Hardwood Harley: All Bark, No Bite

HARDWOOD HARLEY: ALL BARK, NO BITE

IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY night... No really, it was a dark and stormy night. So dark and stormy, in fact, that 41-year-old Virgil Huffman overshot a turn while en route to his Creston, Ohio, home. He wound up separated from his Harley-

Davidson and splayed out in a cornfield with a broken hip. The six-month recovery was long and painful, so Huffman sought solace within his two hobbies: woodworking and Harley-Davidsons. "I was sitting in my wood working shop, and I couldn't get out of the chair," says Huff man. "So I start ed messing with bits of wood. Then, I just

wheeled from machine to ma chine, building the bike." Huffman spent three months working on the wooden 1965 Harley-Davidson Panhead, a replica of a real motorcycle he bought and restored 12 years ago. "I worked from 5:30 a.m. to midnight every day. It took my mind off the pain," he says. The finished product incor porates 24 different types of wood and has 17 moving pieces: The saddlebags open, the front fork compresses, the kickstarter works and the wheels roll. Huffman elaborates,

"When the wheels turn, the chain moves along with them. Each link is indi vidually made, with toothpicks J holding them to gether." , So far, Huffman has been offered up to $5000 for his creation, but he's not willing to part with it. Will he make more? "Only if I break the other hip," he jokes, before stating that he would indeed like to build others. In the meantime, though, Huffman will have to be satisfied with what he's got;~~;: therapy on two wheels.

Wendy F. Black