Cherry Bomb hits the show circuit
By Bill
Andrews
 Mar.
18 – The Skunkworx/Jim Davis project bike isn’t even a month
old when it makes its first appearance on the show circuit. This is what
the bike was designed for, and Bruce Mullins, Skunkworx owner and head
fabricator on the project, is just a bit nervous.
“This is what I do,” he says from his shop in Columbus, Ohio, knowing
that a bad reception of the bike on the show circuit is tantamount to
bad advertisement for his shop.
 His fears are quickly belayed at its first outing in Louisville,
Kentucky, as the bike pulls in a First Place and a Best in Show in the
debut spectator class. Mullins is ecstatic. That First Place trophy
qualifies him for the
Easyriders Invitational in Columbus—one of the
biggies in the business.
Mullins knows that doing well in Columbus will garner some serious
cred, which is always good for business.
By the time the show rolls around Mullins is once again nervous as he
walks around the Columbus Veterans Memorial.
 “I don’t know,” he says from his shop’s display on the main floor.
“There are some killer bikes here. I haven’t seen anything that I
haven’t seen before, but the quality is all high up there.”
The show is very much like a beauty contest, except here the models
stand still and the spectators walk around.
 Motorcyclist Al Osborne strolls over and stares at Cherry Bomb for a
while. He then says, “I like it because of the strong lines. I love the
color. It looks like it wants to hug you—like its saying, ‘Come on, ride
me!’”
Rick Leach, a local from the Columbus area, says, “It’s got some nice
molding, especially the way the seat looks like it’s built into the
frame—real tight.”
 Another chopper fan, Gary Benson, from Washington Court House, Ohio,
stops by and says, “I don’t care for the one-sided swingarm.” Benson
says he’s more into the older style bikes. “I’m basically an old-school
guy, but I love the paint,” he says.
John Loeber, from Dayton, Ohio, says he too is an old school H-D guy,
but he reacts quite differently to the bike. His eyes sort of gleam over
as he says, “I think it’s beautiful.”
Asked what he likes about Cherry Bomb, Loeber says, “Everything. It’s
a beautiful piece. I like the out board brake, and the one-sided
swingarm is trick.”
 Hundreds of people stop, look, and then move on, each one with a
different opinion of what they like, and what they’d do differently.
During the build, even Mullins had said he’s never satisfied. “I’m
always thinking of things I could do differently,” he reiterates from
the show floor. “The day you’re satisfied is the day you should get out
of the business.”
At the end of the weekend, Mullins is once again a happy camper.
Cherry Bomb takes in a third-place trophy in the Easyriders Category,
which Mullins says is about sixth place overall.
“I expected not to win anything at all,” he says, “especially with
all the other competition.”
Mullins next project is a mixture of the old-school and the new. He’s
building an old Knucklehead chopper that he says should handle extremely
well, and produce some respectable times down the drag strip. “I want to
show people that a chopper can do more than just look good,” he says.
Related stories:
 Big,
shiny, and lots of chrome
The Easyriders Bike Show
Custom bike builders from around the country displayed the very best
in rolling art recently at the Easyriders Bike Show held in Columbus,
Ohio. Exhibitors filled the entire 100,000-plus square feet of the
Franklin County Veterans Memorial facility over the Valentines Day
weekend, and hundreds of spectators filed through, enjoying the
kaleidoscope of colors and chrome.
Following the build--
© 2004, American Motorcyclist Association
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