Necessity is the mother of invention

Thought you guys might enjoy what I did to my XJ550. Here in sunny Colorado the highway department only clears the main roads. That means it's up to the sun to clear the side streets. Unfortunately that means shady sections have icy ruts almost all winter long. So for me to get out to the main roads, either I load my bike on the back of my pickup, or I shovel all the sidewalks out to the main street or I do this. :lol:

Once I get to the main street, I take off the outrigger and chain it to a street sign.

Happy Trails!
sanoke

 

Nice. The guy I saw riding his bike in sub zero F temps the week before last had a sidecar. I did not get to find out what make of bike it was, but the operator is definitely insane!

Cant you just leave it on, like incase you have to go someplace where the roads are still snowcovered?

 

Hah, man that's great!

True rider.

 

Brilliant! I've slid around enough icy sidestreets to know how scary it can be. But that usually means it's time to put the bike away for a few months, otherwise I'd be asking for directions on how to make my own!

And I love that you can take it off and lock it up... How long does it take to attach/untach it?

*Yes. I just made up a word.*

 

Thats 1 of the most messed things Iv ever seen and Im upset I didnt think of it first that truly a great idea. I will be watching 2 see the time used 2 attach/untach. Sorrie I used your new word MaximumX but i like it. I gess we have 2 inventers.

 

It only takes a couple minutes to put on or take off. I have two mount points, each using 3/4" x 4" bolts. I just remove the nuts, slide the bolts out and I'm ready to go.

 

Hey John,
I noticed that on the other forum. A very good idea! Now if you just make a more perminent setup, you could just leave it on as a kind of sidecar! PD

 

where are the points where it bolts on?

 

Unfortunately I put the wheel too far forward for it to work well on dry roads. It works great keeping the bike from falling on ice so I'll just use it to get to the main roads.

 

One bracket uses the bolt on the right foot peg and the other I made from a u-bolt that clamps to the frame just below the fork mount. I decided I needed a little more support for it so I'm adding a third mount that connects to the top of the rear shock. If you're interested, I can post more detailed pictures once I have it working the way I want.

 

OK, I understand now.
If you can run a brace from the upper shock bolt, one from the back of the foot peg, and one from the axle bolt, you should be right on the money! (Hey, I might just be onto something here!)
I just might have to go out in the shop and put that extra wheel I have to good use!! PD

 

Ha...... What a Die Hard !!!

Good for you 8)

 

I did some reasearch on sidecars and found out about mounting them. It appears that I was wrong in my assumption about where to have the back wheel in relation to the rear wheel on the bike. It seems that on side cars, the rear wheel of the sidecar must be 8 - 10" ahead of the rear wheel on the bike to work properly. Also, the bike has to be leaned away from the side car 1 - degress to allow for weight in the sidecar. And the wheel on the sidecar has to be towed in 1/2 - 3/4" measured from the side of the front wheel on the bike (you need to use a couple straight boards laying along side the wheels to get this measurement.
If you make the mounting rods adjustable (with couplers on them) you will be able to make all the adjustments to get it right. There are some other fine tuning points you can make, but at least that will get you down the road without killing yourself! PD

 

You know, I had so much fun making the first one I'm thinking maybe I'll go all out and make a sidecar. Now that I have the mounts on the bike, I just need to make another frame that's adjustable like you suggested. Thanks for the good info!

 

I figured as long as you've come this far, you may as well go all the way and make a full blown sidecar. It would be nice to have that extra storage. My thinking was to put an extra fuel cell in the back of the sidecar.

 

I'm thinking I could make an A-frame that the wheel attaches to. Then I could use the point where the wheel currently connects as the forward pivot point of the A-frame, bring two supports back from the footpeg and shock mounts and make the rear pivot point for the A-frame. That would put the wheel back to where it should be for a sidecar and I could use one of the extra rear shocks I have to connect to the A-frame and give it some suspension. All that would be left is to make a box for a rider to sit in. Sounds like fun!

 

John,
That is kinda my idea. All of the websites I've found have 4 points connecting the sidecar frame to the bike, which I suppose is from an engineering standpoint for safety. And also, now that I've seen how they fabricated from the factory, the shocks are on the sidecar wheel, instead of the arm connecting it to the bike.
My assumption is, it's better to suspend just the wheel instead of the entire sidecar frame, right? I mean it's easier to just use suspension for a single wheel instead of using my first idea of putting a spring in the upper connecting arms.
So in conclusion of my theory: If you have suspension on the wheel of the sidecar to take up the bumps, there is less weight involved to control.
You get the idea. >PD<

 

You can also carry several beverages with a sidecar!!!!

 

Be careful, your arrangement MAY be strong enough to get you a few hundred yards slowly to the main road, but you will be putting an awful lot of strain on the bike chassis if you clip a kerb or drop the sidecar wheel into a pothole. Fittings close together and only at the back of the bike will put a lot of stress on a fairly weak part of the frame. You could quite easily find the footrest mounts rammed into the back wheel.

Two mounts at the back with a third at the front - either below the headstock or near the front engine mounts would be much, much better. If you want a full sidecar which carries weight, then four mounts, two at the front, two at the back is conventional and you will need to ensure that they can't pivot in the same plane (easy mistake to make with a flatbed style chassis).

It might seem like quite a lightweight wheel, but at three-four feet from the bike it makes a long lever to bend your frame.

Mind you, when I was a lad, we rode our bikes in the snow and ice 'cos we were real bikers. Mind you, we fell off quite often too...

 

Sorry - I hadn't noticed the last two posts as it has rolled over the page.

Suspension wise, there are three ways to go about it:
No suspension on the sidecar chassis, but suspension for the body. This was common on very early sidecars which had leafsprings between the chassis and body. This was good for handling and comfort (for the passenger - only okay for the rider at low speeds) but did not make much use of the available space. [I have one of these chassis cluttering up a garage]

Suspension on the sidecar wheel, body fixed to the chassis. This is most common now, but as many sidecars have very cheap suspension - isolastic rubbers - the comfort is not too great for the passenger. Larger wheels help, though.

Suspension on the chassis AND between the chassis and body. A lot of Squire/Watsonian sidecars use this, but IMHO the body suspension is a waste of time and just compromises the strength of the mounting. That's just a problem of the design of their mounts, though.

No suspension isn't really an option if you want to take a passenger, unless they are going to stand up. If roll is a problem on your outfit, then hardtailing the bike itself (fitting struts) is a better choice.

One thing you DO NOT want to do is create the possibility of any movement between the sidecar chassis and motorcycle frame. There are some very sophisticated outfits which lean which take a passenger and some very basic lightweight sidecars that leant that did not [these were to exploit a licensing loophole in the UK twenty-twenty five years ago] but you absolutely would not put a shock absorber or damper into an arrangement like that. I could explain why, but essentially you would not get around corners alive.

If it would help, I could post picture of my XJ750 sidecar mounts, although I used what was available at the time, rather than what was ideal.

 

Thanks Greg!
What you say make sense and it's good to know it's possible to even have a sidecar on our bikes. I don't plan on setting any land speed records with the sidecar on, just have one for riding during the winter months.I don't plan to carry any passengers on my sidecar either. I am going to engineer mine so it is mounted to the bike in 4 places so it's solid and doesn't flex the bike frame any. And being my bike is stripped down, it will be easy to get at the frame where I need to. I am looking forward to seeing some photos of your rig. >PD<

 

I'm curious on the turn out of the side car project, I'm considering doing one for my dog. or possibly the trailer