the Norton front end, primary drive and gearbox. The engine has dual carbs.

Below is a shot, courtesy Zippy, of the right side of the club racer.

On the left below is a Chief hillclimber with a special rear tire to really grip the dirt (also check the high ground clearance and the loooong rear fork (swinging arm). On the right is an alcohol burning hillclimber with a 101 bottom end and Bonneville Sport Scout top end. (Photos courtesy Allan Lowson.) You may wonder about the small fuel tank and the shaved fins. A typical hillclimb only last a few seconds, 8 seconds would be a long run, so you don't need much fuel or engine cooling. The ground off fins show what a flathead "really" looks like, so now we know the label "flathead" is very apt.

To finish the racers, below is a 1929 factory 350 cc. Prince, now owned by Barry Brown who lives in a secluded location in the S. E. Ontario countryside. Barry is a well respected vintage mechanic who has a mobile repair and parts shop in his old Ford truck. Recently I was privileged to get a tour of his house. He lives in an old mill with a Douglas (British opposed twin) hanging overhead from a chain, and other old bikes in the living room. The restoration work (not all Indian, some Harley and he was working on a BMW when I was there, if my memory is correct) is done in an upstairs workshop with plenty of old parts on hand.

Next we move from racers to choppers, to see a superb example of a Chief out of New York City. The forks are extended about 2 or 3" too long for my taste but they do provide more ground clearance and aren't raked out too much. (Some rake was necessary to clear the oil tank which is in front of the engine.) I think this is a wonderful example of chopping without compromising the original styling. Bill O'Neill's chopping here actually accentuates the Chief's lines, and even the engine which is not normally a high point on a flathead is a centerpiece here. Mounting the tail light and licence plate on top of the low rise sissy bar was a stroke of genius.

Now here are two photos from the international Indian rally held in Denmark in 2003. The bike on the left is a gorgeous civilianized model 841 and the one on the right is a chopped 1946-48 Chief with a neat custom rear fender getting ready to dump the clutch in the drag race. I think it was just one bike at a time racing against time, but still a drag race. (Why don't we North Americans have such an event at our rallies? From what I read about the Danish rally it was like Heaven on Earth. Riders rode in from all of Europe.)

I cannot resist putting in my own '47 Chief chopper, engine # DO2983, admittedly an amateur quality chopped Chief, but in 1969 I had hardly any money and not even a workbench. Everything was done on a dirt floor with a few hand tools, a vice, and one electric drill. It was stolen, uninsured, in the Fall of 1970 in Stoney Creek (next to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada). Note the chopper fuel tank, 1950's Triumph oil tank and front wheel, custom seat, Z bars, tractor headlamp (useless) and Norton Atlas rear fender. Originally I had two short exhaust header pipes, Sportster style, and I stuffed VW bug resonators into them after the police hassled me about noise. A rubber mallet stuffed down the seat post holds the seat up from the frame an gave a tiny bit of extra suspension. The generator was also VW bug, and I used a go-kart pulley.

You may wonder about the oil tank and decide it looks strange there. The main obstacle in chopping a Chief (assuming you want to get rid of the fatbob tanks which contain gasoline on the left and gasoline and oil on the right) is where to locate the new oil tank. Bill O'Neill (the New York chop above) put a new tank on the frame downtubes, just above the engine, but this requires raking out the front end to clear it when the suspension compresses and the wheel comes up toward the frame. Once you rake the steering neck you have to extend the forks or the bike will have no ground clearance below the front of the engine. I did not want to alter the steering neck nor extend the forks. I was never satisfied with the Triumph oil tank (which happened to bolt on to the old tank mount holes) but the bike got stolen before I came up with any better idea. Since the advent of the 1971 Triumph and BSA 650's with the frame containing the oil, I think that would be the way to go, but the fat frame under the petrol tank makes for a lot less fuel capacity unless you make the tank fatter, destroying the idea of a chopper tank. Maybe a tank where the battery and generator goes and to free up space use a smaller modern battery and an alternator off a small car? However such a new oil tank would not be above the engine oil intake and could not use gravity feed, so a puller pump would be needed. Maybe an electric gasoline pump from a car? Also a tank that small would require a fairly big oil cooler radiator to cool the oil and to hold an extra half liter of oil. I offer $20 to whoever comes up with a better idea. Nothing super expensive and radical like redesigning the entire crank cases to make it wet sump. Just remember it is an air cooled engine so you can't mount a big flat tank or tank/rad combo in front of the engine. I will post the ideas in a future edition of this web page.

Below we see what happened when I tried to make a sharp left turn at the bottom of the hill in my parent's backyard. At this point I had ridden the Indian hundreds of times so was used to the suicide clutch, but ...

Below is the same bike about seven months earlier in the winter of 1969/70, (with a Honda 175 fuel tank and before I chopped the Norton Atlas fender) stored outside in the bitter cold, but always starting on the first kick even though the oil was so thick the kicker crank took 3 seconds to descend. Thirty years later and I still can't believe it. Years later I had a Yamaha 850 triple and it wouldn't start with the kicker crank even under ideal conditions, and wouldn't even start with the electric start unless the battery was in perfect condition. I had to buy a new battery annually just to get enough rpm's to start the pig. (It weighed as much as a Chief.)

Still going back in time, here is what the beast looked like in 1968 before I obtained the chopper tanks for it. That's a Matchless front fender on the rear. The super fat rear tire was Pirelli. Note the Indian Four rolling chassis in the background. This is my parents' house. The Four was also taken from me about 5 years later before I got around to restoring it and finding an engine for it. One day the guy I'd bought it from years earlier came and asked my mother if he could have it back and she said "sure, get that piece of junk out of here." When I visited my parents a few months later and found out, I was furious but there was no way to track the guy down.

Michael Breeding, respected supplier of high quality repro parts for Indians, is seen in the next photo with his 1953 Chief chopper. (Photo taken in 1969.) Somewhere there is a half (U.S.) gallon oil tank but where? The fuel tank looks to be Norton N15/Matchless G-15CS, and looks very nice on the bike. (The Flower Power hippy paint job doesn't really go with the mean outlaw image of the bike though.) Funnily enough I had the same type tank on my Honda around the same time but never thought of putting such a tank on my Indian. Instead I waited about 8 months for the chopper teardrop tank to arrive (there was such a demand everyone was sold out) and then had it chromed.

Next, with photos courtesy of Iron Horse magazine, we have a super updated Indian Four. It has an automatic transmission (GM Corvair) as well as a disc front brake, model 841 rear suspension, and late Chief forks. It was originally done by Ellsworth Dunderland, and later improved by Bob Stark.

Next we see a 1953 Chief which has been decked or dressed with extra chrome and horns and rails. Sure looks good. This was taken by me at the CVMG annual rally in Barrie in 1976, if not Welland in 1973.

Below is a modified Chief photo'd by me in Edmonton circa 1981. Too bad I couldn't afford color film as the paint job was impressive. It is owned by Carmen Brown if I recall.

This Chief has a complete Harley front end (except for the fender which is either Indian or a H-D fender with sheet metal added), a H-D FLT saddle, and a Harley rear fender, tail lite, saddlebags and rear carrier. The exhaust system beyond the headers is custom. One may wonder why all this, but there are practical reasons: Carmen has lots of Hog parts; the disc brake front end and "mag" wheel add a lot of safety and the big saddlebags a lot of carrying capacity. No need to ruin an Indian rear fender making up mounts for the large Harley 'bags.

A reader/viewer of this website sent me this photo he took of a new V-8 Indian available only in Germany. Note the large radiator for this liquid cooled engine. You can actually buy these beasts: www.indian.de but if you live in the USA they may not be EPA legal so check long and hard before spending $ to import one.

From Jim Parker's Indian business in Victoria, Australia we have a prototype of the Apache. This is what I would have expected the new Scout to look like, more or less. (It would've had a new engine.) Note the English gearbox for fast gear changes, and the obvious light weight of the bike. This thing must really fly and be a blast to ride, especially if one just got off a stock flathead Chief.

Jim also had this custom chopper for sale, based on a 1944 Chief engine, a swing arm frame and modern forks, Norton primary drive and AMC 4 speed footshift gearbox. Sorry folks, it has already been sold. Check out Jim's website for other nice Indians: www.parkerindian.com.au

Next is a recent Kawasaki 800 Drifter which when I first saw it from the front fooled me and many others into thinking it was a 1950's Indian with trun signals. (This was before 1999 so there were no new Indians then. Nowadays, why bother trying to make your Kaw 800 or 1500 look like a Chief when there is a real Chief available?) Nowadays the owner is liable for trademark infringement if he still has the Indian logo on the Kaw. The light blue model is a stock Drifter 800. (The 800's look more Chiefy than the 1500's with their swinging arm rear suspension. Unfortunately Kawasaki has discontinued both the 800 and 1500 Drifter so they may eventually become classics themselves)

By comparison, a 1470 cc. (88 CID) Kaw Drifter below. (Perhaps named because they drift rather than steer thru corners? The originally proposed name "Vintage" was much better in my opinion.) The headlight is a copy of a 1950's BSA or Matchless- why they didn't stick with the Nomad headlamp and nacelle which is a copy of 1950's Harley or Indian makes no sense at all. Also the imitation Shovelhead (TM) engine looks like a 1980 H-D stuck into a 1950 Chief. They should've kept the earlier Vulcan engine which was imitation Panhead (TM reg'd). The concept of the rear fender matching the front is great in theory but looks overdone to some. What is neat is that the rear fender is the same distance from the tire as the front, and like the front the fender as well as wheel moves up and down. This concept was copied from the Vincents of the late forties and early fifties.)

Recently on E-Bay was this 6 cylinder Chevrolet powered and automatic transmission "Indian" although the frame is custom and wheels and seat and forks Harley-Davidson, the only Indian parts being the front fender and fender lamp. To see larger photo click on this one (then close new browser window to return here).

Now for something equally interesting, a Swedish Albin ( 1 lite or 61 CID v twin with huge transfer case for the shaft drive) in bobber form. It seems to have Harley split fuel tanks and a 1960's Sportster front end. Custom solo seat and custom exhaust pipes and a bobbed rear fender and chopper style oil tank and rear wheel. Actually other than the engine and gearbox and possibly the frame there is nothing else Albin on this. This would make a really unique bike to show up with at any meeting of vintage bikes or Harleys. I am curious as to what a stock 1940's Albin looked like. Apparently only two Albins were ever built (military protoypes?) and this is what is left of one. Talk about rare! (Click on the thumbails to enlarge, full sized image will appear in a new browser window overtop of this one, when finished looking, click off the new browser window to return here).

No history of American motorcycles in the first half of the 20th century is complete without mention of the Crocker. Crocker made very successful single cylinder Speedway race bikes, and V-twin street bikes. Like the English Vincent this big V-twin was very fast and technologically advanced for its day (1936), and the bikes were hand built, so they were expensive and rare even in their day. (The war put an end to American and English civilian motorcycle production in 1942, and while Indian, Harley and Vincent resumed after WW II, Crocker did not.) The Vincent V-twin came into production about the same year as the Crocker and Harley Knucklehead (1936). The Crocker only lasted until 1942 and the Vincent until 1955. The Harley evolved into the Panhead in 1948, the Shovelhead in 1966, the Evolution in 1984, and more recently the Twin Cam. Probably no two Crockers were alike even when brand new. Buyers could order engine sizes from 61 (1 liter) to 100 CID (1.5 liters or 1500 c.c.). While the Vincent was fast but fragile, the Crocker was fast and rugged. Parts were made overly strong for the power output, understressing them and making them reliable. While the Crocker was like a big Detroit V-8 car of the fifties, the Vincent was more like a finicky British sports car.. (Not that people then and now have not racked up tens of thousands of touring miles on Vincent Rapides - I am thinking more of the Black Shadows and Lightnings. The Vincent engine design was much more complex than the Crocker or for that matter any V twin made in the following half century. The Vincent rear suspension was not copied until the Harley Softail and the oil-in-frame design was copied in a street bike until Triumph and BSA used it in their 650 twins starting in 1971.) While the Vincent was unique in appearance, the Crocker looked familiar: like a stripped down Indian Chief with Harley Knucklehead engine. Actually Albert Crocker used to work for Indian so resemblances between Crocker and Indian parts (tanks, Scout-like forks, aluminum primary cover and generator drive location) are not just coincidence. While some parts were obtained by Al Crocker from Indian and Harley dealers, it is not true that the bike was a combination of Indian and Hog parts. The frame (which included a cast-in steel gearbox), forks, engine etc. were pure Crocker. Many parts which on other bikes were pressed steel or cast steel were made of aluminum; even the fuel tanks. The gears were oversized for strength, but only three speeds were available. (That was standard in 1936.) The engine was of valve-in-head design (OHV) and had an almost square bore and stroke ratio. That ratio was truly ahead of its time as until about 18 years ago V twins on both sides of the Atlantic except for the Vincent and Crocker and Moto-Guzzi had narrow bores and long strokes. The Crocker came out in the same year as Harley's OHV Knucklehead, but beating Harley to the market by about 5 months. Early Crocker V-twins were hemi-head with exposed valve springs, but some of the heads cracked. The later design was called "parallel" and had fully enclosed top end. I am not sure of whether the valve angle was more vertical like the latest designs or not. From what I understand (and probably nobody had dynometers back then) power output of the two designs was equal. Apparently Harley and perhaps also Indian felt so threatened by the more advanced and fast Crocker that they pressured Budd and Kelsey-Hayes, the wheel rim makers, not to deal with Crocker, so Crockers were sold without wheels and buyers had to buy them under the table from sympathetic Indian and Harley dealers. According to one story, during the early 1940's Mr. Al Crocker, seeing the writing on the wall, approached Indian about buying the rights to his engine for use in Chiefs. As is typical of the Indian management of the 1940's, and Indian's own failing finances, they turned their noses up at a golden opportunity and looked a gift horse in the mouth, just as they did in 1949 when they had the chance to power new Chiefs with Vincent engines. Thus the postwar Indian V twin never became an OHV. Al Crocker made over 60 V-twins plus successful Speedway singles and had another 85 V-twins almost finished in 1942 when the War Dept. forced him to melt them down for badly needed metal. He then made so much money making military parts he did not resume Crocker production after the war. He died in 1961. A restored Crocker today is worth far more than an Indian or Harley V-twin of the same era. I mean eight to ten times more. At auctions since late 2006, well preserved or restored Crocker V-twins have been sold for a quater million dollars! Below are two B&W photos: firstly, a photo from the early 1960's showing an unrestored 1942 Crocker in Los Angeles, owned by Hiroshi Watanuki; and secondly a restored Crocker from L.A. (photo taken around Y2K) owned by Richard Morris.

Above two color photos were kindly submitted by web viewer "Bob" (don't know his surname). Bike on left is a stock 1940 Crocker "big tank" while one on right is a "small tank" model. One on right has non-stock exhaust and has a BSA gearbox, non stock front wheel and tire, and is missing the headlight.

NEWS FLASH!

Incredible and joyous as it may seem, Crocker is back in production! A Toronto Canada company (also incorporated in the USA) with Michael Schact as President and a new facility in Gardena California close to the original site is starting to make exact reproductions of Crocker hemi and parallel head V-twins, big and small tank (except for some internal improvements, e.g. 12 v electronic ignition, lighter wheel hubs). The four new models are visually in-distinguishable from the originals, and include original style thick, cast aluminum fuel/oil tanks, and choice of coil spring or cantilever seat suspension (just like the originals). Customer chooses his own tires and paint job prior to pick up or delivery. Due to low volume (only a half dozen a year will be produced), high quality work on components by the best craftsmen in North America, and hand assembly, the price will be well over $100,000, currently pegged at US$125k. I believe desposits are now being accepted. Engines will no longer be sold separately. The externals are made by Crocker and the internals assembled and tuned and dyno-tested by a very reputable sub contractor. Since production will be so low, these should be a great investment. They are admittedly expensive but a lot cheaper than a restored original Crocker, getting road insurance should be therefore be cheaper, and you could feel more confident about riding one of these bikes because they are 100% brand new and if one is stolen or wrecked you are not going to be out $250,000 or more. (Note the author is expressing a personal opinion only and is not making any promises as to future value of the new Crockers, consult your own financial advisor if planning to purchase as an investment rather than as a rider.) For details visit www.CrockerMotorcycleCo.com (Not www.CrockerMotorcycle.com) One thing I can almost guarantee is that in a parking lot full of old Harleys, customized Harleys and even restored Indians, your Crocker will draw the biggest crowds. Unless there is another Crocker present (what are the odds of that?) you will have Exclusivity with a capital E.

Note that I have no financial interest in any company mentioned anywhere in this web site, and am not encouraging the purchase of one product or service over any other. My opinions are not intended as endorsements or recommendations.

If anyone recognizes their bike here please let me know so I can put your name in as owner. Also feel free to send me photos of your Indians (especially rare models and Crockers as I have more Chief photos than I can use) so I can add them to the site. If I got anything wrong in here, please Email me the correction: author and web designer.

THANKS TO ALL WHO HAVE SENT COMPLIMENTARY MESSAGES AND INFO. THIS IS WHAT KEEPS ME ADDING TO THE SITE AND PAYING THE HOSTING SERVICE FOR ITS EXISTENCE.

This site is not the official site of the makers of the current lines of Indian motorcycles, INDIAN MOTORCYCLE in Kings Mountain, North Carolina (V-twin) and INDIAN MOTORCYCLE LTD. of Edinburgh, Scotland (4 cylinder) nor is it the official site of the new Crocker motorycle company.