When talking about the exploits of that European Harley-Davidson custom shop by the name Thunderbike, we’re usually treated with reinterpreted modern motorcycles. Occasionally, we also get full custom builds, based on their own frames, and somewhat rarer, conversions of earlier Harleys.
Gray 1944 Harley-Davidson FL Is a Rare Wartime Machine 20 Feb 2021, 6:10 UTC ·
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Back in 1944, pretty much every single company in America was busy contributing to the war effort. That year was a particularly important one for the conflagration, with several major military developments, including Operation Overlord, or the Normandy invasion, taking place. That left little room for civilian products to be released. 11 photos
Like all the others, Harley-Davidson was part of the war too. The WLA, as the two-wheeler Milwaukee developed for the Army was called, swarmed in large numbers over the world’s battlefields: some 90,000 of them were made in a very short time. Meanwhile, civilians were treated only with scraps, but ones that would grow into becoming incredible collectibles. Such as the FL.