Gulf Edition Harley Wears Iconic Motorsports Livery

Legendary Livery

Few liveries in automotive history are as instantly recognizable or iconic as Gulf Oil's light blue and orange combination. Those colors have graced the flanks of many race cars over the years, but now German builder Thunderbike has applied them to a bike it calls, appropriately enough, the Thunderbike Gulf Edition.

Photos: Thunderbike

Race Inspired

The basis of this particular build, as is the case with many from Thunderbike, is their custom frame kit with a single-side swingarm. With an RS fork and air-ride suspension, the bike certainly looks the part of a two-wheeler that belongs on some sort of race track.

Photos: Thunderbike

Mighty Mill

To that attractive base, Thunderbike added some serious power in the form of a Screamin' Eagle twin cam powerplant. The mighty mill turns a rather large rear tire with no problem, which is wrapped around the German builder's own in-house triple design wheel.

Photos: Thunderbike

Deep Roots

Put it all together, and you've got one seriously cool bike that anyone who appreciates motorsports can certainly get behind. And the story behind Gulf Oil's association with racing goes all the way back to the 1930s, so its roots are obviously quite deep.

Photos: Thunderbike

Golden Era

It wasn't until the 1960s when the world would first see these iconic colors put together on one machine, however. But that was also what most consider the golden age of sports car racing, a time when some of the most beautiful machines ever created did battle wearing amazing color schemes at endurance races around the world.

Photos: Thunderbike

Perfect Pairing

The famous Gulf Oil Livery also adorned the flanks of some of the most beautiful and legendary racing cars in history, including the Ford GT40, Porsche 917, McLaren M20 Can-Am, McLaren F1 GTR, Aston Martin Vantage, and Audi R8, so that certainly doesn't hurt its cause. 

Photos: Thunderbike

Needs Companion

And personally, we think it fits this custom bike's flanks perfectly, too. We can't imagine a better pairing for a motorsports superfan than this and one of those aforementioned machines, though we imagine this two-wheeler will come at a much cheaper price than its four-wheeled counterpart.

Photos: Thunderbike

>>Join the conversation about this Gulf Edition Custom right here in HDForums.com. 

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