2006 H-D Road King
It has been said that if you can make a living doing something you love you will never have to work a day in your life. I would have to agree it is so true when it comes to custom bike building. Ask any bike builder that loves what he does and he'll tell you, it is all about the bikes they just happen to make money doing it; as long as they are doing it for the right reasons the love and enthusiasm of motorcycles.
The guys at Showtime Custom Cycles seem to have the same feeling when it comes to building custom bikes. Give as much time as you can to the thing you love and it will show in quality. Phil Estioco and his brother Jerry grew up in the trenches of Sacramento with the passion to tinker on anything with a motor. As a kid, Phil was always trying to out-do and show-off all his skills by taking apart his go-karts, mini bikes, dirt bikes, and so on then putting them back together but with his style.
Jump ahead a few years and hot rods, lowriders, motorcycles, and even a dump truck were the next things on Phil's list of things to customize and show off. Over the years Phil and his brother spent most of their free weekends entering custom cars into shows taking home tons of trophies, giving Phil the nickname "Showtime." He is always ready to head to a show. So, no stranger to the show circuit and knowing what it takes to have a winner, motorcycles were next.
With the bagger craze still on a strong upward move, Phil came across this '06 Road King to be the best platform for his next show bike to add to the Showtime family. To get the bike ready, they started with what Phil says has to happen to every bike: it was striped down to the frame to get built back up the right way. Also, there was very little time to get this bike done to meet all of the show deadlines. To get started the bike was torn down in just a few hours and all the pieces were separated. The motor was hopped up to 95ci with new Screamin' Eagle pistons and cylinders, the heads were ported and flowed, along with adding bigger valves. On the lower end, a set of S&S 585 gear-drive cams and a high-flow oil pump from Feuling found their way into the case. The trans was inspected and found to be fine and working good.
With this going on, the frame and all the sheetmetal was sent over to Eddie the painter who got started on molding the frame and gas tank. Then they got a replacement long rear fender and a set of saddlebags from Arlen Ness. The rear end was slammed 5 inches with a custom made bracket and the use of Platinum Air shocks. Phil made and shaped a front carbon fiber fender that is just over 2 inches from the ground in the rear. The bike was then turned into a roller once all the frontend components were back from the chrome shop and the set of twisted spoke wheels from Wheel Works were shipped out. Then, a set of Paul Yaffe Monkey Bars were bolted to the bike along with hand controls from Chesapeake Performance.
After all the mock-up was done, the parts came back off the bike and a few boxes of parts headed over to the chromer and polisher as the others headed to Perfect-it Powdercoating. When it came to the paintwork and color, Phil was set on something a bit darker than the last bike he did. Eddie told Phil he was going with an old school style of layering color from the '60s done with a dark basecoat of black-purple and then a six-layer top coat of pearls and metal flake-one on top of the other. This helps make the colors come out and pop day and night from a flash of a headlight or at high noon on a sunny day.
The bike was done and just in time to kick off the year with the West Coast Easyriders show, taking First place best in show. But that was just the start, by the end of the year the bike had taken home its fair share of trophies and cash prizes, enough to pay for the bike and that's why Phil called the bike Jackpot.