Fortunately, Ryan Martinson doesn’t mind getting questions about the Kawasaki he rides. When someone asks what kind of bike he owns, he tells them it’s a NoClassEak. Then, of course, he has to explain.

The story of the NoClassEak starts about 10 years ago when Sherm Acord had just sold his shop, Sherm’s Cycle Products, in Oregon, to Steve Lacewell. The transaction was a friendly one, and Acord still spent time at the business that carried his name. Acord was also ready for something different in his garage and had some ideas. So Lacewell and the business’s long-time mechanic, Guy Mobbley, set to work to build Acord a bike.

The NoClassEak currently owned by Ryan Martinson. (Photo: Jill Reed)

Guy Mobbley, owner of Sherm's Cycle Products located in Reedsport, Oregon. (Photo: Teri Conrad)

You’ve probably seen plenty of custom projects that began with a big budget, proceeded to a big stack of aftermarket parts catalogs and led to a big pile of boxes delivered by guys wearing brown shorts. This wasn’t one of those projects. Instead, Lacewell and Mobbley looked around the shop to see what was on hand and could be used to turn Acord’s ideas into rolling metal.

Another customer had brought in a 1998 Vulcan® 1500 Classic that had suffered engine problems due to modifications elsewhere. In the end, the owner gave up on the project and signed over the bike to Sherm’s Cycle Products to settle his bill. The bike had been stripped to the frame, so Lacewell and Mobbley made that their starting point.

“It was nothing but a frame,” Mobbley recalled. “It didn’t even have the wiring harness on it.”

For power, they trolled Ebay and bought an engine from a wrecked 2001 Mean Streak® that had hardly any miles on it. When the engine arrived, it had also been stripped to the bare bones. It didn’t come with the fuel injection system. So the build team bolted on a carburetor from a Vulcan 1500. That part of the project went so well that Mobbley has since built 15 other bikes by putting Mean Streak engines in other Kawasaki frames.

As the project progressed, Acord bought other parts as needed or else Mobbley and Lacewell just grabbed whatever they had leftover around the shop.

The Mean Streak donor engine was torn down as the Sherm's team began building the NoClassEak. (Photo: Sherm Acord)

Floorboards from another Vulcan, Dyna 2000 ignition, SuperTrapp exhaust, Forcewinder intake, passenger footpegs with integrated LEDs, Progressive shocks, and other bits and pieces fell onto the bike as the build progressed.

“Anything we could put on it to make it look nicer, we put it on there,” said Acord.

But most of the parts were still Kawasaki pieces, not aftermarket, said Mobbley. And conversions that you might think would be difficult, such as tuning a carb for an engine that was originally fuel-injected, or bolting that engine to a different final drive, turned out to be pretty simple, Mobbley said.

So if you’re looking at the NoClassEak name and seeing the Class from the Classic frame and the Eak from the Mean Streak engine, and wondering where the No comes from … well, that was the hard part.

Fitting a Nomad front wheel into a Vulcan Classic fork was the hardest part of the job. (Photo: Sherm Acord)

From the beginning, Acord wanted to use the aluminum wheels from a Nomad™ rather than the spoked wheels from the Classic. The rear was no problem. The front turned into the biggest time sink of the project.

“I just thought it would look good and once we got into it, I didn’t want to quit,” said Acord. “But I wouldn’t recommend anyone doing it because it was a big pain.”

The different width of the Classic and Nomad forks meant that both the Classic fork legs and the Nomad front wheel had to be machined to fit. Mobbley said that every time one piece was machined, they found another one that needed modifications. The most complicated part was fitting the speedometer drive into the modified wheel and fork.

With that finally done, the project was down to paint. With minimal instructions, the NoClassEak was handed over to a painter who owed the shop a favor. The multi-colored result was an unconventional choice.

“The first time I saw it,” Acord admitted, “I didn’t think I was going to like it. But he did a beautiful job. The more I see it, the more I like it.”

Sherm Acord sits on the NoClassEak ten years ago when the build was just completed. (Photo: Courtesy Sherm Acord)

Acord traded an enclosed trailer to Lacewell to settle his account and rode off on the NoClassEak, pleased with the results.

“It all came together and it ran well,” he said.

Acord added a Mustang seat and windshield for touring purposes and rode the bike to East Texas and twice to Arizona. But like many of us, Acord suffers from MBS, “multiple bike syndrome,” and soon had his eye on something else. He sold the NoClassEak to a guy in Washington, but within a few years, he bought it back. That’s when Martinson entered the NoClassEak’s story.

Blue pinstriping on the gas tank adds to the custom look. (Photo: Ryan Martinson)

For Martinson, the appeal of the bike was how it combined elements he favored from different models. Predictably, the power of the Mean Streak engine is a positive, but so are the Nomad wheels. One of Martinson’s least favorite tasks is cleaning spoke wheels. If it’s any consolation to Mobbley and the others for the hours they spent making the Nomad wheels work, Martinson appreciates it. And while Martinson has made a few minor modifications, it’s largely still the NoClassEak the Oregon crew created.

There is no shortage of chrome to add to the NoClassEak's sexy profile. (Photo: Ryan Martinson)

Martinson, who lives near Des Moines, Iowa, knew Acord – and knew about the NoClassEak – through VROC (Vulcan Riders Owners Club). But he hadn’t actually seen the NoClassEak, much less ridden it. That didn’t stop him from wanting to buy the bike, however. So the bike that started with a California-titled frame, was built in Oregon, and temporarily lived in Washington, was shipped east to Iowa.

Plus, there’s the satisfying advantage of owning a motorcycle that’s unquestionably one of a kind.

One of Martinson’s favorite things when telling someone about his motorcycle is to search the internet for NoClassEak and when the other person says, “Your motorcycle looks just like that one,” he replies, “No, my motorcycle is that one.”

“I kind of wanted the history of it,” Martinson said. “It’s probably one of the most famous Vulcan motorcycles because thousands of people know about it through VROC. You walk into any parking lot, there’s never going to be another one just like it.”

Ryan Martinson's one-of-a-kind Kawasaki Nomad™ Classic Mean Streak®. (Photo: Ryan Martinson)

So what kind of motorcycle is that? It's one of a kind, that's for sure.

By Lance Oliver

Lance Oliver's book of motorcycling stories, The Ride So Far, is now available from Whitehorse Press. In addition to being a contributing editor for Accelerate, he has written for several other motorcycle magazines, as well as non-motorcycle publications.

Comments(2):

1. Air filter

   What kind of air filter is that, and where can it be purchased?

   Sunday, December 25, 2011 Robert

2. Air Filter

   The Air filter is called a Forcewinder ... looks great and breathes free!!! They can be purchased from Dennis Kirk or several other online suppliers. I'm the 'OTHER GUY' from Washington ... rode that bike for two years, wonderful ride - its an eyestopper for sure. Scorpion~ VROC 1506 Scurrilous Curmudgeon Emeritus, 2x Iron Butt Olympia Washington

   Wednesday, March 14, 2012 Steve