E-Mail This Article to a Friend CARNAL KNOWLEDGE Welcome to machine-made love BY CAMILLE DODERO

You might expect, with a product name like the Ultimate Love Machine, that the newfangled mating mechanism conceived by Illinois resident Jim Johnstone would not only satisfy aroused longings way better than a dirty magazine, but also tie you up, slap you around, and steal your wallet when it’s through. But what the 50-year-old Johnstone, who’s selling his homegrown invention at www.ultimatelovemachine.com, believes his copulation contraption can be is something else entirely. "This machine is to sex," the Web site proclaims, "what power steering and an automatic transmission are to driving."

The Ultimate Love Machine is not a plushy pink appliance with adjustable mirrors, coin-op vibratory powers, or a video-camera-ready tripod. Rather, this "carnival ride for the bedroom" looks more like patio furniture than motorized Viagra: it’s a black apparatus with two wheels, padded shoulder restraints, foot stirrups (which could easily be mistaken for handles), and a T-shaped bench. Intended for sitting, kneeling, and lying positions, the bench glides back and forth when the device is turned on — a sliding motion meant to replace pelvic thrusts.

"Nobody looks down on you for using a dishwasher or a self-propelled lawnmower, and this is really no different," contends Johnstone over the phone, from his Urbana home. A father of two, he says he’s been imagining the Ultimate Love Machine since the early ’70s. "Like all guys, I think about sex every 3.2 seconds," he admits. "The way I originally conceptualized it was like a mechanical bull. But that’s obviously a lot more aggressive in the sense of the motion, and when you’re having sex, that’s probably not real comfortable." So when Johnstone left his job as an automotive engineer in September 2003, after more than 20 years in the industry (he also fabricated a double-bladed ice scraper for windshields), he finally decided to turn his dream into a reality, but wisely opted for a less-whiplash-inducing configuration.

Although the carnal tool’s design certainly could aid anyone with sore hips or creaky joints, Johnstone doesn’t think his only customers will be the elderly or the physically challenged. "I remember when Viagra first came out, my dad was bragging about [how] he had used it. And now you hear teenagers using it, because it enhances the experience." Nevertheless, high-school kids probably won’t be the first consumers — swapping their parents’ credit-card numbers for a permanent ticket to ride the Ultimate Love Machine — considering the very adult price tag. "While $2599 might sound like a lot, many people think nothing of spending that much for a cruise, or a trip to Europe," says Johnstone. "And this lasts a lot longer than six days and seven nights."

The ULM isn’t typical sleazy sex-toy fare, mostly because it focuses on partner enhancement, not partner replacement. "A lot of people actually told me that I needed to come up with some sort of attachment so that you could ride the thing solo and still derive some satisfaction," Johnstone said. One reason he hasn’t installed any phallic implements is liability: "It’s probably hard for non-engineering people to understand, but this thing is a pretty powerful machine. When you’re moving somebody’s entire body back and forth 100 times a minute, there’re some fairly high acceleration forces involved. And if you’ve got a [coupling] device stuck out there that somebody’s getting rammed into, you could literally impale them on this device." Johnstone adds, "You don’t want that in your obituary."

For his part, Johnstone isn’t wearing out the motor on his own personal Ultimate Love Machine. "I’m single at the moment: divorced, two kids — both in their twenties, and neither one can get over showing their friends the crazy contraption in the living room, the temporary home of my prototype, that their dad built," he writes in a follow-up e-mail. "I’m a little shy about using the machine as a pick-up line. ‘Hey baby, do you want to come over and test out my sex-machine invention?’ just conjures up too many freaky images — not only that I have a sex machine, but that I invented it. I’m waiting for social acceptance to catch up with the idea."

For more information, visit www.ultimatelovemachine.com.