Passes & Canyons Blog

After about 10 years, Rick Steele owned and was making a success of his business, Steele’s Cycle, but what he wanted most was to own the property, rather than continuing to pay rent. He started trying to buy the whole property, but his landlord, Fred Neuschwanger, would not sell, saying he didn’t want to pay the taxes he would incur from capital gains. Rick kept asking to buy and was told that if the time to sell ever came he would be given first shot at buying.

The thing about capital gains is that if you die holding an asset, and that asset goes to an heir, the heir’s cost basis is reset at the value at the time of death. So when Fred Neuschwanger died, and the heirs agreed they did not wish to continue dealing with the property, they could now sell without incurring a huge tax bill.

The property was finally offered to Rick.

The deal was pulled together in late 2007 and early 2008, and by that time Rick had a partner and the two of them were able to come up with the money. At the closing Fred Neuschwanger’s daughter showed up with a picture of her dad, saying she just wanted to bring her dad along because he had always promised to give Rick the chance to buy the property.

The deal was made and a new era began at Steele’s Cycle. Rick’s first partnership did not work out, and meanwhile, in 2011, Matthew Morrison had joined the crew and he and Rick worked well together. In 2014 the deal was finalized where Matthew bought out the old partner and Rick and Matthew were in business together.

Now the clean-up/fix-up of the property got into full swing. The main building got a new roof, walls were built inside and everything got a lot cleaner and more organized. Distinctive older bikes were mounted on the walls or from the ceiling and a proper showroom was set up for used bikes. Racks were put on the walls and a wide variety of motorcycle gear was put up for sale.

“In the early days, yeah, we sold tons of parts through here,” Rick explained. “But brick and mortar’s dying a slow death. You know, where we sell stuff is, ‘I need a set of brake shoes but I need it today.’ That’s the only brick and mortar advantage anymore. Before the internet, the yard was a good thing. The yard anymore is not what it used to be. The internet’s changed all that. But like Matthew says, there is a draw to it. We have people all the time, oh, can I walk in the yard? It’s just interesting.

“The salvage yard has always been what I describe as an attractor for people to come here. But we weren’t generating much money out of the salvage yard. It was all online. So we really focused on growing that side of the business. I mean, we went bananas. We grew it to 50,000 parts listed on eBay, but it became unmanageable and we ended up cutting back.”

eBay. That’s the key word. Right around the time Rick was able to buy the property, changes in the world around them altered the entire landscape. In July of 2006, this new marketing concept called eBay had emerged and Rick had immediately seen the possibilities it presented. They could list parts on eBay and suddenly the entire world became their market rather than just the Denver area.

Next: Motorcycle Salvage

Biker Quote for Today

Getting to be an old Geezer is not for the TIMID!! Also its not grey its CHROME!!

On July 20, 1986, Rick Steele was 26, about to have a second child, and was now the owner of a business on which he owed $90,000. What business? He now owned a junkyard. A motorcycle junkyard.

Almost 40 years later this former junkyard is a multi-million dollar business servicing bikes, selling used motorcycles, and breaking bikes down to sell for parts. The internet has helped transform this local business into a global operation, and customers needing that one hard-to-get part for their 40-, 50-, 60-year-old bikes are thrilled to find it at Steele’s Cycle. As are the owners of much newer bikes.

Today the main showroom is packed with a large variety of bikes for sale and the walls are covered with gear and memorabilia. The place is clean, well-lighted, well-heated, and a staff of 10, including Rick and his partner Matthew Morrison, keep the place humming. According to Matthew, storage rooms hold more than 100,000 parts from every model bike imaginable, all neatly stocked and quickly accessible, based around computerized inventory.

The conditions on that July day in 1986 could hardly have been more different. Bikes for parts were lined up outside for customers to find and remove their own parts and then bring them in to make payment. Grime coated everything. Lighting was poor. There was no running water. And Rick was scared to death.

He knew motorcycles. He had worked at several shops around town: BK Motorsports, Western Honda, Senti Yamaha. But he had never owned a business. He had seen the possibilities. No stranger to Denver Used Motorcycle Parts (the D.U.M.P.) just east of downtown Denver along Park Avenue, Rick had seen the profit to be had from used parts. Pick up a crashed bike for pennies and sell the undamaged parts for dollars. There was money to be made here. But first he had to survive as a business. The $10,000 he had put down, half loaned to him by his then-mother-in-law, was, to him, all the money in the world. What had he gotten himself into?

“The scary part was just starting that late in the season because I opened July 20th. Back then, winters were, you know, it snowed on Halloween and it stayed. You didn’t get any customers. So, I was here all by myself, just a new dad. It was what I think anybody starting a business goes through. It was like, why did I do this kind of thing? And then it was challenging. It’s always challenging in the beginning. But, there was a demand, it’s supply and demand. And there was a demand for the stuff. And people kind of knew about stuff that was here. So that first fall, I think there were a few bikes in here that I sold right away. And that kind of carried me through. But, it was touch and go that first one, for sure.”

A Utility Heart Attack
Occupying at that time only a small portion of the space that now comprises Steele’s Cycle, the space had only one electric heater. Rick ran that until he got the first electric bill. For $1,500.

“I about had a heart attack. I didn’t know. So I quit heating this. Right inside the door, there was an office. Where that window is, that was a closed-off office. And I had a space heater outside of that office. I was working in that little room in there. And then I had a kerosene heater. And that was my heat.”

The building itself was sheet metal and cinder block. And the lot was rocks. There was no pavement. It was rocks everywhere with tree shoots growing through the rocks.

While initially the site was in pretty poor physical condition, because he was only renting the space Rick did not do a lot of clean-up and fix-up.

“When I rented it, I never really asked to fix things because I didn’t want to get my rent raised. So, I would just fix them. I fixed all the plumbing. The winter before I bought it, all pipes froze. They shut the water off. So, when I came, there was no water or anything. I didn’t fix it the first winter. I think I ended up fixing it the next summer.”

In addition to being cold, that first winter was lonely. “It was me for about the first, I think, eight months to a year. And then, my first employee was a guy named Bobby Berkler. And he worked for me for probably 20 years. It was just him and me for the first four or five years.”

Then, four or five years in, Rick got his dealer’s license so he could sell motorcycles. They had already been doing service on bikes and this opened up additional opportunities. In this manner the company existed for about two decades.

Next: From Renting To Owning

Biker Quote for Today

I may be lost, but on my bike, I’m always found.

My previous Shoei helmet gave its life for mine back on June 29 of last year and finally, today, February 17, I got a new one. Or more correctly, Judy did, a Christmas present, to replace the old one which she gave me as a birthday present some years ago. Thank you Judy.

Just a note: it’s not like I’ve been riding without a helmet ever since; like most motorcyclists I have several, but the Shoei was the best of the bunch.

I had looked at various helmets awhile ago and had considered different models and manufacturers but ultimately decided to just go with another Shoei RF-SR.

Judy went with me to Performance Cycle and the sales guy suggested the RF-1400 as an alternative. It cost about $150 more but he said it is quieter and a bit lighter, with the same level of protection.

I may have had some interest in that one considering that he said it comes in a yellow. The RF-SR does not. I could be interested in yellow as being more conspicuous, more visible, but they did not have any in stock. Why? He said very few people actually want a yellow helmet, but he could order it and it would be here in a week.

Judy was pushing me to go for it but quieter and a bit lighter don’t matter that much to me and I was already figuring on getting the RF-SR in white, which should be a lot more visible than my old black one. As long as the protective qualities are equal I just didn’t feel like doing the hassle of coming back when I could walk out today ready to go. Plus, I tried both of them on and the RF-SR felt more comfortable than the RF-1400.

So I went with the RF-SR in white. Then I asked them to transfer my communicator (speakers and wiring) from the old helmet to the new, which I had been told they are happy to do at no charge if you are buying either the helmet or the communicator from them. I’ve been carrying that communicator around in my jacket pocket ever since that crash. I guess I better get it out and get it recharged.

Biker Quote for Today

A true biker finds freedom even in the confines of a helmet.

Someone brought a bunch of gear from a former member to last month’s RMMRC meeting and I managed to snag something that could be useful.

This thing is a Pittsburgh Automotive air compressor that is small enough to fit into the top bag or one of the side bags on the V-Strom just to be there when needed. Nice.

The one thing it did not have with it was any way to connect it to the battery on the bike. It has one of those connectors that you plug into what used to be called the cigarette lighter in a car, but my bike does not have one of those. I needed to go to some auto supply place to find one.

But then I was at the Colorado Motorcycle Expo a couple weeks ago and as I was walking around in an area where there were vendors set up tables filled with parts it occurred to me that someone might have what I needed. Sure enough, I found a pigtail with the right kind of plug and it was $5. I was happy to hand the guy the five.

I could just go ahead and connect it to the battery now, as I have with the connector for my electric vest, but I won’t do that. For one thing, if I do end up getting a second bike that would leave me with only the one bike ready when this thing might be needed.

No, I’ll just stick it in the top bag and let it ride around with me everywhere I go. Hopefully I’ll never need it, but if I do, or someone else needs it, it will be there.

Biker Quote for Today

A world of endless roads is calling. Get out and ride them. — Eric Trow

(This is part two of a series on stripping a motorcycle for parts and listing them on the internet for sale. This is all taking place at Steele’s Cycles.)

With this wrecked 2023 Kawasaki Ninja EX650R now reduced to parts, the good separated from the bad, Tyler loaded all the smaller stuff on a dolly to haul it over to his listing station, where he would prep each individual piece for storage and listing.

But first he needed to deal with the larger parts: the engine, the intact and undamaged rear wheel, and the swingarm. These he hauled outside and doused liberally with degreaser. (He had previously sealed and taped every opening in the engine in order to prevent any water or degreaser from getting inside it.) Nothing that gets listed for sale goes out without being thoroughly cleaned, looking as much as possible like new.

Typically Tyler would use a hose to rinse off the degreaser but on this cold January morning the hose was frozen. So he brought out a large bucket of warm water and poured it over them to rinse. Then they were brought inside to his listing station along with everything else.

That was just the beginning of the clean-up, however. Starting with the rear wheel, Tyler lifted it onto the bench and went at it seriously. Every spot on the wheel was scrubbed clean and then he sprayed it all over with a gloss coating to make it look really good.

He moved to the computer to begin the listing. Steele’s Cycles uses a system called MotoLister, which is designed to simplify the whole process of preparing a part for listing on eBay and then actually putting it up as an item for sale. The screen is quite large and vertically oriented, which minimizes any scrolling that might be needed.

Typically Tyler will search for a comparable part and use that as the starting point but in this case it appears Steele’s Cycles had never broken down a 2023 EX650R, and as the first one, Tyler needed to create a new listing.

Once that was done he opened the listing for the wheel and used the connected camera to shoot more than 20 photos, from every angle and showing every bit of the wheel. In this case, the wheel had a small cosmetic gouge in one spot and he was particularly careful to document that bit of damage. He also made a note in the description of the wheel stating that the damage was there.

At times there can be issues where a customer receives the part and then complains about a ding like this that is clearly shown in the photographs. Did you not look at the photographs? Steele’s will take returns and give refunds but they do not offer free shipping on returns. Rick Steele said he wants the customer to have some skin in the game. Everyone knows these days about customers who order a lot of things online, only to return many of them because there is no cost to them. Not at Steele’s.

After the wheel was clean and the photography was finished, Tyler wrapped it with clear plastic tape and laid a red strip of plastic with an identifying number on it next to the wheel for another photo. He then printed out a tag with all the pertinent information, laid it and the red plastic strip on top of the wheel, sealed those in place with more tape, and then shot one more photo of the whole package.

With a few more entries into the listing system the job was done, Tyler pressed the Enter key, and in seconds this wheel was now available on eBay for purchase. Before his job was done he would do the same for every single part he had stripped off this bike.

When all the parts were listed, they were loaded (with the exception of the motor) into a large blue bin and hauled back into the storage room. Here row upon row of shelves filled with similar blue bins store the individual parts of many, many motorcycles. The location of the bin is logged in the computer and when someone buys a particular part it is retrieved from the bin, matched to make sure it is the right part, and then shipped.

And just like a transplanted heart, a piece of that once sad, broken motorcycle helps another motorcycle go on living.

Biker Quote for Today

I’m not a biker by choice; I’m a biker by destiny.

I wanted to see the actual process of breaking a motorcycle down into parts so over two days I watched Tyler, at Steele’s Cycles, disassemble a 2023 Kawasaki Ninja EX650R that had clearly hit something very hard. The story behind the bike? Totally unknown.

The bike was up on a lift when I arrived and Tyler, with the assistance of Kade, had it running and were testing the motor and all the electrics to determine the running condition of these items. Kade shot photos of the instruments to document their functionality.

Meanwhile, the front end was clearly headed for the trash or the scrap metal bin. While the right fork tube was bent, the left one was busted wide open, with the spring inside now completely exposed.

Naturally enough, Tyler started on the outside, stripping off the plastic body panels. The bigger ones were trash but many of the smaller pieces further back were in good shape and clearly worth resale. These were stacked on an adjacent bench, which got fuller and fuller as Tyler worked.

The gas tank was in excellent condition so that came off and had to drained. Tyler removed the gas cap mechanism from the tank and set that aside with the keys. Later when the ignition switch came off the frame it was bagged with the tank cap and the keys. On other bikes, with keyed elements such as helmet locks, those, too, are included.

The muffler came off and would have presumably worked fine but it was dented so it became scrap metal. Is this axle good or is it bent? It looked straight and it rolled smoothly on the floor. Salvage, not scrap.

Piece by piece the bike came apart with everything salvageable set aside with all nuts, bolts, and washers carefully collected. Tyler might start on removing one item but then find that to get it off he first had to remove something else. The construction of the bike dictated the sequence of its deconstruction.

The oil pan came off and the oil had to be drained. The cooling system came off and the coolant had to be drained. Sometimes it was not a clean job; shops rags are close at hand when needed.

Finally it was time to remove the swing arm. Tyler put a jack and a block under the engine and raised it to take the weight off the rear wheel. First the wheel came off and then the swing arm.

Out at the back end, the taillight assembly was in excellent condition—salvage.

One of the very last things to come off was the wiring harness. Pretty nearly everything else had to be removed because that octopus of copper and rubber winds its way through everything.

Now it was time to release the motor, leaving only the frame attached to the front fork and wheel. The triple clamps seemed not to be bent but they would be examined more closely before the decision was made as to scrap or salvage.

Nothing else was good. The wheel itself was shattered on one side and the brake disks were bent.

Amazingly, the front lights and mirrors were undamaged. This bike hit something really hard but that object must have been no more than two feet high and the upper portion was unscathed.

The very last thing to come off the frame was the ignition. And this, Tyler said, was “The most painful frame ever.” Up to this point Tyler knew the words and had been singing along to practically every country/western song that came on his Pandora feed. For the next 20 minutes Tyler did not sing.

The box with the ignition switch was bolted to the frame with bolts designed not to be removed. The only way to get them out was to drill into them and then tap them with reverse bits and back them out that way. But Tyler drilled and tried the bits, drilled more and tried again—over and over and over. They just would not come. Until they finally did.

What had been a motorcycle was now a collection of larger parts—engine, rear wheel, frame—and two benches of smaller parts. The job was half done.

Biker Quote for Today

You might be a Yuppie biker if you think a wrench is a bitchy woman.