Handy Hog
A Ford V8 Moto Guzzi
Cycle World, July 2001
It seems appropriate that a man who works for the toy giant Mattel would build himself a giant toy.
And if this stretched 1971 Moto Guzzi Eldorado's, flamboyant paint and flathead V-Eight power plant suggest Hot Wheels, well that's probably not an accident. Bike owner John Handy is the senior VP of design for all of Mattel’s "boy" brands, but he admits Hot Wheels is his baby.
A veteran of several vintage car restorations, Handy, 42, was looking for a new challenge. He bought a basket case Bantam hot-rod with a 1940 Ford V-Eight "60," so called because that was the stock power output for the 130-cubic-inch (2200cc) engine. "The moment I saw the tiny flathead I thought it would look great in a motorcycle," said Handy. Next was to find the right frame and transmission. Moto Guzzi was an inspired choice, and $50 later-for a frame and rebuildable transmission-the project was in motion. Handy thought his local Guzzi guy, Mark Etheridge of Moto Guzzi Classics in Long Beach, California, was being generous with the used parts, but Etheridge told him, "You'll be back." Indeed he was, nearly every weekend for the two years the "Handy Hog" took to build.
Being an industrial designer by profession, Handy approached the project from that perspective. "I established the overall design ethic: The bike should look like it was manufactured in 1940 and customized in the '50s." Handy said. "'Then I laid out the frame and mechanical components in a scale drawing, and came up with a clear order of construction before I cut or welded anything."
The petite V -Eight is tidily connected with a machined adapter to a polished Guzzi four-speed gearbox and shaft final drive. The candy-orange gem of a motor is no stocker, though. A period correct Stromberg 81 carb, feeds the mill through a modified manifold, and Edlebrock heads complete the hot-rod look. Chassis is standard Eldorado, but stretched 15 inches. Handy did the cutting, and tack welded in the new rails, but left final structural welds to a pro. Wheelbase is 74 inches - 7.5 inches longer than a Honda Valkyrie's, for instance.
Handy, who says he rides the bike every chance he gets, did a good measure of other fabrication, including turning on his own lathe the aluminum coolant-mixing tank. The Jet Hot-coated headers are Handy Originals, and feed a pair of Harley Davidson mufflers with fish tail tips. Like most built Ford flatheads, the engine sounds most excellent.
Several of the 162 people who work for Handy climbed on board to help, since the concept's "cool" quotient met the Hot Wheels criteria (they didn't help, for example, when he built a hot-rod riding lawnmower a few years ago).
Paint was done by freelance spray-man Bruce Schultz, who does concept work on prototype Hot Wheels cars, and Tom "Ichy" Otis laid on the pinstriping. The very gorgeous aluminum intake cover that resides atop the engine/fuel tank was custom sand-cast from a maple pattern carved by one of his Hot Wheels guys, Mark Mayer. The aluminum gas tank was hydro formed and welded by another, Scott Tupper, whose family runs a aircraft-parts business.
Like it? You too can have a Handy Hog, albeit at 1.18 scale. Yes, Hot Wheels is making a model. It should retail for around $5, a bargain at about $19,995 less than Handy spent. But surely not nearly as much fun as the giant version.
~Mark Hoyer