Custom Motorcycles With A Manufactured Ring

By Wrench
Photos by MF

The level of workmanship, innovation and pure effort that went into designing bikes in those years is astonishing. In most cases, each bike was hand made. That's the theory behind Huey's new Cleveland motorcycle. He's not trying to build a formula motorcycle for the mass market. Instead, he's building six to eight motorcycles a year for individual customers, made to their specifications with a variety of components. 

"We build a number of pro-street, rubber mount performance bikes," Huey said. "But nothing is the same. No two bikes have the same drive line, engine or styling." Huey's company was originally called Performance Engineering, which also built bikes and engines. "We don't usually purchase complete motors. We prefer to order the components and assemble the motors to our specifications." 

His shop builds motors with predominately S&S components, but more and more with TP Engineering parts. "I like the large pinion and drive shafts in the TP engines," and even Kech motors, he said. The Cleveland machine shop is experimenting with new twin cam motors, reworking the heads, drilling and welding the cranks to the flywheels to prevent shifting and installing Wisco 95-inch kits. Huey is already pulling 106 horsepower out of 95-inch twin cam engines. His favorite configuration Evo is the 4 -by-4 formula. For years he installed Rivera belt drives exclusively, "but more recently the BDL units are taking over," Huey explained.

The Cleveland marquee is attached to each and every Huey creation from Softail to rubber mount, and his desire for speed is the signature of his work. When I asked him about final drive belt systems, he said, "We have problems breaking chains. We can't run the narrow belts. They won't hold." 

There's one more benefit to the Cleveland name. Seems building one-off assembled motorcycles and selling them in Ohio is a problem, so the manufacturer’s certification affords a more user-friendly motorcycle for his customers. When asked when he was going to completely design his own original motorcycle from the nuts up, Huey said, "Whatta ya fuckin' nuts? Then this would be a job."

--Wrench 

Back to Page 1

Back to the Bike Barn....