Most of the customs at Portland's The One motorcycle show tend to put style over substance. The crew from BMW Motorcycles of Western Oregon wanted to do something different, and the result is the Logger Bike. The name pretty much says it all.
The staff at the dealer were kicking around ideas for a build for this year's show when the idea hit them.
"This is Oregon," Kary Krahel, the parts manager at the dealer told Lanesplitter. "This is timber country."
Krahel, who has friends in the logging industry, and the crew took the idea and ran with it, beginning with the donor bike, a 1995 R1100GS that was abandoned at the dealer.
"We wanted to make it reminiscent of a piece of logging equipment," says Krahel. So the bike was coated in Caterpillar yellow and they started strapping shit on.
Obviously, you need a chainsaw, so there's a scabbard up to hold it, and when the tree comes down a wooden cable spool out and integrated a winch can tow it. They mounted a headlight grille and slew of crash bars for protection, emergency lighting, a new gauge panel, CB radio, and swivel spotlights, along with heavy duty panniers packed with tools, a first aid kit, and tire chains. Yes, they even added mudflaps.
"Everything actually works," says Krahel. "Everything functions."
Here's proof:
Thanks to volunteers and parts donations ("lots of donations," says Krahel), the entire build, minus the cost of the bike, came in around $200. That's probably less than the rest of the builders spent on a single "vintage-inspired" tire, and it walked away with the Wang Chow award at the show.