Lurking in the shadows is the original V&H building, in use since 1979. Photos by the author.
The adage, ?mighty oaks from little acorns grow,? could also describe how cold, hard steel has, over the years, helped Vance & Hines grow to be one of the largest aftermarket high-performance companies in motorcycling today. It was in October of 1979 that two young, ambitious men, Terry Vance and Byron Hines, formed their budding company, establishing headquarters in a small industrial unit (consuming about 2,000 square feet) on Marquardt Avenue in Santa Fe Springs, California. Their product" A chromed four-into-one collector exhaust system for GS-series Suzukis, which they also happened to drag race at the national level.
Thirty-eight years later there are two things to consider about Vance & Hines: first, even though the business now requires nearly 200,000 square feet of industrial space, the California-based company (with a sister facility of equal size in Brownsburg, Indiana) still owns, and continues utilizing, the original shop space at 14010 Marquardt Avenue. Perhaps the most fascinating place at V&H?s facility ? the shelves that contain every jig for every product the company has made.
Second thing to remember about Vance & Hines is that it still has the original jig used to build that first collector exhaust system. In fact, a portion of the manufacturing facility contains every single jig the company has used for developing and manufacturing prod...