09-30-2009, 06:09 AM
|
|
CC Member
|
|
|
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Long Island,
NY
Cobra Make, Engine: FFR with a Ford 302 Supercharged
Posts: 141
|
|
Not Ranked
Bobby Well Done!
Great day all around!
I sent out an eMail telling about the day - I added it to this thank you.
The trip up was clean and easy for the most part. We made one pit stop for a “coffee dump” and another for a direction pick up and we made it to OCC World Headquarters!
That silly bike show will soon be selling bikes on 5 continents with a multi-million dollar facility and a merchandising arm in stores and on the web that must pull in $10's of millions selling shirts, books, bike leathers and “things” not to mention custom bikes. The store was much bigger than I had imagined and held racks and racks of OCC labeled good, clothing and motorcycles.
All but two of the charity bikes they built on TV were on display at the store. (see pics) They buy back all the charity bikes and keep them on site as a type of museum and marketing exhibit in their store. The bikes in person are incredible - you can’t see the fine work on the TV screen. I have a new respect for crazy Paul the elder as a businessman – and yes, we were told, the crazy family malfunction is real not a put on.
Paul Jr. & Mike are no longer with pop, they finally had enough and moved on about a year ago.
Our guide gave us a great tour of the bike building facility, which was smaller than I expected for the number of bikes produced. The TV show films 5 days a week and more. The shows deadlines keep the build times extremely short where a regular custom shop deals in months and years to do a custom job OCC deals in weeks and months to keep up with the TV shows deadlines. The facility does sport state of the art equipment; metal working, cutting and forming equipment and supplies. Many of the “custom” parts used on the bikes are stock fenders and tanks that are modified on site to reduce construction time. A full custom gas tank could take a few weeks to produce; OCC starting with an off-the-shelf tank does it in a couple of days.
To his credit Paul senior is on site running his empire 5 days a week and his son Paul Jr. now only comes in when his dad is on a road trip.
After the show and tell and my slightly thinner wallet due to the OCC store (got a 10% discount – thanks Bobby for setting it up) we took a quick food brake and set out for home. Our guide was nice enough to take us for a little run through the local area and after an all important gas stop we were on our way. Running south along the Hudson River on the West Point side, we made our way “quickly” through the winding roads and small towns till we reached a traffic circle (at Seven Lakes Drive?) where our tour guide waved us off and we made our way to major roads and home.
We had a lot of new faces and cars – always nice to see fellow Cobra owners.
Some small wrench turning went on (and I heard a car dropped out on the way up?) but overall a very nice run and with “cool” but great weather.
__________________
Nick
|
Linear Mode
