The Torker Bike Archive

The frame that started the company. Pro-size, 20" top tube, forward-facing dropouts — switched to rear-facing in May 1978, when it took the name it kept: the Big Bike. Kevin McNeal, California State Champion and NBA/Mongoose Grandnationals winner, was its rider — a big racer with a brutal style, and the MX was the only frame that fit him.

18.5" top tube, lighter, tighter geometry — built for smaller, faster, more aggressive racers. By June 1979 BMX Action reported the chromoly LP was the best-selling item Factory Torker made. It became the platform for nearly everything that followed — and in 1980, Clint "The Barbarian" Miller rode an LP to the first IBMXF World Pro Championship ever held. The world's first BMX Pro World Champion raced a Torker.

The LP with a European bottom bracket, carrying the name of Eddy "The 1$" King — the OG of the Torker team through the late-'70s LP era. Torker sold E.K. posters in the back of BMX Action. When Eddy left for Diamond Back in 1982, the frame carried on as the LPT.

Torker's factory-built completes: TorkFlyte for the Expert, MaxFlyte for the Pro — joined in 1980 by the all-mild-steel TrashFlyte at the budget end. BMX Action tested the MaxFlyte in December 1980; by September 1981 BMX Plus! called the TorkFlyte "the most popular racing bike in the TORKER line due to its light weight, strength and reasonable price." The MAXFLYTE crank we sell today carries the name.

Lightweight, no gussets, built for the smallest racers on the gate. Nine-year-old Jason "Juicy Jaws" Jensen got a factory profile in BMX Action in April 1981 riding his. In production through 1983.

Chromoly frame and forks, full-size wheels — a big bike for grown racers, decades before "Big BMX" was a category. BMX Action tested it in September 1981; the same issue covered Clint Miller winning the NBA Supernationals in San Diego on one, in his first-ever cruiser race.

The 26's little brother — 4130 fork legs drilled for a front caliper. BMX Plus! ran the test in November 1982 as "The Torker Twenty Four, with pilot Clint Miller." Sold as a complete in 1982 as the 340.

September 1982: Torker streamlined everything. Mild steel was eliminated, the serial system flipped (TZZ counting down to TAA), and the LP became the 280 — with the 280X adding length and an oval-hole gusset. BMX Action tested the 280X in November 1982 with the Trick Team along for the antics, and by June 1983 the ads called the all-chromoly 280 "the hottest production bike."

Bob Haro commissioned it. Torker built it. The world's first purpose-built freestyle BMX frame came off the Fullerton line between July and November 1982 — roughly 500 made, serial numbers ending in "F." Production moved overseas in late 1983, which makes the Fullerton originals the prize: only a handful of first-run frames are known in collectors' hands.

Machined head tube, machined bottom bracket, butted tubing — and the first Torker to run small triangle downtube gussets in place of the traditional sideplates. This was the frame of the Torker Twins: Mike "Hollywood" Miranda and Tommy "The Human Dragster" Brackens, 1983 European Champion and #3 NBL Pro plate holder.

The final Fullerton year was the busiest: the Micro Mini (parallel double top tubes, integrated seat post clamp), the TorkLite complete, the Magnum entry-level complete — and the Mini Pro, built for factory rider Craig Bark and never mass-produced. One is known to exist.

Martin Aparijo designed Torker's own purpose-built freestyle frame — the Freestylist, the first to wear the Torker name. The Targa was developed the same year as the new BMX race frame that would carry Torker into its next era. Then November 1984 came, and the bankruptcy cut both short. Fewer than 75 Freestylists were built; the Targa never reached production, and only five are known to exist. Between them, the two rarest Torkers of all.