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What are the key elements that make a bobber a bobber?

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  #1  
Old 04-23-2023, 05:01 PM
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Default What are the key elements that make a bobber a bobber?

What are the key elements that make a motorcycle into a bobber style motorcycle?

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Old 04-23-2023, 05:06 PM
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As per Wikipedia: the typical construction includes stripping excess bodywork from a motorcycle; removing the front fender, and shortening the rear fender, which is "bobbed" (as in bob-tail), and all superfluous parts removed to reduce weight.
 
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Old 04-23-2023, 05:08 PM
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THIS is a "bobber."


 
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Old 04-23-2023, 05:16 PM
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Making a motorcycle as uncomfortable as humanly possible. If you are able to do that, you can build a bobber.......
 
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Old 04-23-2023, 05:39 PM
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You can only own one if you’re named “Bob”.
 
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Old 04-23-2023, 05:49 PM
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A ‘bobber’ is a motorcycle that is typically stripped down from stock, but not stripped down as much as a “chopper”.
If you can ride it for more than 50 miles at a time, it’s probably still a ‘touring bike’… unless it’s a Road King.

(I’ll take those cross-post points now.)
 
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Old 04-23-2023, 05:58 PM
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Originally Posted by 07UltraGuy
A ‘bobber’ is a motorcycle that is typically stripped down from stock, but not stripped down as much as a “chopper”.
If you can ride it for more than 50 miles at a time, it’s probably still a ‘touring bike’… unless it’s a Road King.

(I’ll take those cross-post points now.)
Folks rode Bobbers and Choppers all over God's green earth when even "touring bikes" weren't anything like today.
 
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Old 04-23-2023, 08:05 PM
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So, the Street Bob pictured here would not be considered a bobber?





 
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Old 04-23-2023, 09:01 PM
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Definitions change over time. What we call a bobber today could be a chopper if you were having this discussion in the 60's. A guy I know has a hardtail panhead with a springer front, a sissy bar but uncut frame that would be called a bobber today but decades earlier it would be considered a chopper before choppers got long front ends and raked necks. He went so far as to make it clear his bike is NOT a bobber and that he might get violent if someone called it a bobber lol.

Is the modern bike above a bobber? Kind of but more wanna be because it's too new and comfortable looking.
 
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Old 04-23-2023, 09:17 PM
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Dictionary: Bobber - a small float placed on a fishing line to hold the hook at the desired depth.

If you throw your motorcycle into the lake and it floats, it's a bobber...
 
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