I believe that a three wheel vehicle has many advantages over a four wheel vehicle but only if it has a very low C of G and also only if that C of G is located well forward and on the centre line. I have designed everything in my vehicle with performance and driver enjoyment as number one. When finished it should weigh in at around 350Kg and have a 60/40 centre of mass bias to the front. The overall width is 1840mm and the engine and swing arm is from a VTR1000 Honda Firestorm. Wheelbase is 2580mm. Power to weight should be around 300BHP per tonne. Mmmmm... This is a bit of a diary of my trike build. I would have been quite happy to build a 4 wheeler but the government didn't want me to so I am building a three wheeler. Well in fact the government will let me build a four wheeler but only if I build it the way they want me too. No thanks!
From simple beginnings a frame grows.
Front suspension is like any clubman except it is closer to being a parallel wishbone set up to get the roll centre down to road level to match the rear single wheel's.
Its getting bigger and so is the workshop mess.
Thinking through the bottom wishbone design. Decided to put shocky and bottom ball joint pick up points real close together.
Rear end taking shape.
So I think I'll put the engine about here!
View from front with proposed donk sitting roughly in position.
Springs and damper units roughed in on the front suspension. Units are from a CB1300 I am wrecking. They are a bit soft though, mostly cos of the fairly extreme angle.
Starting to look like something.
I thought I would move it outside for some sun.
Engine needs a clean!
Bike tyre must go!
Now has a car tyre at the rear. Fitted fine on bike rim.
Gear linkage almost visible. Works a treat using mostly left over bike bits, a few new 6mm rod ends and some half inch steel tube. Light and strong!
Steering rack attached and after much fiddling, has negligable bump steer.
Seat now added in high tech 'steel'.
My green assistant.
Close ups coming soon. This was taken December 2009 during the effort to get loose ends tied up before some proper testing.
Have been doing some work on the nosecone. More pics soon.
Was going to become a master metalworker but didn't/couldn't so this has become a plug for a fibreglass mould.
Some headway has been made on the nosecone 'plug' and some thought and mock up of the side pod. Not sure ewhether this will be the final version of the sidepod 'look' but its a start.
This plug building is getting on my goat a bit. As you can see hear there is some progress (mainly on the side pod) but that is hampered by my desire to get the nosecone as close to symetrical as possible.
Its getting there.
As you can see its pretty close. The only way forward for a finer finish at this stage is to paint it.
The first of about 4 - 6 coats of hi fill acrylic primer have been sprayed on. Careful final shaping is now done using a softish block and 240 dry.
Still not quite there but from memory about 2 - 3 hours of stuffing around with further touch ups and sanding here and there and it was ready for a final couple of coats of primer and a final sand pre colour with 400 dry.
Colour at last! I applied two and a half coats of white acrylic lacquer.
Now I have cut the acrylic back flat with 1200 or 1500 (can't remember as it was over 3 days ago!) and then started to apply many coats of mould release wax. About 6 - 8 coats, buffed to a polish after everyone.
Part lines, split lines whatever you call them are part of this mould as it will not come off the plug if I made it in one piece and in turn neither would the finished panels that will ultimately be laid up in the mould.
Time to re test drive the thing now that I have improved the brakes, fitted the new quick rack and given it a tape measure wheel alignment. It drives rather well now actually
Great fun! It doesn't look to bad either I think. Engine cover to come next and of course replicate the drivers side sidepod on the passenger side. Ultimately it will have a slightly smaller steering wheel too.
Passenger side sidepod is very nearly done. On schedule for a 2012 finish.
Passenger side sidepod is done...but this pic doesn't show that. Engine cover underway and now looking better than in this pic. Exhaust cans moved to final position. Dash done and will be fitted soon.

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 I started in April of this year (2006) buy buying a steering rack off ebay. Frame designing and then building started soon after. Thats not quite true actually as I really have been interested in proper three wheelers (2 wheels at the front and one at the rear, reverse trike, tadpole trike, whatever you want to call it) for 20 years, but I kept forgetting that they seem like a great idea. I was reminded about what a great idea they are when I found out that you can't put a bike engine in a self built car (4 wheels) in Australia but you can in a three wheeler. That was enough almost by itself to convince me.

See I don't believe that lightweight cars should be weighed down with things like live rear ends, crappy old truck gearboxes and giant heavy engines that produce very little power and weigh heaps. All this sort of stuff is designed to move a round a tonne or more of machinary and is constructed with enough strength in reserve to do it for many years. Bike engines are light and powerful and are just strong enough to do the job in a light vehicle. My trike will weigh around 350Kg when finished. 350 is a lot closer to the 250 that the bike weighed than the 1000+ kg a car weighs and car mechanicals are designed to work with. The concept of sticking 200kg's worth of gearbox, engine and diff in a 70kg space frame just doesn't make sense to me. Rave finished!!
Well! Its been a long time since I added a report to this page. The fact is that not long after I wrote this page in July 2006 I started a new business doing what I have always done (HiFi repairs) and have been busy building that up. BUT I did get the thing driving on the 21st of December 2007. How was it I hear you ask? Bloody scary is the answer. Well not really that bad but a key design error in the front end was exposed. I had actually been wondering about this weirdness in the front for a while when just pushing it around the workshop. If you put it on full lock it tended just to understeer straight ahead. A closer look at what I had done with the mounting of the steering rack reveals all. I had located it 'out front' simply because there wasn't a lot of space where the pedals were inside the main space frame. This was wrong. I certainly tuned the bump steer to nill but had a major 'Ackerman' problem. ie. The inside wheel in a corner was steering a considerably larger radius curve than the outside one when in fact it needs to be the other way 'round. I have now fixed this (as at Easter 2009) and am now finishing of other minor bugs in preparation for a fresh test drive soon to establish whether the thing handles in a pleasant enough manner that it is a viable project for completion.

If it steers nicely I will begin designing and building the fairly simple bodywork that it needs.

Oh and by the way it went rather well, but the wheel spin was a little over the top. I am going to need to fit a very sticky rear tyre! In fact what made it a little scary was the fact that it pretty much wants to drive sideways the whole time and when you get it crossed up at a certain point it got weird and un predictable and was swinging all over the place. I suspect its to do with the Ackerman issue but it could also be lack of castor? Or could it be due to a lack of one wheel at the rear? I hope not!

Pics coming soon of recent work.

UPDATE!!

Well work (Audiofix) has remained busy and nothing much has happened, BUT I have decided to not go anywhere much for Christmas (2009) and will hopefully get this thing running nicely over Xmas and during January. PS. I have moved the steering rack! Driving results coming soon.

FURTHER UPDATE 20-12-09

I have gotten the thing running again. Peddle box more or less sorted, brakes reasonable (still locks rear first, but fronts aren't bedded in yet), new rack position is an improvement, and I have the engine running rather well. This thing is quick!! First gear is all wheelspin but second pulls hard as the tyre gains some traction.Work to do now is - quick rack (2.2) as the current one is 3.5 and is a joke, get front brakes bed in, add some floor, firewall etc, check everything over and take it somewhere for a proper shake down. Some Youtube videos are now up! (more at the Youtube site than embedded here).

FURTHER FURTHER UPDATE 12-01-2010

I have now fitted a quite sticky rear tyre and the thing now drives rather well. If it was a bit more finished and registered I doubt whether you would get me out of it! Great fun!!!

FURTHER FURTHER UPDATE 10-03-2010

Well the fun is over and now its time to get this sucker finished. It is now almost mid March and a little progress has been made on the panelwork. I would like to think by mid year that the panel work might be almost done and I can get started on pulling it apart and painting it (the whole trike that is). We'll see... There in fact is a lot of thought required at this stage to get the look and the functionality (lighting etc) right. More thinking than doing at the moment. If I was building a kit it would be all done by now!

ANOTHER UPDATE 02-07-2011

Mmmmmm, well...Anyway I got sidetracked by business and life in general and now its another year but I am back onto it. Today was a bit of a milestone as I started laying up the mould on the nosecone plug. Next is the side pod (yet to be fully formed and finished) and then I'll rip all that plaster, foam and tin off and get stuck into the rack swap. Then it will be time to shake down the dynamics of the way it drives and then hopefully suitably motivated I'll get back onto the body work. Building the nosecone plug has been quite time consuming. Maybe 100 hours? Could be more. Probably is more. Who knows... I have learnt a few tricks though that might see the sides and rear done more quickly. Enjoyable though in a masochistic kind of way!

Happy New Year 02-01-2012

Well I got a fair bit done in the last 6 months but it aint finished yet, but this is the year to get it wrapped up. I really want to drive this thing so a big effort is going to be made to get the bodywork finsihed over the next 4 months.

The engine cover is being worked on at the moment with the exhaust to be completed shortly. Once the exhaust position and pipework is finalised the wiring and plumbing front to rear can be permanently layed out.

If I get the trike finsihed this year it will be 6 and a half years in the making and thats plenty!

2 Months of 2012 gone! 25/2/12

Back again and things are coming along nicely. Plug for passenger side sidepod is complete. Approx 140 hours so not too bad. Maybe we work slow? Anyway its looking surprisingly identical but mirror imaged to the drivers side version. Engine cover is half done and will be finished in a couple of weeks. Once that is completed then it is on to finishing bracketing, a bit of welding here and there and pulling it apart for blasting, painting and flooring etc. Once that is done its down to Lakeside park for a thrash (having carefully screwed it back together of course.
Youtube videos are now all on Youtube.....HERE
This site was last updated 10-04-2012 - Contact Andrew Hutchison at ah@audiofix.com.au
 All images, text and information on this web site are copyright to Andrew Hutchison. 2006 - 2012