It has been a while since we last updated you on the progress of the 1963 Triumph build, and it is not without a story of its own. Progress on the bike continued steadily, Jimmi chipped away at both the fabrication, as well as fixing some lingering mechanical issues on the engine, but despite all this progress the build hit a metaphorical brick wall… and literally went up in flames.

The biggest pieces of forward progress came in the form of scoring a never used mini-drum on a 19 in rim, fabricating a armature for the pull/stay, and fabricating exhaust brackets. With these out of the way, the bike appeared to be hitting the “little tweaks” phase before going to paint. But the building gods had other plans.

By early December we were beginning to see the bike take real shape. It felt it was only a matter of weeks before we could send the tins out to paint, paint the frame, and begin working toward a final assembly. But, with every build speed bumps got in the way. Only this time those speed bumps had nothing to do with the build itself.

In the morning hours of December 15, we woke up to messages that a fire had started in the building next to where our both our office, and Revival Motors and Coffee co. was located. By the time we were able to get downtown the building was engulfed in flames as well as a substantial part of the block. The three-alarm fire gutted our building, and impacted many businesses in downtown Olympia.

The fire is presumed to have been started around 5 am, by 7:30 am our office was completely leveled, and nearly 24,000 gallons of water rained down ash, drywall, and anything else in its path on top of Revival, and our Triumph project.

Immediately following the fire it was not known what state the bike, or any other motorcycle in the shop, was in. Complicating matters, due to scale of the fire the FBI and ATF were brought in to investigate. This meant that we were unable to access the bike for nearly two weeks following the fire.

When time came to move the bike to an offsite storage location, as the building had been condemned, it was immediately clear that the build had took on significant water damage. However, in my view, with every tragedy the is a silver lining if you look deep enough. And trust me, this experience has put that theory to test. In this case, we were fortunate to have the bike on the lift as it was not further damaged by sitting in a foot of standing ash filled water. Additionally, the top end was put together, and no water filled the engine that we can tell. Of course we will have to rebuild the carb that was sitting as a mock up.

So that begs the question - is it salvageable? The short answer is yes. The more complicated answer is that because of the fire all of Revival’s tools were significantly damaged, the power tools are of course a total loss, and there simply is not space to finish the fabrication of the bike at the moment. Sadly, the bike currently sits as a monument to rust. But - we have plans on keeping the bike build moving forward, but at a slightly different timetable than previously imagined.

You can provide support to Revival Motors and Coffee Co. at: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-revival-motors-and-coffee-co

The 1963 Triumph - Part 5. Things We Lost in the Fire