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Last Update 7/01/08
(TMW, V-Max Conversion shown above)
This International, Reverse Trike Club web site is dedicated to all 3-wheel style motorcycle trikes with two wheels in the front, and one in the rear. Depending on who is speaking and what part of the world you live in, this style trike may sometimes be referred to as a 2F1R trike, Tadpole style trike, Backwards trike, Y-Factor trike, Y-Design trike, Y-Configuration trike, T2F - Trike 2 Front Wheels, Cycle Car, Cabin Scooter, Scooter trike, Tricar, and maybe other things I haven't heard of yet. However, on this site, we prefer to call them RT's or 'Reverse Trikes', to differentiate them from what first comes to mind when you hear the word 'trike', a motorcycle that has one wheel in the front and two wheels in the rear.
Whether it's a Front Wheel Drive Trike (FWD Trike), or Rear Wheel Drive Trike (RWD Trike) doesn't really matter to us, as both designs have a good following these days. I hear there are even some All Wheel Drive 'AWD' designs being developed too, like the Riley XR3 for example. Most RT's use motorcycle engines as the motive force, but some use a car engine and/or transmission, diesel engine, electric motor, fuel cell, or some combination thereof including Hybrid designs. So I expect to embrace all possible design criteria's as we're made aware of them, including tilting trikes which are especially interesting designs as you can see in the image above.
In fact, one of my own ideas for a design is to recycle automotive engine / transmission combo's in either a front wheel drive or rear wheel drive configuration. I'm also very interested in any new all-electric, plug-in style RT's, and I have a page specifically for those. Our 2F1R trike design should be light enough and efficient for an electric vehicle where the range, overall size, aerodynamics, good handling characteristics and initial cost will all be important factors in the design criteria to deliver acceptable performance. We have a few all electric designs listed on the site now, and some other electric technology posted on various pages as well.
So it could be a high performance hot-rod trike; it could be fuel efficient and slow as far as the acceleration performance is measured; a hybrid design; or an all electric vehicle; but the main goal of this site is to promote this unique two front, one rear wheel trike design to the general public as a safe and viable means of day to day transportation or for recreation. After all, this style trike has been around since at least the Morgan RT's from the 1930's, and I've even seen a few designs that were made earlier than that. While there are specific handling characteristics with the RT design, there's considerable difference between FWD and RWD in the off line traction capability and cornering capability. Still, all RT owners I've talked to agree that either RT design handles better than the standard trike's they've ridden with one wheel in the front and two in the rear.
We don't aim to be a fancy website and dazzle you with a bunch of Java or fancy html code, we just aim to be the best resource for information on the current RT designs available, designs being worked on or ones in the conceptual stage. Used reverse trikes for sale; parts to fit trikes that could be useful for our particular design; service providers to build trikes for us; design trikes for us; whatever and whoever that has something to offer for the Reverse Trike owners, you're all welcome. But we only specialize in Reverse Trike designs.
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Official Reverse Trike Radio Show on Blog Talk Radio (started 3/28/08 and weekly shows are tentatively scheduled for 9:30AM every Friday, although I may add more days or times as needed depending on interest)
Official Reverse Trike Discussion Group on Yahoo.com associated with this site (started 8/06)
Advantages of the Reverse Trike Design
My Personal Reverse Trike design ideas (Investor Wanted)
Electric Reverse Trike conversion possibilities
Crossover Technology (technology from other vehicles that could be used on RT's)
Licensing and Regulations by State
Marketing Concept for manufacturers
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You Buy It - We'll Build It! (We'll build your kit and you ride it home!)
It is not my intention to provide a lot of information on this site about RT's that are not being manufactured anymore, as our focus on this site is on showing people what is currently available, or supposed to be available soon, and can be built or purchased now. The information I gather on these old designs is better suited to be included on a members DVD for the hardcore enthusiast. But they do lend credibility to the fact that there's historically been a lot of interest in the Reverse Trike design by many people and over a very long period of time.
So that's why I continue to add names and pictures of RT designs I run across on the 'Design Database' page. There are also some good 1F2R designs out there that aren't included on this site because they're not within the scope of our general discussion. If there are some 1F2R trikes that I think should deserve a special note, I may decide to create a separate page for them. For now I have a link above to a 'crossover' page that should work well for this purpose, and I have a links page you should look at as well.
Historically, there's been a lot of interest in the Morgan design. Looking at the Jeluli Morgan Replica in our kit section, you'll notice that there are a few other similar looking designs currently available like the JZR - CV3, CX3, ACE, Triking and maybe others I'm not aware of yet. So if you like this older design from the 1930's era, you can buy something that's considered to be a fairly exact replica like the Jeluli, or just a kit that's just similar to the Morgan design like the ones I just mentioned. These seem to be much more popular in Europe than in the US, but this basic design does seem to have the largest following by enthusiasts of the RT vehicle. Judging by price alone it appears that the various Morgan style replica's are probably the best value out there, but this is not the design I get the most enquiries about.
What probably 50-75% of people ask about are fully enclosed RT's like the Alé concept, Aptera, Comet, or XR3 kit for instance. In this group there are few enclosed designs currently available as you can see, but this is why I wanted to show some pictures of these older designs since there are some older enclosed RT kits. Also in the USA, it seems there's more interest in high performance, 'go-fast' RT's. People don't care so much about gas mileage as they do breaking the speed limit.
On occasion an enclosed Tri-Magnum, Puma, Fire-Aero or similar design may come up for sale, and if you're in the market for a good deal on an enclosed RT, then it helps to know what designs were made so you can keep your eyes open for one when it does become available. So, watch our classified ads, set up a search profile in your ebay account for these names if you have an account with ebay, join our discussion group or other RT discussion groups, or get involved with the RT crowd and you may find one of these for sale at a bargain price one day.
Maybe because of the demand for enclosed RT's, an RT enthusiast in Virginia last year, bought the mold from a design called a Turbo Phantom. This was originally designed back in the 80's and a few copies were made back in that period, but it seems it was never successfully marketed to the general public. Now, the bodies are being made again and you'll find them listed on our links page. No frame kits are available for it right now, but here again, if the demand is there...
We all know if there's a big enough demand for a product, someone will eventually step in and fill the need. Your part of the equation is to get involved and create the demand! Get in the groups, get the discussions going, share ideas and let people know what you think you want and don't be surprised if what you want becomes a reality someday!
If you know of plans, kits or complete trikes that we don't have listed I would like to hear about them so I can add this info to my site.
I think there's room for more kits in the $5000 - $15,000 range. I've talked to some of the 'plans built' designers to see if any of them might consider offering their plans built kit as a complete kit instead.
Depending on which design we're talking about, that would be a complete body and frame, or complete frame whichever applies, with the front suspension, steering assembly, wiring, gauges, brakes or whatever is needed to make a road ready
trike minus the donor parts.
So far it seems that the guys selling plans either don't have the finances or don't want to commit the finances to make and build kits to offer to the general public.
That could mean renting a building, hiring a crew and expensive liability insurance
requirements as well.
With nothing to gauge the possibility of success of such an investment, I understand why there's not much in in the way of complete kits available and never has been.
With the higher gas prices and the renewed interest in riding motorcycles to work to save fuel, this could change.
I think the RT community needs to be on the front end of this trend if we ever want to see general acceptance of these trikes in the marketplace.
In general, this is my goal for this discussion group and this domain. Get
involved! The
more RT's we get on the road, the more we'll of established the credibility for
the RT design over the long haul and more companies will decide to make them.
Especially with the members of the discussion group, at some point in the future when there's enough RT owners out there, this site should be a real clearinghouse for the pro's and con's on each design. When someone hits this site and wants to know how we like this design or that design, or they want to know how good a particular company takes care of their customers and that sort of thing, we should establish a feedback record by owners of each RT so we know the in's and out's of each design. At some point we should have a real database of information to help new owners make a good decision on which RT would best suit their needs, and what things to 'look' for or to 'look out' for. At the rate new members are joining our Yahoo discussion group, that day really shouldn't be too far off if members chip in their two cents.
Besides this International Reverse Trike Club, I'm also the owner of the international KZ1300 USA Club at kz1300.com - and this is the 1984 model, 1300cc water cooled, 6-cylinder Kawasaki Voyager motorcycle I normally ride. Click on the thumbnail to view a larger image -
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