The Family Wagon

My two boys are getting to the point that they need more regular transport but each time I drive a car to work I can feel the will to live slowly being drawn from me. So the solution arrived home yesterday:



needs a couple of small things done before I load them into it but I am looking forward to getting all four of us onto it and having some family trips around.

Feels pretty out there to ride but I am coming to terms with it - definitely not like any solo bike you've ever ridden! But having ridden it to work today I can say it fullfils the criteria of not feeling anything like a car either!

I reckon it is going to be fun!

 

haha, cool ride

 

Sensational!!
Just keep your keys hidden from Stout

 

:cool1!:
Nice bike! I'm pretty sure I saw this on ebay a few weeks ago..

 

awesome idea - heated seat mod for the coming months?

 

thats a sweet ride!

 

Awesome!

 

Haha! possibly not a bad idea. it is actually possible to put a heater into sidecars using the cooling system of the bike...

 

thats not a speed triple shame on you

i demand a user name change to say tsp3 and the outfit

 

Well, I am hoping the the God of Three will be appeased by the presence of three wheels...

 

That's awesome!

 

That's nice.
I like side-car outfits; I'm old enough to be able to remember when the NSW cops used Triumph outfits in various locations....always seemed to be several around Sydney suburbs.
The company I started work with (Sydney) used them for service vehicles back in the 1940's/50's (before my time.)

Are they very difficult to learn to handle?

 

I am starting to get comfortable with it after the trip back from the central coast and a couple of trips to work - although I am quite certain it is going to scare the shit out of me sometime in the next few weeks at least a few times.
before picking it up it spoke to as many people as possible and read what I could find on riding the things. The closest comparison I can make is it is kinda like riding a 4 wheeler/quad on bitumen...but different. And then there is the thing about remembering to keep the left wheel out of the gutter/off the curb/out of other peoples lane.
It is probably one of the more challenging things I have done in motorcycledom recently.

 

So there is nil benefit to be had by having ridden a two-wheeler.....it's a completely different ballgame and the only relationship is that the outfit has a motorbike as part of its makeup?

Interesting.
I'd like to try a side-car outfit one day.

 

+1 on that..
hence why

I may have been having a look.. :whistle way before I'll actually ever be in the market for one..

tsp3 - you'll need to let us know how you find it after a few thousand k's..

 

Yes please.

In fact, I'd like to see a series of posts as you continue to use it and become more familiar with it.
I think that would be very interesting.

I wonder if the CanAm 3-wheeler behaves in a similar manner to a sidecar outfit?
I was passed by one the other day going up Yamba Drive - it reminded me of a modern version of a 1930's Morgan 3-wheeler! :biggrin

 

While there is alot that is different I am glad that I could ride a solo before I tried to learn this thing. general road craft etc is much closer to a bike than a car - you just have to keep reminding yourself about the width! Although it has been suggested that it may be easier to teach someone that hasn't ridden a solo to ride an outfit. I strongly expect that a mis-spent yoof riding 4 wheelers on the farm has helped me a little.
I found this document pretty helpful in knowing what to expect.
[link:3f6jyxlw]http://www.sidecar.com/Files/SC%20Manual.pdf[/link:3f6jyxlw]
It is a little dated in parts and you have to keep switching from right to left because it has been written from the prespective of the chair on the right, but it outlines it all pretty well.

Yeah Bob' I have been looking for about 18months and actually saw this outfit come up aug/sept last year and was tempted by it then...

I have been running with decreasing amounts of ballast in the chair since pickinging it up. I had 40L of water in it for the trip home then took out 20L for the last couple of days. This morning I tried it with none which has slowed me down considerably on the left hand corners :nooo2 ...I'll be putting it back in when I get home.

I'll let you know about the spyder comparison as I am booked in on Sunday.

 

i rode one of the spyder's on the 'spyder experience' it was actually pretty fun. you have to lean right off it to get the best feeling, although its different to a biek cause the bike isnt tipping in it sort of feels like a mash of a bike and car the way it turns whilst using the handlebars (you know instead of a stering wheel) and it feels a little bit like the back wheel is sliding/drifting round when you hit a corner sharply. definetely fun, but weird, i sould see my self on one if it wasnt for the expense. much safer too feels a bit like a car that you can escape from (see fall off) easily. ireckon it would be good for travelling two up especially well - plus automatic

ramble over

 

Noice!!!!! Lurch is correct, don't leave your keys lying about. Unless you want to....

That looks a lot like a HRD (Hurdis) Grand Rallly 1.5...and with much nicer paint than mine too.

We've got to arrange to be at the same rides....two outfits at a CR ride would be grand!

One note of caution re: getting 'all four' of you on the rig sometime soon - be VERY careful. The weight of the two kids is not sufficient ballast for two adults on the bike if anything approaching 'spirited riding' is involved. FWIW, there are plenty of members in the USCA (organisation that owns the link you posted) who are adamant the pillion seat on a bike with sidecar should never be used. I should know, they all lectured me repeatedly....Anyway, apart from the 'tipping' issue, there is the very real possibility of tossing your pillion off the back as the lateral forces are very different to the more 'normal' (literally) forces on a solo bike.

Finally, in case anyone that was wondering is still reading this, an outfit and the Can-Am Spyder are very different, despite the few obvious similarities. Not sure why anyone would want a Spyder, unless they felt unable to keep a solo bike upright (in which case an outfit is still better) In every other respect, the Spyder seems the worst of both worlds to me. I rode one when they were first released in the US and was underwhelmed. Now, if you were to turn the traction control off I might be lured back for another ride, but there is still no more carrying capacity than a normal bike and any passenger is far less secure / comfortable than on either a bike or sidecar.

Drop me a line if you have any qns - I'm about six years ahead of you and have owned a couple of outfits. I got into sidecars for very similar reasons too - I was looking for a way that both of us could keep riding after our first ballast (as I now call them) arrived.

 

Stout, I should have known you'd be all over this like a cheap Pierre Cardin