Art in Motion, LLC was dreamed up by Tom and Christine Kapp to build beautiful motorcycles for the discriminating buyer. They decided to do something different than what all of the other bike builders are doing. They wanted to build a comfortable, custom ride based on the rubber mounted Harley FLH series of motorcycles.
Tom, after growing up in an auto salvage yard as a kid in Scituate, MA, has been working on cars and motorcycles since the early sixties. He went to trade school for high school and learned design drafting. Graduating in 1975 he went to work for a company that designed and built packaging machinery, learning how to design mechanical devices for the machines. He then went on to design large satellite dish structures in St. Cloud, Florida, then on a design team developing a laser printer during the early eighties. During the time of developing the laser printer he would work on the design, then assist in machining the parts and setting up the testing for production. After the testing was complete he would then implement the design into the manufacturing. He then went on to a civil engineering position designing water transmission systems within waste water treatment systems. Prior to the start-up of Art in Motion, LLC he had 15 years experience as a construction Project Manager, on Multi-million dollar projects in the Orlando, FL area. During all of this time he had been riding and working on Harley’s and owning and working on classic cars.
Christine, growing up in Austin, TX and graduating from the University of Rochester in 1984, went to work in aircraft simulation on Long Island, then financial computer systems in Manhattan. While there, she took design and fashion illustration classes at the Fashion Institute of Technology. She then worked in computer consulting for many years before starting, growing and selling her own computer consulting company. She brings the business expertise to Art in Motion, LLC.
Tom and Christine met online in the beginning of 2005 and got married in the end of 2006. Neither had ever had a real honeymoon in their first marriage, so they decided to have “100 honeymoons” before getting married (this changed to “20 honeymoons” later). One of their first “honeymoons” was to go to the ProOne Bike Builders event in California. From this event, the dream of building custom motorcycles kept growing. They founded Art In Motion, LLC in January of 2007.
They then had to do the work to become a licensed manufacturer to build the motorcycles. The process is quite an ordeal in the State of Florida. It took about five months to get the repair, manufacturer, and franchise dealer licenses to be able to provide motorcycles with a 17 digit VIN number to compete with the likes of Harley, American Iron Horse, etc.
When Art In Motion was started, there was no frame manufacturer that was making a frame for the modern FLH style bikes. Tom had resigned himself to having to buy an older style frame and do the modifications himself to make it work for what he wanted to build. Then they went to the V-Twin Expo in Cincinnati on Super Bowl weekend 2007. For now warm-blooded Florida residents, the 0 degree temperatures were not very fun. While there they found that Rolling Thunder Manufacturing had just started to build the FLH frames based on the 2005 FLH. They had several models from stock to raked, 2” drop seat and widened to accept 200mm tires. After consulting with Skeeter and Sam from Rolling Thunder Manufacturing at the show, Tom determined that he wanted a frame with a 4 deg. over stock rake and a widened rear frame and swing arm to fit the 200mm tire.
They then looked at the other manufactures at the show that had bought the first frames to see them put together. They also found many other sources for parts while at the show. This show is a great resource for anyone in the motorcycle manufacturing business.
After ordering the frame then ordered the engine and transmission from Custom Chrome, a 100 CI EPA compliant motor and 6 speed transmission. They then ordered many parts from Harley Davidson. The wide back fender came from Russ Wernimont Designs and was fitted to the Rolling Thunder frame. The wheels and tires are from Weld Wheel, Avon tire, and Continental tire. The braking was left to Baldwin Wilson Development, dual set-up, 360 brakes on the front, which lets you see the front wheel without obstruction, and Harley Davidson on the rear. The lighting package is from Bulletproof Electronics in Bradenton, FL, It is a great package including all circuit breakers and relays to run the bike. They used a Dakota digital display attached to the handle bar cover with a custom made bracket by Tom.
The finishing was done after mock-up with the powder coating done by Ameratrail in St Cloud, FL, Chrome by Like Chrome Polishing, Apopka, FL and the most important the paint by Paul Wong of Aruba, painted in Kissimmee. Paul is a well-known painter in Aruba and has done a lot of show bikes in the USA. As you can see from the pictures the detail work on this bike is impeccable. Tom commissioned Paul to do the paint job telling him the concept that he wanted and Paul coming up with a design to meet the concept. Paul first takes pictures of the bike and does the mock-up on the computer to show the approximate configuration of the job for approval before beginning the painting. He does his work using painted graphics and then doing all of the detail work with airbrush to make the bike look like it is moving when it is standing still. On the areas above the graphics he used pearlescent and an additive in the paint that splits the paint and raises the pearlescent to make a great effect.
The bike is now being shown throughout central Florida and is for sale after its debut in the Rats Hole Bike Show at Biketoberfest 2007. Tom has the next bike on the bench as of this writing in October that will be complete in a couple of weeks. This bike will have a batwing fairing similar to the Harley Electra-Glide. It will include an upgraded stereo with the option of having GPS if the buyer would like to have it.
This is the next revolution in custom bikes. Over the last few years Tom has seen his riding friends go from softails to choppers and then to FLH’s. All of the bikes built by Art in Motion, LLC will be one-off customs built to the customer’s specifications. From order to completion will be 2 to 3 months depending on the complexity of the work required to provide the bike the purchaser wants per his/her dream. Art in Motion also can customize your Harley with paint, 6 speeds, big inch engines, wheels and tires, fat tire, etc. if you would like to update to your bike to a one of a kind dream bike.
Art in Motion specializes in FLH’s but will build any type bike that a person would want. Art In Motion also has a BYOB (build your own bike) program where the buyer comes to sunny Central Florida, spends a couple of days picking out the parts for the bike they would like built. Then, Tom purchases the parts and mocks-up the bike, gets all the parts chromed and painted to the customers specifications and then when everything is ready the customer will come back to Art in Motion’s shop and assemble the bike with Tom’s help.
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