Students get their hands dirty working on Buffalo Chip Bike Build Challenge

Students in Sturgis were getting their hands dirty working on the motorcycles for the Buffalo Chip Challenge.
The students say one of the rewarding experiences is working with professionals in the motorcycle industry.

Chris Malo, owner of Black Hills Urethane, Black Hills Magster and Dirty Bird Manufacturing in Phoenix, Arizona has been assisting students with the Buffalo Chip Challenge for the last three years.
This is the first year the students are working on an Indian Motorcycle and Malo says he and the students will construct one of the nicest Indian Chieftains on the market.

Malo says, “For the first time ever we’re actually converting a 2014 Indian Chieftain. This is the first year of the bike, the company Indian was bought by Polaris and this is their first production model and my company along with John Shope, Dirty Bird Concepts, have designed a full custom kit for these motorcycles.”

The bikes have been completely stripped down.
Monday the student team has been reassembling the tail section and fenders
And doing work on the gas tank.

Malo says, “This would take a very skilled person days and days to do. We’re going to accomplish this in a bout an hour to an hour and a half. We’ve developed a glue on shell that gives the appearance, using the stock tank, of a custom stretched tank.”

Some of the students have some big aspirations after school.
Sidney May says ever since she was young her life and has been about bikes and cars.
When she found out about the bike build project, she jumped on the opportunity.

May says, “Right now I’m a technician at Queen City so I’ve been mostly cars, but I’ve worked at a few motorcycle shops in the summers and I haven’t decided if I want to do cars or motorcycles.”

Other students joined the project to try something a little new.
Kassidy Kitzmiller says working with professionals in the motorcycle industry has been very rewarding.

Kitzmiller says, “It’s awesome. Getting to know all the guys that are working on it and I’ve worked on both bikes so far and we’ve torn down the Harley and got to learn about all the different parts on it and hopefully not make a mess and working on this and meeting the other guys is really cool.”

The students will continue working on the bikes every Monday and Thursday over the next seven weeks.

Students get their hands dirty working on Buffalo Chip Bike Build Challenge