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Last Update 8/16/08
Aero Trike Roadster Complete Reverse Trike Kit starting @ $5000 with body (available now)
The 1st finished prototype in China
1st production build using a Honda 1200 Goldwing as the
power-train. Only minor fabrication is needed to make a couple of support brackets
which will be unique to each bike. The motorcycle you choose to power your
ATR could be new
or used, but the rest of the kit uses all new parts, new suspension, etc.
It even comes with a generic shifter cable, throttle cable and other parts to
simplify the build process.
Body parts minus the fenders -
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The finished ATR on its way to the Houston, Texas AutoRama Show 11/22/07:
I think the Aero Trike Roadster 'ATR' Design will be popular with riders who want to convert their current motorcycle over to a 3 wheel Reverse Trike design and want to do it for minimal cost. This kit is available right now from a manufacturer in Marquez, Texas just a short clip north of Houston, Texas. I had the luck to be able to see this kit in the pictures being assembled using a 1200cc Honda Goldwing as the donor bike. Had we been able to take this outside I could of gotten some better pictures, but you can get the gist of it.
As you can see from the pictures, it's designed as a front cab assembly that uses a donor motorcycle for the power plant and rear suspension. There will be minimal fabrication needed to connect struts from connecting points on the motorcycle to the frame of the front cab assembly. This is a pretty standard design in most respects to RT kits from the past. What is good about this kit is that it comes with most everything you're going to need to make a running vehicle out of it except for the few items that will be unique to each bike.
Things like the brackets and struts used for bracing will have to be fabricated according to whatever motorcycle is used as a donor, and each bike is different as far as attachment points. These parts will have to be fabricated by the dealer that's building the kit. Here again, the desire to have each kit sold to be made into a completed vehicle and put on the street is very high, so whatever needs to be done to accomplish this end will be paramount in the decision to sell to dealers only, or directly to the customer. Not all customers would have the skill to get everything hooked up and make it roadworthy.
Once you get the bike mounted to the back of the cab you have to deal with the throttle cable, clutch cable or hydraulic actuator and shifter assembly. You've got gauges to deal with as well. At minimum you want a fuel gauge, tach, speedo, turn signal indicators, head light switch, ignition switch, neutral indicator, and possibly other things unique to your bike. On a lot of bikes your tach is cable driven, and the question is, if you make a custom extended cable that will reach all the way up to the dash, will it still work properly or will the extra length make it too hard to turn.
There's always the possibility to make a wiring harness extension for your original gauges, and move them up to the new dash in the cockpit, but during this conversion you might decide this would be a good time to upgrade your old gauges to something newer like Cyberdyne, ETB or ElectroSport digital gauges. I have all these listed on the links page on this site. Even for a dealer that works on bikes, if they don't do much in the way of customizing bikes already, they might find some of these things are a challenge. They'll be a certain amount of technical support no doubt, but what will make this kit a big hit I think is the price.
This kit will be in the $5000 range complete with the body as shown, and basically everything to make it work except the few unique items already mentioned. In this price range I know of no competing product. If you have a bike you're not riding because you really don't feel like you can handle the 2 wheel scene anymore, here's a way to put it back in service. Stability and handling are big issues also when you covert to a 3 wheel vehicle. You can convert most bike's to a traditional trike design with 2 wheels in the rear, but I don't think there's any comparison when it comes to the physics between the two designs. And the price is about the same. I haven't heard of any traditional trike designs that are capable of pulling 1.9 g's on a skidpad as the T-Rex, Veloss, Ale and others have been promoting in their literature. So there's a definite advantage to a properly designed Reverse Trike in general, that I think people will realize once they drive one.
Contact the manufacturer - M. W. Bourne Co: aerotrike.net
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