DichotomyOne

I have recently built about 4 possible versions of the tilting mechanism I have beem toying with in my very informal test stand. Here are some pictures of the one I think will work the best.   This is pretty much like I think it will be on the actual trike. The orientation on the outer tilting assembly may change a bit but it will be very similar to this. The shocks that are visible should be the ones I use. The tilt arm on the center shaft will be very similar.  At this point I have gotten the general outline of what I want to do sketched out in my mind. I have another bathroom to work up and a garage shop to work up before I get back to this little project. Time to get some of the things I put off during the winter done so I can get back to the trike.  The things I have been figuring out lately have been the way to get my steering kingpins made and I think that by using a female heim joint and a longer bolt with a spacer to hold the extension of the heim joint I

Hello Hein, Titan Wolf, Stefan, and trike like! I have been doing a few things in the last few weeks that I want to share. I last posted with some sketches that showed how I thought a potential tilt steering mechanism might look like. After reviewing the ideas and models I had previously made I made up the following models. The first is the basic geometry of a tilting assembly using Heim joints (Rod Ends) for the bearings. Heim joints are a bit of a departure from what I have been illustrating but would seem to be superior in some ways to thrust bearings. I do have dust covers for the bearings but they are not shown in place...  Without the reinforcing structure necessary to hold the arms in place, as my previous post shows, the tilting mechanism will fold far beyond the furthest limit that might be used on the trike when tilting. I show this just to illustrate the potential. The furthest practical tilt would be somewhere near 45 degrees on a trike like this. I had to e

Hello Hein, Titan Wolf, trike like (Martin?) and Stephan (shs2_de) It has been a couple of weeks since I was able to remark on what I have been doing with the idea of a tilting space frame trike and I have some things to share. I have built another new prototype of a tilting mechanism and have already come up with a new version. Interestingly enough my newest designs bears a great resemblance to what Stephan (shs2_de) worked on with his suspension system at the beginning of this forum file. It may be interesting to Stephan and others to see a modification of that suspension system. I have also spent a considerable time with my husband and a friend remodeling our 2 bathrooms as well as working overtime… Sigh real life… enough said on that subject. Before I much go on I want to address a couple of comments from Wolf. I read your comment on obstacles in the road and thought about that in terms of tilting and locking the tilt mechanism. First I think that a tilting trike (1 st te

Shop Workbench: Internet amalgam The lift and cranks are just visible and the vises are obvious but look at that top! I mentioned that I was finishing a shop workbench and now finally I am getting close to rounding out this project. Not sure I am ever really finished with a project but I will soon cease to work on this one because I would have to start over to make a new one if I did! I will tell you a bit about the workbench, show you the basic plans, and then tell you what I would change. This workbench has a Paulk workbench top that has been modified to use in a shop as a primary workbench. You can find his plans at  http://stores.modularmarket.com/paulk_homes/  .  I will no doubt show you pictures of what I built but I will not gift you the plans. Hey Mr. Paulk originated the thing so go buy the plans if you want to make one. I will try to give you enough hints to help you make it successfully. The bench has been modified by adding two Moxon style wood vises and two more

Recumbent tadpole trike: Posts on velomobilforum p.7 Hello! I have been doing some fast prototyping in plywood. I glued up a strip of 3/4" plywood and  1/4" plywood (they are actually metric ply close to those measurements) to get a small sheet of 1" thick plywood. So I then cut this to made some 1" square plywood dowels about 8 foot long.  From these dowels , some wood screws, and a couple of bolts I put together a proof of concept tilting trike frame. I want to play with it a bit and will buy more hardware to hopefully put on some wheels.  Nothing I built is usable for riding. This is literally just a full scale model and a poor one at that. Mostly I want to see the full size geometry and how the machine functions. So here are my pictures from shortly after the sun was up so forgive the shadows. Now tilting Right Now Tilting  Left Now a couple of close ups of the middle. I will post more as I bui

Recumbent tadpole trike: Posts on Velomobilforum p.6 Hello sheng-fui, I understand about translations since I must use one for German! I think I would miss so much without the translation as I found out the first time I looked at the forum with the machine translation. So German on Velomobilforum and American on my blog… Perhaps I will get it right the first time! ;D So on to leaning trikes. I think I came up with a better geometry for the XYZ Leaning trike than what I presented but I am having real difficulty putting it into 2 dimensions. To solve that I am making a prototype in plywood. It will hopefully help me visualize. Maybe my prototype will let me take pictures that make sense instead of sketches and text descriptions. I believe what I have in mind is a bit like the Chike trike without suspension. I think the Chike trikes are awesome! I think these trikes use a fairly common geometry. The nose rotates and with a modified wishbone they are supporting balance wi