Shovelheads Of Japan

This story originally appeared in an issue of Street Chopper.

Our final Yokohama chopper gallery is all about the Shovelheads. The Mooneyes Hot Rod Custom Show had its fair share of them, including a nice, wide range of chopperized Shovels. These motors bridged the gap between the pre- and post-AMF years for Harley-Davidson; a burden not easily borne to be sure. Although AMF ownership almost destroyed the company in the 1970s and early ’80s, Harley-Davidson survived and thrived in the years afterward.

Throughout the Shovelhead’s run, the engine had many changes made to it to improve power, cooling, and oil consumption. In the end, though, aggressive competition from Japan and Europe forced Harley-Davidson to scrap the aging, problematic Shovelhead design in favor of the Evolution motor, which had aluminum barrels and heads. By 1986, Shovelheads were completely out of production altogether.

They weren’t out of style though. In the decades to come Shovelheads, like the Pans and Knuckles before them, lived on as custom bikes, including choppers like these.