Our Story

The home shop August 2021 to march 2024

Much more space

NINE LIVES MOTORCYCLE WORKS was started by Jesse Hockman in August of 2021. jESSE BOUGHT HIS FIRST MOTORCYCLE AT 17 AND HAS BEEN OBSESSED WITH THEM SINCE. NOW 30, BETWEEN SEVERAL YEARS PERSONALLY LEARNING MOTORCYCLES BEFORE SPENDING 6 YEARS FULL TIME AT A LOCAL MOTORCYCLE SHOP, AND 4 ON HIS OWN, JESSE BRINGS OVER 10 YEARS EXPEREINCE TO THE TABLE.

Tail of the Dragon May 24’

“I was always into motorcycles as a kid, but nobody in my family owned one, so until I was a teenager I had little actual experience with them. My best friend in highschool was really my introduction to motorcycles. Travis rode one to school, his dad Ronnie had a small shop on their property, raced in the 80’s and both were very heavily into bikes. after failing to convince my mom a motorcycle was the ideal first vehicle option, I got my first car. Somehow instead of a motorcycle we settled on a Mitsubishi 3000gt as the better option.

I drove the brakes off that car, broke and worked on it constantly and After a lot of mechanical trouble with it, Travis finally convinced me to buy a motorcycle and that pretty much set it all off.

My first bike was a 93’ Honda cb750 nighthawk, I purchased it in September of 2013 with a dented tank and immediately started modifying it. I got the bug hard and started buying cheap bikes off craigslist to wrench on, some survived the learning process and a couple didn’t.

July 4, 2015

July 23, 2015

The Nighthawk in a couple phases during 2015

at the time I was working on bikes in a basement under my grandmas house and for a period at Travis’ house. At one point I got a 89’ Yamaha fzr600 that I tore apart in that basement, loaded it up in my car, drove it over to my buddies house, resto’d it and assembled it in his living room.

June 17, 2015

June 20, 2015

We built a bunch of bikes in that house including rebuilding his wrecked cb1100f.

April 20, 2015

Time passed and in 2016 I landed a job wrenching at A motorcycle shop in Gastonia and the rest is history.

May 27 2016

That shop worked primarily on vintage Japanese motorcycles with American & modern bikes mixed in. I had a decent base knowledge when I started but it took me several years of hard learning before I was really an expert and proficient in working on motorcycles. By the time I decided it was time to start my own venture I had accumulated thousands of hours working on motorcycles and become a master of my craft. Over the years I’ve realized motorcycles have brought so much into my life and bring much to many others lives. everybody’s looking for a way to add some positivity to the world and I feel like motorcycles are my way of doing that. If I can get your bike working and you back out on the road getting some enjoyment out of life, i’ve done my job right.” - Jesse Hockman

Built on a foundation of good values and hard work, NINE LIVES HAS GROWN FROM A HUMBLE 1 CAR GARAGE AND MOVED TO A 36’X24’ SHOP that strives to provide the best quality and value for its customers.