The discovery of gold nuggets in the Sacramento Valley in early 1848 sparked the Gold Rush, arguably one of the most significant events to shape American history during the first half of the 19th century. Would be gold miners traveled to San Francisco and the surrounding area. The Gold Rush led to the creation of California. By the end of 1849, the non-native population of the California territory was some 100,000 compared with the pre-1848 figure of less than 1,000. Gold mining reached its peak by 1852 but since then continues to be the inspiration all over the world for movies, books, art, fashion, all types of artwork including custom motorcycle designs and paint jobs…
There may be way too many motorcycles designed around the wild west or gold rush theme. A few good ones able to develop the Far West conquest atmosphere, but also, unfortunately, a vast number of others limited to tacky western painted murals. In the UK, couple Vic and Lin Jefford from custom shop Destiny cycles, have consistently produced multi show winning bikes for both customers and themselves since 1998. They are too experienced to fall in the trap of a theme bike without soul. First, they carry almost all their work in-house to project their own style and personality and in the end have always offered high quality hand-crafted bikes winning a record of important bike shows in Europe.
49ers Gold Rush features a home made rigid frame, an S&S Sportster engine fitted with Pan rocker covers for a retro look, a one-off Destiny Cycles polished 2 into 2 stainless exhaust, a genuine Harley-Davidson Springer front end, Canonball 12 spoke mag wheels and the cool oil tank is fabricated out of two fire extinguishers. And of course all work packaged in a superb “gold rush narrative” paint job. Gold Rush 49ers just won Best Of Show at The Bigtwin Bike Show & Expo in The Netherlands. Destiny Cycles UK. (photos @ Onno Wieringa for Cyril Huze)
Wow. Beautiful machine! Not a new look, but extremely well done. I’d be happy to give it a spin!
Love it!
Good looking bike and ride-able, too.
BOSS HAWG
Nice bike … I love the wheels… what were those called back in the day? Drag racers used to use them for front wheels on their Gassers sometimes too…
… Domino Dave …
Beautiful Bike to my Good friends Lin and Vic Jefford top Builder to détails and finition !
Always difficult to make an XL EVO look good and not “deja vu”… This one is a stunning achievement but at what galactic cost ?! 🙂
That is the best looking bike featured on this site in a long time. I love it!
Fantastic Build!
very nice scoot!
@domino…Halibrand used to market a wheel similar to these that were used as front runners on race cars back in the day, but I seem to remember that they only had 10 spokes instead of the 12 spoke versions that are shown here. I believe that Rader Wheel now makes a close copy of the Halibrands in aluminum instead of the magnesium that Halibrand used.
A well deserved congrats to Lin and Vic this is magnificent!!!
these guys are legit. they build proper swedish longbikes and take calculated risks on progressive ones.
The wheels you can get from W & W
Thank you all so much for all the nice words… and @ Jeff Duval – probably not as much as you may think… 😉
Tres tres belle!!!
Love that S&S motor.
Brilliant artwork from Dave Dickinson at DDK airbrush & paint UK