help with trike ideas

[stuee147]

Can you imagine the results if @stuee147 & @voyager got together!!

do you think the world is ready for that lol


ok now everyone please bear with me here i have had a little idea, iv been thinking about front suspention for MK3 and iv been looking at different ways of doing it. now i was on ebey looking at different types of suspention and i found this

a seat post with suspention so my brain started to creak and grown and soon came what is either the stupidest idea ever or one of the most ingeniuse ideas iv come up with.

when i look at the seat post i imagen it upside down with the wheel bolted to a plate fixed to the part the seat would attach to. then i could make up some form of bearings and useing the seat post stem as a sort of king pin for the wheel to piviot on maybe some form of thredless headset or compresion fittings should work i think.
i know it wouldnt give a lot of travel on the front wheels but it should help sofen the ride on gravel or dirt tracks a bit.

so come on whats your thoughts ? @voyager have you thought of this befor or seen it before ?

im still working on the folding mech and its coming along nicely i have a few good ideas writen down and some designs sketched out and im hoping to do folding and allround suspention but we will see.

one good thing thats happened is it looks like i have finaly got a house
i should be signing the papers next friday morning and i can start to move in at last. i cant wait iv lived in tempory hosing for almost 3 years now and i hate it in that time iv been moved once from one tempory house to another and i was given 4 hrs to move and told if i didnt move then the council would have no obligation to house me and i would lose the house and become homeless. but now hopfully i can start to settle down at last.
and the best bit about the house i have found is it has small brick outbuildings in the garden that will make excerlent workshops. they arnt huge but they should be big enough. and then of course i have the encolsed back garden to do all my welding and bits its even got an old gazibo frame that i can throw a tarp over if it rains.
so its fingers crossed for next week iv hired the van already so on wed i will load the van thurs hand the keys in for the temp house and then fri move into the new place
then sat i can start building MK3 well maybe sunday lol

stuee

 

[voyager]

Happy Easter Stuee

Good to hear the move is imminent , , You would need to replace the bolts as they would need to be thicker and HT as a minimum , or you will be needing that helmet .
Front wheel suspension has another down side that the trike weight transfers onto the outer wheel and the trike leans in the wrong direction . Sandman on AZ has got a part finished e-warrior that uses fibre glass rods and machined parts but has stalled his project for the folding electric tourers with a solid front boom and NO rear suspension , The folding front boom idea has a lot of mileage and is worth pursuing .
Popshot built a tilting trike that leaned the right way but had handling problems and was converted back to a "standard " trike

regards emma

 

[starhawk]

Well stuee I don't think it will work, the spring or whatever in that thing are intended to cope with the riders entire weight, and if you put them in front they will only experience half your weight and will therefore be to stiff

 

[paul fellows]

You say your looking at different suspension options. Have you conceded modifying torsion suspension, as used on tanks.

Or alternatively what about this. Take a leaf spring, and use it as the cross bar, with the wheel steering etc fixed to the two ends, and its centre fixed to the main bar.

 

[starhawk]

Take a leaf spring, and use it as the cross bar, with the wheel steering etc fixed to the two ends, and its centre fixed to the main bar.

Wouldn't that lock up the steering? Anyway how would it work? there are no bumps to soak up at that point, the steering and main bar has no vertical freedom of motion in relation to each other

 

[paul fellows]

Im not sure I have gotten the names of the bits right. But the idea is to replace the stiff bar [part of the frame] that the wheels are mounted off, with one that flexes up and down a bit.

 

[classic33]

Cheap mountain bike forks, cut down to size?

 

[paul fellows]

he said he was looking for something different.

 

[Tigerbiten]

Im not sure I have gotten the names of the bits right. But the idea is to replace the stiff bar [part of the frame] that the wheels are mounted off, with one that flexes up and down a bit.

Think something like two transverse leaf springs as opposed to a solid transverse frame member.
One below the main frame and the other above with the the king posts on each end.

 

[paul fellows]

yes . thank you tiger. your right it will need two.

 

[starhawk]

Tigerbitten and paul fellows: That has been tried already and it works! check out Carbontrikes, they actually are in the neighbourhood, 3 stations away on the subway or a couple of minutes triking.

 

[stuee147]

Happy Easter Stuee

Good to hear the move is imminent , , You would need to replace the bolts as they would need to be thicker and HT as a minimum , or you will be needing that helmet .
Front wheel suspension has another down side that the trike weight transfers onto the outer wheel and the trike leans in the wrong direction . Sandman on AZ has got a part finished e-warrior that uses fibre glass rods and machined parts but has stalled his project for the folding electric tourers with a solid front boom and NO rear suspension , The folding front boom idea has a lot of mileage and is worth pursuing .
Popshot built a tilting trike that leaned the right way but had handling problems and was converted back to a "standard " trike

regards emma

i always thought that front suspention increased road contact as it keeps the wheels on the ground but yea i think i can see how it could cause some problems.

Well stuee I don't think it will work, the spring or whatever in that thing are intended to cope with the riders entire weight, and if you put them in front they will only experience half your weight and will therefore be to stiff

iv looked at a few types some are small pistons types some are spring and some i have seen have like a rubber bush type, i was thinking of lightening them off to take less weight or alternitivly use ones designed for kiddys bikes.

the leaf spring idea is good but it could be a problem to get the kingpin to flex in the correct arc so as not to alter the caster angles to badly. i do like the idea of the 2 leaf springs the only thing i would be worried about is the weight i would imagen it would be heavy but then again iv only ever worked with landrover and tractor leaf springs but i think they may be a bit to much lol.

to be honest im starting to move away from front suspention at the moment im thinking more along the lines of just a folding trike with rear suspention for MK3 and play with the idea of front suspention more befor trying it out.

so now my MK3 design is going to be a folding E-trike.

so here is what is probably a dum question im looking at this type of battery pack (to start with lithion upgrade later )

its a 36v 14ah battery pack now my question is how do i charge it ?
iv got a car battery charger do i just do one battery at a time or is there some 36v charger i can use all the ones i have seen for 36v have a 3 terminal plug and they say 2 stage chargers but this battery pack only has 2 wires not 3. ?
as you can tell iv not got a clue about e-kits or how they work iv never used one or even riden a e-bike so any help would be good.
iv rewiered clasic cars and even built a couple of caravans with 12 and 240v electrics so i do know a bit about electrics but not that much

 

[voyager]

Hi Stuee

Chinese make a 36 v charger for 3x 12 batteries about £20 on ebay delivered with 3 weeks delivery time worth ordering now so you have it before you want it

3rd wire only is a kill connection for use on wheel chairs where it has been known for the occupant to drive off connected !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Been running e-trikes for over two years now ( still have 4 e-trikes ) main problem is getting the batteries low enough for good handling see feb 14 newsletter on AZ in search of the near perfect e-trike That had 4 12ah car batteries but had a limited range of 12 miles once upgrade to li-on the range went up to 17 miles
SLA batteries at the 1 hour rate are 50% of stated capacity

If you can get down to Brum I have a mate who has some Lifepo4's at a sensible price PM me for details

regards emma

 

[stuee147]

ok so im finaly moved in to my new house and im finaly after near on 3 years in temp homeless housing getting to settle down. and the best thing is i have 3 yes 3 brick outbuildings one is attached to the house and is where im now storing my trike and the other 2 are in the back garden. one im using to store the gardening tools and bits and bobs and the other one whitch is a long narrow building with old kitchen units and work top fitted in already, is getting turned into my workshop. it looks like thats what it was used for before so its more or less just a case of moving and sorting my tools out and getting things like a vice and bits and bobs to set it up how i like.
and i have a lovely garden at the back that iv already planted some veg in, and there is loads of flowes that where there already. and its fully enclosed withh a high stone wall all the way around.

the only drawback is there is no way into the garden or outbuildings without going threw the house whitch means to get my trike in or out i have to remove the track rod, frount wheels and handlebars, just so it will fit threw the front door.
and as you can imagen its a bit of a pain and seeing as there is a lovely park with cycle routs and even a BMX course right behind my house its frustraiting having to spend 20 to 30 min just trying to get the trike out and the same again getting it back in.

so as most of you will be awear iv been thinking along the lines of making a folder to make getting the trike in and out a lot quicker and simpler. so i was sitting on the decking at the top of the garden the other evening with a coffe watching the sun set and the birds going home to rost in the woodlands at the back, and i suddenly had a thought, after the pain and shock went away lol, i started to think the idea out and i think it could work but im not 100% yet.

so heres the brain wave
what if i make the frount wheels and boom arms a single removerble section, simular to the folding trike i think @voyager has done ?
but instead of making it removerble id would drill a hole dead center and then a corisponding one on the main boom of the trike then with a high tensile bolt as a king pin have it so i can simply rotate the boom arm so instead of the front wheels being inline with each other and the boom arm at 90 degrees to the main boom (the riding position) the boom arm would rotate on the center bolt and become almost inline with the main boom, and the frount wheels would be one infrount of the other.
now i know i would never really get the boom arm to rotate and become inline with the main boom, as the wheels and handlebars would all get in the way but i do think it would narrow the with enough to fit threw a standard frount door. and as long as i stick with direct stearing it should be quite easy. and i shouldnt have to remove the track rod either as the distance between wheels will never change.
im not to sure how i would lock the boom arm into the riding position yet iv a couple of ideas like a suport thingy fixed to the main boom at an angle that can be quick released from boom arm to alow it to rotate. or maybe some form of locking spring washer between the two booms and a quick release bolt as the piviot bolt that will lock it in position. or maybe somthing iv not thought of yet lol

so has anyone got any thoughts or ideas on my brainwave ? im sure it must have been tried before but iv not seen it.


stuee

 

[paul fellows]

I may have missed something, but are not the seat and backward moving wheel going to get in each others way. Is will of cause still be narrower.

By way of a daft alternative. Put 4 casters on a bit of board with an old cushion on it, tip the trike on its side with 1 front wheel on the cushion. Then push it through the house like a df. Or just knock down part of your fence and go out through the woods.