Build your own Quadricycle!

There was a recent post on Steampunk Fashion about a company in California called Rideable Bicycle Replicas www.hiwheel.com that has some really beautiful antique replica bicycles for sale. I fell in love with one of the "Surrey" quadricycles, a four-wheeled, two person pedal powered vehicle, but at nearly $4,000.00, I despaired of ever being able to afford one.

Enter American Speedster!
www.americanspeedster.com

For a mere $18 plus $2 shipping and handling, they will send you plans to build your very own surrey-topped quadricycle, built from commonly available hardware store items and two salvage bicycles! They also sell an electric engine conversion kit, should one wish an "assisted" ride! The look of these quadricycles is rather old-fashioned, and I believe they can be readily converted into a very steampunk looking vehicle with a few cosmetic changes.

I have recruited Mr. Sullivan in this effort, and he seems to be on board. Plans will be ordered this week!

And by way of precedence of a steampunkish nature....

1911 Jones Airscrew:




and an old fashioned rail velocipede:




I figure you could easily do up one of those from plans and make a bang up job of bodywork.. wheel pants, faux exhausts, etc...

Cheers
Harold

Fortunately those are safely in the US, and I only have to worry about the high wheeler replica in the local bicycle museum shop that calls to me in my dreams....

The plans, however, sound like a fantastic proposition. Have fun with them!!

Totally. Sweet. Link.

Hmm. That certainly does have possibilities. We had been thinking about one of these last summer.

I remember seeing someone had found an old utility type bike that looked quite like a quad bike but it was old like 1890-1930's in style. I would love to find that photo again. It might provide additional inspiration to modify one of those in the plans.

That looks like it could be a fun little machine. I can foresee some fun material scavenging adventures for parts. Thank you for sharing.

To continue a discussion, as it were, from BG proper, the idea I had was to build one of these, electrify it, and add an onboard generator. This would make it into a True Hybrid, one of the most efficient setups available. With appropriate and steamy bodywork, we could go from this:



to something more like this:








Cheers


Chas.

I think something like that might actually provoke me to learn to drive

I always liked the bodywork of the Model T Speedster.

one of the books at lindsay's pubs is on building your own motor car with all the latest tech ...............Circia 1909 .it retails for 9$ us i think , i posted on a thread at BG about the UK and OZ shops that carry Lindsay's books, the UK shop had the" build your own machine shop from scrap" book bundle for 45 pounds ,from lindsays it lists for 65usd+shipping. i think that is a reasonable price for 900+ pages of info.