Look at me adding this post. It’s AMAZING.

People ride bikes for many reasons: their practicality, their simplicity, exercise, self-expression, and hell, even for fun. Adding aftermarket details, tuning the bike to their preferences, and making aesthetic choices are all part of the fun. Working on bikes, building bikes, and riding bikes can be a labor of love. 

Many bike tinkerers possess an overlapping interest in cars. For those people, we present Radical Rigs, with support from 1Up USA. Like the bikes on The Radavist, these rigs might be perfect. They also might be so far from perfection that they go full circle and become better than perfect. They might be dented and dinged, they might be muddy and marred, but they’re all rad.

For the next installment of this new series, Paul Kalifatidi presents a portrait of Bellingham trailbuilder Flynn alongside his 1997 Mitsubishi Delica and Raaw Jibb. 

 

 

An important thing you must know before buying a JDM (Japanese Domestic Market) vehicle is that you will most likely spend more time at the hardware store than at the auto parts store. You are forced to get creative when parts must be imported, cost an eye-watering amount, or simply don’t exist without an obscure connection to an overseas junkyard. On one particular occasion, I ended up at the local hardware store in search of bar stock to fabricate the rusted-out square nuts that secured the radiator in my 1996 Toyota Prado. Where would I park? Next to this Mitsubishi Delica, of course.

I suspected its owner would likely be on a similar mission. I carefully left a note asking if I could photograph the Delica and its owner under a wiper blade that is likely only replaceable through a Japanese order and duty tax. It turns out that the Delica’s owner, Flynn, works as a full-time trail digger for the Whatcom Mountain Bike Coalition, our local trail advocacy group. The shoot was on. I now present Flynn, his 1997 Mitsubishi Delica Space Gear, and Raaw Jibb.