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Broken Back Harley-Davidson Radical Over 26 Is All About Wheel Play

When it comes to custom motorcycles, there’s nothing more appealing than seeing a two-wheeler almost entirely built from scratch. Maybe that’s because in the not so distant past we were flooded with TV shows like say Orange County Choppers, which initiated an entire generation into the secrets of custom bike building.
Harley-Davidson Radical Over 26 12 photos
Photo: Thunderbike
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Most of these shows described how Americans like to do things, but we all know there are custom garages elsewhere, possibly equally as talented as the ones in the good old U.S. of A. One of them, and perhaps the most active over the past 20 years, is in Germany.

It’s Thunderbike we’re talking about, a German shop that somehow managed to get our attention a while back with their stunning builds. The group is in the business of both customizing stock Harleys and building their own frames – obviously fitted with Harley engines.

We’ve talked about Thunderbike extensively as part of our Two-Wheeler Month coverage, but there seems to be no stopping the flood of German custom machines coming our way.

The latest build we chose to talk about is called Radical Over 26. It is a custom frame that holds a carbureted Harley-Davidson Screamin’ Eagle 103 good for 100 ps, and rides on ridiculously big wheels.

At the front, the shop fitted a massive 26-inch wheel from its own inventory (hence the name), working together with a 23-inch rear one. And if it weren’t for another extreme element of the bike, these parts would have certainly been the highlights of the build.

That other extreme element is the low-riding seat – it has been designed to stand behind the engine, at roughly the same height as the upper side of the powertrain. Because of the elevated fuel tank and the 40 degrees rake, the Radical Over 26 looks like it has a broken back.

Usually Thunderbike cuts no corners when it comes with fitting their own parts on stock Harleys, and given how this is a custom frame, no exceptions were made here either: from the tail light to the paint, everything on this machine is custom, and somehow all these parts were made to fit together just right.
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About the author: Daniel Patrascu
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Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies.
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