In the age of Chat GPT, 3D printing and filtered photos, you’re going to be hard-pressed – and dare I say fortunate – to discover anything one-of-a-kind or raw come across your feed. Seldom do we hear the word “craftsman” applied to the whole of its meaning, but I can confidently say that once you wade through the noise and fake shit of the internet, you’ll find that true fabricators and builders, in every sense of the word, still exist. I present to you as evidence of this case Exhibit A: Ryan Gore (owner and operator of Paper Street Customs) and his triumph of a chopper King of Pain.

Ryan Gore is no fresh face on the scene – he is a seasoned builder and fabricator whose hand-machined parts pepper a myriad of motorcycles at most custom bike shows across the country. A graduate of AMI in 2004, he trained his chops working in shops on both coasts before starting Paper Street Customs.

With a style influenced by the likes of Warren Lane, Indian Larry, Tom Foster and Masa, Ryan’s builds are highly accented customs that are built with old school elegance but meant to ride.

He truly found his niche in handcrafted small-batch custom parts and accessories, the kind made with the care and attention you’d more likely find in an art gallery than on a motorcycle. The details are where his builds rise above the bulk. There are few if any mass-production elements setting off his pieces. King of Pain is no exception.

I got Ryan’s take on the process of building this centerpiece of a Shovelhead and this is what he had to say:

Hot Bike: Where did the inspiration for this build come from? All the signature touches tie together so well, it’s obviously thematically influenced.
Paper Street Customs: I don’t really have “inspiration” for builds. Typically, I can see the whole bike in my head before I even start. I really wanted to push myself as far as my manual machining skills, so I knew I wanted to incorporate a lot of the decorative machined pieces like the top motor mount and country bar in the frame, then tie in as many of the small details so it all flowed together.  I really appreciate the subtle details you can put in a bike without overdoing it.

HB: What did the original bike/situation look like? Roller? Engine, frame, what pieces did you have to start?
PSC: The bike started out as a stock 1974 FXE I found on Facebook Marketplace across the state.  It had been sitting in a storage unit for over five years. I brought it home and got it running, then immediately tore it apart. All I kept was the stock neck casting, lower frame rails, motor, and transmission.

HB: What elements on this bike were handmade/fabricated by you or by anyone else?
PSC:I chopped the frame and stretched it up 4” in the downtubes and 2” in the tail section. Then I hard-tailed the rear using loop tail style castings and added the machined stainless motor mount and country bar. I machined all the stainless struts, linkages, and accent pieces to match the stainless frame details. I made the curved oil tank and had Thomas Kearney at Leading Edge Machine make me the end caps styled after old Supreme 5 spoke wheels. The gas tank is an old Blackbird tank that I frisco’d and narrowed 2 inches. The stainless foot controls were the prototype for what has become my diamond pedal controls I sell. I made the exhaust and tried to style them after church organ pipes. I shaved a 39mm frontend and used nitrile coated tubes for the murdered-out look. The wheels are 5 spoke invaders made by Rick Bray at RKB Kustom Speed. I made an aluminum seat pan and had Curt Green of Bare Bones Leather hand-tool the seat.

HB: Where does this fall in your career rankings? Favorite? Longest build? Most difficult? Hardest to part with?
PSC:I tend not to think about things like this. I think it’s one of my best builds based on the feedback I’ve gotten and how well it did on the show circuit (went 5 for 5 first place wins in Sturgis with 4 Best of Shows). But I don’t really let myself celebrate things for very long. I acknowledge what I did and then move on to the next thing. In my mind I’m just getting started and have so far to go to reach my goals. My favorite build is always the next one. I wouldn’t say this was my most difficult build but I did try to push my skills with things like stretching the frame and incorporating the machined stainless. The longer I do this for a living the easier it gets to part with them. Things are just things. And I love building them more than anything.  To feed that addiction I have to sell the previous one.

HB: What’s the future of chopper culture look like to you and how does your style fit into that?
PSC:I don’t know what to think about the future. I just do what I do. Hopefully people keep digging it and I get to keep doing it. My style is mine, I don’t worry about whether it fits in or not. I worry more about just being authentic…being authentic never goes out of style.  HB

WORDS: Giselle Allison