https://wheelrevolution.blogspot.com/...1_archive.html

That's an interesting link I'm wondering how many folk out there use a sidecar on their bicycles? I own an old sidecar rickshaw mounted onto a Chinese 'Phoenix' heavyweight bicycle and I purchased it in a slightly distressed condition because I saw it as being a good car replacement once I could get stuck in and undertake a few repairs and modifications.



My ultimate aim is to make the body more weatherproof and to fit up some kind of electric assistance to help me out on the occasional small hill we have around town as well as to get me home when I get tired.

yikes. Does it have gears? For your neighbor's sake I hope you hide it in the garage.

Nice... I like it! I'm not sure I would have the strength to pedal it with even one passenger.... what's it like?

I've never seen a sidecar rickshaw before. That's awesome!

It's pretty heavy to tell the truth and only single geared, but that gear is pretty low. It rides and handles surprisingly well, but I haven't gone for a serious ride on it yet due to the fact that it needs a bit of TLC and a good mechanical service. The big 28inch wheels make for a smooth ride and it certainly rolls over the bumps well.
Like all my bikes it lives under cover in my garage so it doesn't get to amaze and confuse the neighbours too often; - or not yet at least.

Screw the neighbors...let them get their own...or pay for rides

Sianelle I am in awe! That is one awesome piece of equipment!

Aaron

So what is the advantage here?
I've never tried it myself, but I do not see much of an improvement over just using a regular trailer. The sidecar is wider (not a benefit!), attached less reliably and not as quickly adaptable as the trailer was--and from the looks of it, the sidecar is considerably unsafer as well because she's got no brake on the sidecar wheel.

Sidecars were never a good idea, they were always a kludge, and time has not improved the concept. If you want proper handling, you get a trike....

And I especially don't understand this part:
More visible? How do you make a bicycle "more visible" to someone who can't see it in broad daylight already? And how is impeding motor traffic benefiting this lady's bicycling use?
~

Looks like it would flat cure problems with the Xtracycle tipping over when loading heavy items.
It would also allow one to keep the center of gravity low by placing the heaviest and largest objects in the trailer, making the handling better.

Doug,
Other than a possible stability gain I little difference between Sianelle's side car and the pedicab/trike truck. I some ways the side car has an advantage in that the "driver" is sitting up higher and can see better.

As far as increased visibility it will be more visible with the added mass than a conventional bike. Unfortunately that won't necessarily add to safety. I have seen people run into the back of a stopped school bus and claim they didn't see it and in the one case I witnessed the bus had been stopped for a period of time.

Aaron

Yea but then what was the xtracycle for?!?!?...
~

If you're comparing the home-made sidecar with one of the trikes from Lightfoot, then yes, there is a big difference. The trikes I linked to have proper 3-wheel [disk] brakes, and carry their loads centered. During emergency stops, this is going to make a BIG difference, especially if the cargo you are carrying around is your child. ...And if she was using the trailer as intended, it would carry the load centered and not interfere with the bicycle's ability to turn rapidly.

Can see what better?
~

For carrying not quite as much stuff.

Traffic, incoming mortar rounds, ....what ever. I have ridden recumbent and was a bit frustrated by my inability to see over most vehicles and the terrain around me. I am used to an upright riding position (think English 3 speed) not being able to see over parked cars, corner trash bins, code required landscaping, etc is frustrating. FWIW I am 6'+ tall and that puts my normal line of vision well over the 5' height. Lowering it to 3' or even less IMHO was uncomfortable. 75% of my riding is urban, where I consider the upright position a plus.

Brakes can be added to side hacks and I can't fault anyone for experimenting with something different. FWIW I don't own a single bike with discs. In fact I still have a couple of Raleighs with the OEM style John Bull black brake pads on them Discs may be an improvement, but they are also expensive and can't be retrofitted very well.

Aaron

I do not think that the Lightfoot trikes would ride that low.
I have one of these bikes:
https://www.cyclegenius.com/ltx.html
I'm 6'2" tall and just measured, and my eyes are 54 inches height when seated on this bike.
The seat on mine appears to be about what the Lightfoot cycles use (both bikes use 26"/559 rear wheels).

I don't have a normal bike to compare, but I can estimate: the semi-normal biycle I have has a normal-height BB, and it results in about 5" of pedal clearance between the ground and the pedals at BDC. I just measured in a mirror and my eyes are just about 5" below my total height. So sitting on a "normal" bicycle with my spine perfectly vertical would raise my eyes to about 74" off the ground--but nobody rides a bicycle that way; everybody leans forward at least somewhat, and that loses 4 to 6 inches in height... (using six inches) putting my eyes around 68" .... versus 54" on the recumbent.
Around fourteen inches less.

If you compared a recumbent to a conventional road bike, the practical height difference is even less--for years RANS had an advertisement that noted that when you rode their Stratus model, your eyes were only four inches lower than if you were riding a conventional road bike on the drops.

A lot of people think there's a huge difference in visibility on recumbents, and there's usually not.

I don't know what bike you were riding that put your eyesight only three feet off the ground, but there's very few recumbent bikes that sit that low. The Challenge Fujin and Velokraft VK2 would be two. They are expensive and rare even among recumbent cyclists, and they're for long-distance riding, nobody buys them for urban utility use.
~

Yes those old Raleighs are great aren't they Aaron

Despite being interested in any kind of HPV developments and recumbents in general I still continue to ride my upright ladies roadster bicycles and retro-Edwardian tricycle. Why? - because as Aaron has pointed out you can just plain see better when riding around town. Being able to see if a parked car is occupied and if it is what the driver is doing can pre-warn you of a possible danger that someone is about to try and occupy the same space on the road as yourself. In such cases a quick ring of my bicycle's Lucas 'King of the Road' bell, or in the case of my tricycle a honk of the old fashioned bulb horn quickly alerts the driver that I'm there. If I was riding a recumbent I would more than likely end up with tyre marks across my chest instead.
As for the folk who run into school buses and not see them, - there are always going to be those drivers who shouldn't even be allowed outside on their own let alone be in charge of a motor car (sigh).

As somebody who does a lot of miles on a tricycle I must comment that their big failing is not being able to easily see any load you might be carrying. I owned a motorcycle and sidecar for some years and I must say they are a far more social form of transport if you're carrying a passenger. When my children were small they rode in the sidecar and it was great to be able to see them and what they were up to. (Actually most of they time they were too wide-eyed thrilled to be out with me on my motorcycle to be doing anything naughty). For carrying loads a sidecar is entirely practical and the extra width does make motorists behave themselves and treat you as another vehicle on the road. If you know what you're doing with riding a sidecar outfit a brake on the sidecar wheel isn't necessary, but if you intend to carry heavy or bulky loads it would be smart to have one. As for holding up traffic (shrugs), car drivers hold up traffic everyday and do far dafter things with their cars than I've ever seen any bicyclist do.

Damn, I really like that sidecar rig. Nice.

Doug,
Of the two recumbents I have ridden, one was a tadpole trike, the other an old Easy racer. With both I felt like I was not seeing enough of what was going on around me. It may well be that there is only a a foot or so difference in eye level but that is enough to me to miss something critical. FWIW on a road bike even in the drop position you can still sit up and get a view of what is ahead, with a recumbent you are stuck at the level you are sitting at unless you stop and stand up. I ride in fairly congested areas and need the heads up view. And yes on at least two of my bikes my riding position is almost "bolt upright" with a straight back. Recumbent bicycles and tricycles have their place and I know many people that would be unable to ride if they didn't have a recumbent. But to summarily dismiss something as a side car as dangerous and no good is a bit of stretch. Someone is always inventing a better mouse trap, but we still have mice

Aaron

Could you provide some real-world example?
You could state that you prefer one type of bicycle or another, but I'm not understanding why you think that having one's eyes ~68 inches above the ground is going to reveal vastly more than having them only ~54 inches above the ground. When I ride that thing up alongside a lot of cars, I'm sitting a couple inches higher than people in the cars are....

You think bells and horns don't work on recumbents?
~

Tadpole trikes are a poor example in this regard, they are some of the lowest-seat-position HPV's around.
See photo of Greenspeed GTE, a typical example:
https://www.greenspeed.com.au/OldWebP...BB)%201536.jpg
--this trike uses 20 inch (406mm) wheels, and the seat base height is about even with the axles, and the seat back angle is fixed rather reclined. This is common with tadpole trikes, and your eyes would probably be only around 3 feet off the ground. ...But if you look at the Lightfoot trikes, they're not built like this. On them, the seat base is almost level with the tops of the rear 26" wheels, and the seatback angle is much more upright.

The Tour Easy is not that low at all however, it's similar to what I ride:
https://www.easyracers.com/tour_easy.htm
...here we see, the seat base is almost level with the top of the rear 700c wheel, and the seat back is also quite upright.

Well the main reason you can't see well on the drops of road bikes is that your neck gets tired and you end up spending a lot of time watching the pavement three feet in front of your front tire. Simply holding your head up becomes a struggle. On a recumbent your neck generally doesn't get tired this way.

While riding a recumbent (that has a similar seat-height to the Lightfoot trikes) I've never had to stop and stand up to look at anything that I would have been able to see on an upright bike.

When you guys on upright English 3-speeds figure out what it is you're looking at be sure to tell me, because I haven't been seeing it for ~6 years now.
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A real world example? - well I will assure you that I do ride all my vintage bicycles out in the real world and they very much get used as my everyday transport as I don't own a car.

The bicycles I ride -

Indian built Hercules roadster: This bike is now converted to a retro Edwardian tricycle.

1953 English Hercules roadster.


1942 Holfa by Veeno Dutch roadster.


1947 English Raleigh Sports.


I'm a 6ft tall thin woman, so I would imagine that 68inches would be close for the level my eyes are at while riding one of my roadster bicycles. I find that I can easily see into vans, light trucks and SUVs and see what the driver is doing. I have a good view over the top of parked cars so I'm able to see children and elderly folk on the pavement who might step into the road. I can see over the municipal shrubs and flower beds as well as brick walls, utility cabinets and street furniture that line the road edges in parts of town. I have no desire to cast stones at recumbent bicycles, trikes and quads because they do interest me greatly, but from my own experience I feel much more secure and informed of my environment riding my tall roadster bicycles about the town.
Yes I do realise that recumbents can and do have bells & etc, but I was merely expressing my delight in being able to use suitably period accessories on my bicycles. Any impression that I was saying that recumbents lack for such equipment is due to errors in the way I constructed those sentences.

Got bored this weekend and since I have a Xtracycle and a Flatbed......
I haven't taken it past the proof of concept stage, but it's going to be an easy modification.

WOW! Now that is a load hauler...

Aaron

Hey I like that It looks like it's going to be a very useful rig. I for one will be interested to hear how your test rides go.

Thanks guys.


Anyone know what that^^^thingamabob is called? It's a ball on a "L" spring and allows two pieces of telescoping pipe to be easily locked together, similar in function to a bolt and cotter pin.
Monday I'm going to head down the the hardware store and buy the right size pipe so I can have a quick-detach system for the trailer; mount it to the frame the same way the "wide-loaders" are mounted.

So far it's only held in place with zip-ties, but I do get a good idea of how it will handle. Turning right is basically the same as turning right without the trailer. The trailer just lifts off the ground, don't know how it will be with a load though. Turning left, be prepared to make wide turns. I have about the same turning radius as my Miata when going left; not bad, but still plan ahead.