Choppers

By: Mike Seate, Linda Black McKay .

Builder and rider Mike Seate profiles today's best in custom choppers and bobbers. Bared to the bone and splashed in wild colors or outfitted with the most amazing custom parts, a chopper can be anything you want it to be. Stretched, fattened, filed, bent, lowered, or raised? You decide. Express yourself with a chopper.

This book is about chopper builders and their machines. A chopper is a motorcycle that has been customized to fit what the owner wants.

There are many kinds of choppers—from retro choppers, which are usually built from used parts and handmade components, to choppers built with more standard methods and prefabricated parts. While choppers from larger builders are often available at shops and dealerships nationwide, the small builders usually sell their bikes out of garages and small storefronts. As long as a bike is "street legal," there's nothing illegal about outlaw choppers or chopper builders. The name refers to the chopper's radical styling and independent and unconventional building methods.

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