“Let me think about it!”
Picture yourself on a tropical Brazilian beach, sipping fresh coconut water through a straw, lying on a sun lounger, relaxing for the first time in five years, and listening to the sound of the sea, trying to drown out the invasive thoughts that keep pulling your mind back to work and London.
That was me one afternoon in March 2024, when I gave in to the urge to “just check my work emails”. I was greeted not only by the usual spam and daily things a person has in their emails, (although in my case it was a few days old) but also an email from Hannah, assistant producer for the Bangers & Cash production team introducing themselves and asking if I would be interested in having Zenith Motorcycles work on a 1947 Harley Davidson WLA Flathead Restoration for them.
For those of you who don’t follow Bangers & Cash, it is a top-rated TV series shown on U&Yesterday that follows Mathewsons Auctions in Yorkshire. They also have a spin-off series that is as popular as the main show, “Bangers & Cash Restoring Classics” in which the Bangers & Cash production team bids on an auction lot and then has it restored and sent back to the auction and try and make a profit. As someone who is more of a reader than a TV viewer, I do make a few exceptions and Bangers & Cash has always been a guilty pleasure of mine and a few of the Zenith Motorcycles team.
Back in Brazil, after I had read the email from Hannah several times and picked my jaw up from the floor, I thought about how I would reply without seeming too keen. Also, panic had set in that the email was quite a few days old and I was worried that I had missed my chance. After approximately 20 seconds of thought, I replied to Hannah explaining that I was out of the UK and I was indeed interested in the project and if I was not too late and the project had not already been offered to someone else I would “have a think about it” and get back to her. This was my version of trying to appear cool, calm and professional when inside I was already thinking that this could be my career holy grail.
You see the thing is Hannah has sent some images of the bike they wanted us to restore with the introduction email. When I opened the images I knew this was it for me. As a technician, we all have one career-defining bike that we dream of working on and mine has always been a Harley Davidson WLA Flathead preferably 1942. I knew from the images sent that this was certainly not a 1947 WLA as there was no such thing as these bikes were made by Harley Davidson to serve in World War 2 and by 1947 it was all over. So could this be the one?
Fortunately, I didn’t have to wait too long for a response from Bangers & Cash and it was great news. The project was still mine if I wanted it and we arranged to speak when I returned from Brazil. Needless to say, the rest of my holiday was spent with visions of olive drab, clapped-out Harleys and mental lists being made sitting by the pool of parts suppliers and purchasing parts catalogues and workshop manuals to read to get myself and the team ready for what was to come.
A week later, after a few phone calls and emails between myself and the production team, the date was set for the bike to be delivered and for filming to start.
