“I wanted a fun bagger that rides like a Dyna but has the luxury of the Road Glide. At the same time, I didn’t want it to look like every other Road Glide.”

That’s how Austin Padgett sums up his hard-charging street slayer of a bagger. This lays down the basics but what it doesn’t tell you about his 2017 Harley-Davidson Road Glide Special is how (or why) he zapped it with spray can paint instead of going the gun route. Seeing as how he paints bikery for none other than Arlen Ness Motorcycles, we can probably give him the benefit of the doubt. But it’s not your usual plan for painting a motorcycle.

Then again, Austin ain’t your usual guy. Yes, I know, who among us in the custom motorcycle world really is? “Usual” is where fun goes to die. None of us threw a leg over a bike one day because being mundane sounded like a good life plan. No, we did it for the speed, the wind, and the tang of flying insects in our mouths on the highway (for those of us who aren’t big on full face helmets). Austin Padgett is a creative guy who digs motorcycles and combining those two things.

But that’s probably always been the case for him. See, he gets both of those traits from mom and dad. “My mom is an artist and I’ve always been around it,” Austin says. “I enjoy other media as well but painting just works well in this industry. I was also obsessed with my dad’s Kawasaki 900 when I was a kid!” he continued. “I would just sit on it making brap noises. I never had a bike as a kid, but we got stand-up jet skis when I was six or seven and went deep into them, until I broke myself too much. Later I ended up getting a supermotard to commute on and I rode it for years.”

This Road Glide is, of course, the latest brainchild of his creativity. Very little of it stayed stock over the course of its Dynatization. If you follow King of the Baggers, you know how much touring rigs have changed since the days of Street Glides-turned-Big Wheels. Performance bumped style to second place and this Road Glide was built with that in mind. If you’re not familiar with KOTB, I’d advise removing your tin foil hat, replacing your flip phone, and using this thing called, “Google” to get caught up. But I digress.

In a nutshell, this bike was torn down to the bare bones for some serious surgery. While it was once stock, it now fully identifies as custom. For one thing, the Milwaukee-Eight got pulled apart, its cases, cylinders, and heads retained for the job while other bits and pieces of the powerplant were tossed in favor of bold new aftermarket upgrades. S&S Cycle bored it out to 129 inches and Austin brought in a Ness Crossfire air box and 2-into-1 S&S Stainless Diamondback exhaust to give the high displacement V-twin the breathing it richly deserves.

No changes went into the frame but that’s where the stock parts pretty much end on this bike. Having more power to bear on the asphalt doesn’t mean as much without the handling to back it up. The stance of the chassis was where Austin wanted it, but the suspension needed some love if it was going to keep up. That’s why he changed over to Legend Suspension AXEO cartridges set in black Arlen Ness fork tubes, mated to 2-inch drop-in Ness triple trees. Matched with 14-inch Legend Gold Reservoir shocks out back, the overall parts combo makes this bagger much better geared toward handling like a Dyna than it did in its stock life.

Austin continued his personal gold rush at the wheel level with a set of Ness Y-spokers, 19×3.5-inch and 18×5.5-inch. They run on Metzeler Cruisetec and rely on 6-piston Ness calipers and rotator brake rotors for stopping power.

Unlike the wheels, the OEM back fender kept its job. But that carbon fiber skin hugging the front tire is a prototype from Arlen Ness. How many of us can say we’ve had the opportunity to run something that new on a motorcycle? Like the front fender the gas tank got some fiber in its diet, too, thanks to a Ness carbon fiber dash. It’s capped off with an Arlen Ness 12-point gas cap. Austin went with Custom Dynamics lighting from nose to tail.

In keeping with the Dyna vibe, the floorboards had to go. “I wanted to build a bike for myself, for it to be comfortable enough to ride anywhere, any time,” Austin continued. “It was important to me that the bike handled well and showed off my style.” To those ends, Austin swapped over to Arlen Ness mids and MX pegs to get the foot placement more in line with deep leans and twisty carving. Of course, while he was at it, Austin also made the switch to Ness bars, grips, and MX stainless steel handlebars, just to keep everything properly matched like it should be.

The final touch for getting just the right seat position came down to the seat, however, “Dontay at Le Pera built my seat to position your body one inch taller and one inch further forward. It works perfectly with the mid-mount controls and Ness Method Risers.” Speaking of method, we now come to the paint. Austin caught a lot of grief online about his spray can process. But how good is the payoff if there’s no risk? “Of course, the most rewarding part is the most challenging,” he tells us. “My mom is an artist, so I grew up around art and love to create. I’ve always liked working on stuff mostly because I can’t afford to pay a mechanic so I just learned, I also always had hot rods growing up and just did all the basic stuff with them. Also, all of my builds are spray painted! I use a two-part clear coat called SprayMax 2k, which is the key to making the paint look great. I’ve gotten some hate for doing it this way and that’s ok! That’s my thing now, and I’m going to stay with it and improve my skills.” As it turns out, Austin and rattle can paint go way back, though: “Well I painted bicycles and a Chevy step side when I was a teenager with spray paint because, well, I was 16! I ended up painting a few jet skis with normal style guns and I just didn’t enjoy doing it on jet skis. I’d done some air brushing on fishing lures from time to time.”

Fast forward to when he started working for Ness. He’d bought a 2007 Dyna and wanted to build a club style bike out of it, fast and dirty, for Sturgis. “At the time we had our metal fab guy Alex Ramirez, who also builds model cars, who told me about a twopart clearcoat called SprayMax 2k,” Austin continued. “He said it can be wet sanded and buffed to get the professional look, so I went to Home Depot and bought a bunch of Tiffany Blue spray paint and did the Dyna up with it. And it came out way better than I expected. So, it kinda just turned into a thing and now I have painted four of my own bikes. I like using spray paint because most people will not believe it’s spray paint and it gives me my own little niche. I would like to start adding in some airbrush techniques and maybe Monty Roach of Roach Kustoms can teach me some basic pinstriping!” HB

WORDS: MARK MASKER
PHOTOS: JUSTIN GEORGE