Up until this point I thought I had done a reasonable amount of research on the various types of cargo trikes and ended up having more unanswered questions than when it started... typical.
How much cargo space is too much or too little?
What type of pivot?
What size wheels for the front?
What type of steering?
And for each of these questions there were five more and then 10 more, hmmm and then came what about or what if?
I felt like I was going backwards, so...
I started with one fundamental decision.
Cargo space... I wanted to be able carry my son home from daycare along with my work gear and his bag plus a couple of extra bags for good measure. I grabbed some chalk from my sons blackboard and started drawing an outline of roughly 900mm long x 700mm wide and what do you know there's plenty of space for all that and more. So with the cargo box at roughly 900mm long and add to that the length of the bike frame the overall length would work out to be just over 2m. I'm happy with that.
On to the next decision or so I thought, I hoped everything else would just flow on from there but alas no. You see the pivot or steering type and wheel size are all connected in one way or another and that's where I found it difficult to make a decision.
Do I want to turn the whole cargo box like the Haley http://www.haleytrikes.com/ and Christiania http://www.christianiabikes.com/ or do I want to keep the cargo box centered and turn the wheels like the Nihola http://www.nihola.com/ and Carryo http://www.carryo.info/de/carryo-bikes
I pondered this for a good four or so weeks before committing to a decision, weighing up all the pros and cons for each style/design. (I'm about 8 weeks into the build since making the decision to build and not buy and at this time I'm writing the blog in a sort of catch up fashion).
As you'll see further down the track I have opted to make a keep the box centered and turn the wheel type... what these are called I have know idea?.
Tomorrow I'll go over a few of the reasons why I went for that design.
The type of steering you speak of is called Ackermann steering. I think its a good choice, but it might be difficult to set up right. There are various tadpole trikes out there with it. If you don't get your geometry right it won't handle well.
ReplyDeleteCheers For that Ray, I got a chance to test ride it before sending to the powdercoaters and there was slight scrubbing of the outside wheel when turning full lock but I have built in some adjustment in various places fingers crossed it's enough. I have just got the frame back from the powdercoaters so I'll be putting it together shortly along with a well overdue update.
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