Custom 2014 Street Glide Built By Sturgis Students Wins Donnie Smith Bike Show High School Award

DonnieSmithShowWinnerThe Sturgis Buffalo Chip® proudly announces that the custom 2014 Harley-Davidson® Street Glide built by participants of the Chip’s Student Build Challenge received first place in the High School Build Open Class at the 27th annual Donnie Smith Bike Show this past Sunday, March 30. The Sturgis Brown High School students participating in the build had been working steadily since Jan. 6 under the instruction of industry’s top professionals in order to complete customizations in time for this past weekend’s unveiling. The finished bike features a fully overhauled and customized motor for increased performance, a lowered stretched body and an eye-catching graffiti-themed paint job. It is also one of the first custom 2014 Street Glides in existence.

“The motorcycle these students created has absolutely blown away my expectations for this year’s bike build project,” says Rod Woodruff, President of the Sturgis Buffalo Chip. “Moreover, these young students created a machine that wowed the industry’s top builders at the Donnie Smith Show. That’s something the students, the school, the community and all those involved in the Student Build Challenge should be very, very proud of.”

2014 marked the first year the Student Build worked on a new-year motorcycle sponsored by Black Hills Harley-Davidson, and the students found customizing a brand new Street Glide to be one of their largest hurdles. The Motor Company had made drastic changes between the 2013 and 2014 models, which meant most of the custom parts for the bike had yet to be created.

This was also the first year the bike build program placed the same focus on the motorcycle’s performance as it did its appearance. The bike features a Trask Turbo System with a 10:1 compression ratio, Dave Mackie Engineering hemi Harley heads, CP Carrillo dome pistons and performance parts from Feuling Parts. The class anticipates that together these parts will work to produce 175 horsepower once the motorcycle has enough miles on it to safely run a Dyno test.

Students worked closely with industry veterans, Keith Terry of Terry Components and Randy and Nick Cramer of Dakota V-Twin, along with high school instructors, Chad Hedderman and Bill Johnson, to learn the state-of-the-art techniques needed to customize their 2014 Street Glide. The bike build project taught students important values and life lessons while vastly increasing their technical knowledge. The skills learned will give these students an overall advantage should any decide to pursue a career in motorcycle fabrication or customization.

The Student Build Challenge is a groundbreaking collaboration between the Sturgis Buffalo Chip, Sturgis Brown High School, Black Hills Harley-Davidson, Terry Components, Dakota V-Twin and a large group of industry-leading parts sponsors. Special thanks to the sponsors and motorcycle industry leaders who make the Student Build Challenge possible: Arlen Ness Enterprises, Adventure Power, Baggster, CP Carrillo, Dakota Digital, Inc., Dave Mackie Engineering, Diamond Heads, Dirty Bird Concepts, Feuling Parts, Handy Industries, Hawg Halters, Inc., Horsepower, Inc., Hot Leathers, Howard Knight, Ian Strachan Designs, Jamie’s Repair, KICKER Audio, Kinetik, Legend Air Suspensions, Owens Interstate Sales, R.C. Components, Thunder Cycle Design, Inc., Thunder Max, Trask Performance, Jack Van Kampen and Vee Rubber America, Inc.

15 Responses to “Custom 2014 Street Glide Built By Sturgis Students Wins Donnie Smith Bike Show High School Award”


  1. 1 takehikes Apr 2nd, 2014 at 8:53 am

    I love that kids are learning how to build and fabricate and they did a fine job. Too bad it was on such a turd of a bike.

  2. 2 Mike Apr 2nd, 2014 at 9:17 am

    It sucks that we probably have to wait 5 years or so for the “big wheel” fad to go away. I wish American Chopper was still on the air, so they could beat this fad to death and make it go away even faster!

  3. 3 Woody Apr 2nd, 2014 at 10:01 am

    At least as High School students, THEY have an excuse 😉

  4. 4 Devil's Plaything Apr 2nd, 2014 at 12:01 pm

    Looks pretty sweet to me. Congratz to all those involved!

  5. 5 Clark Kirkendall Apr 2nd, 2014 at 12:05 pm

    Agree with takehikes and Mike, and Woody . What a waste of a perfectly good motorcycle. Put that motor in the stock bike and have a sweet bagger.

  6. 6 rebel Apr 2nd, 2014 at 3:42 pm

    where’s the bike?

  7. 7 Wilhelm Apr 3rd, 2014 at 7:01 am

    These students got started on the wrong track for sure.

  8. 8 bigitch Apr 3rd, 2014 at 8:11 am

    didn’t hear anyone complain about the parker brothers choppers big green machine.

    remember the big wheel trikes as kids? this is just an extention of the big wheel desire. even your grandpa use to ride a big wheel bicycle.

  9. 9 Joe Mielke Apr 3rd, 2014 at 8:12 am

    The Donnie Smith Chopper Class Challenge (DSCCC) is almost 10 years old and many great motorcycle have been built by students. Not many of them have large budgets behind them like this project with the Buffalo Chip. I encourage you to check out the DSCCC facebook page and see what some of the other schools have done. https://www.facebook.com/DONNIESMITHCHOPPERCLASSCHALLENGE
    Most of the teams operate on a shoe string budget. They do search out donations from industry. Check with the local trade and high schools in your area. You may have a shop program that would be interested in participating!

    Do something good for our industry in your area!

    Thanks
    Joe

  10. 10 RUB Apr 3rd, 2014 at 9:52 am

    congrat’s to the kids , to bad it looks like a cartoon .

    1972 , 1972 , 1972 ………………………………………………………………………

  11. 11 live2rideaglide Apr 4th, 2014 at 9:19 am

    Creative expression is always subjective , but I hope that these kids don’t allow the off point hating comments about big wheels and other things , discourage them from keeping on. Some of you humps can never see any good in anything , always have to find the black cloud in the silver lining. Never an attaboy for effort , creativity etc. even though the bike don’t fit your ” special ” little kind of preference.
    So let’s by all means do everything we can to beat down these kids so they’ll grow and design mini vans and smart cars. Kids , awesome build and you got the trophy to prove it , which the majority who comment here , don’t.

  12. 12 Woody Apr 4th, 2014 at 2:14 pm

    live 2, it really doesn’t help much to declare anyone who doesn’t like something is a hater. Maybe one thing everyone needs to learn is there’s more than binary in the world. I don’t hate these kids or their bike but if they’d put racing stripes on a ’68 Ford wagon I wouldn’t hesitate to give an honest opinion because it might damage their self-esteem but they’d still grow up fine.

  13. 13 live2rideaglide Apr 7th, 2014 at 8:47 am

    Woody , ” off point hating ” . These kids didnt invent the big wheels and the script on the bike is like gang art not cartoon which speaks to the kids. If you were interested in anything other than beatin me down , you would notice I never said anyone hated the kids especially you.. I said the haters start picking apart a nice effort and build over one particular aspect like big wheels or cartoon look , very little to nothing positive. I don’t consider your comment , ” At least as high school kids they have an excuse ” as supportive, encouraging in any way. Does that mean that because they are high school students they have an excuse for a crappy build , according to you? Man that aint condescending is it?
    I assume that if they had been handicapped kids you could have said, ” Since they are handicapped they have an excuse. I don’t think they need and excuse , they built a project for their age group , not for my age or any other old fart. Happy Binary, Woody.

  14. 14 BCinSoCal Apr 7th, 2014 at 12:56 pm

    What terrible thing to do to young,innocent, impressionable minds, make them create a horrible “thing” like this. Not their fault, someone guided them in this direction. Nice that they got to learn the basics of a motorcycle, kids put in a lot of work! Bravo for them! Whoever lead them to make one of these rolling juke boxes, should be slapped! The scary thing is that some people like this kind of thing and seem to think that this is a motorcycle,. Shame some sick mind lead these poor kids in this direction. Hope this doesn’t warp their minds and create serial killers 😉

  15. 15 SovBum Apr 8th, 2014 at 5:53 pm

    I think choppers, with stupidly fat back tires and forks so long that they are dangerous, are incredibly lame. But if a group of students wanted to build one to learn mechanics and welding, I would applaud them for the effort. Good job kids. One important lesson you can learn from this thread is that there are plenty of people willing to put down your accomplishments in life, and those people are best ignored.

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Cyril Huze