Home Page
The Trip!!
Why bother & selling the idea
The Route
Why East to West
Some Highlights
The Trike
The Trice Explorer
Why a Recumbent Trike
How it Behaved
Tyres and Punctures
Fitting the sunshade
Logistics
Luggage
Getting There & Back
Trip Log
Links:
FARM Africa
Adventure Cycling (Maps etc)
ICE (The trike manufacturers)
Larry Black (recumbent dealer)
The Trice Explorer
The trike is made by a small company in Cornwall, England. I visited them for a test ride in the summer of 2002 and ordered the machine direct, along with a lot of extras – 81 gear option (there’s a 3 speed SRAMM in the rear hub), rear suspension, pannier racks, extra bottle cage mounts, side carrier for a “handlebar bag”, mirrors, mudguards. The total cost was a bit frightening, but I have to say that the quality of the engineering is superb, and their support has been first class.
The enormous gear range means that you can spin at 80rpm at 2 miles an hour or at 28 (although I need quite a lot of help from gravity to achieve the latter). And the machine is a great ride – see below. The guys in Cornwall are a pleasure to deal with and are true enthusiasts. More on www.ice.hpv.co.uk
Why a Recumbent Trike
1. Hills are a blast. Tired? Drop down a gear; on a trike you can “spin” at 2mph and still not fall off! Still tired? Stop pedalling, rest in the most comfortable seat on the road, and then start again with minimum effort. You may be carrying slightly more weight, but that is outweighed(!) by convenience.
2. Stability. You can put one wheel on the grass without worry; tear downhill fully laden with impunity (but I would caution against crossing rumble strips at high speed – the rear comes unstuck!); and when you stop, you apply the parking brake, stand up and walk away.
3. Other road users give you a wide berth - contrary to the concern of people you meet. I put this down to the fact that the trike is unusual (it gets noticed), and that it looks wider than it really is because it is so low.
4. Fixing punctures. With the aid of a “jack” ( a small piece of wood I carried with me), you can support the appropriate corner of the trike while a wheel is removed, thus avoiding the need to put the machine on its side or upside down. Ditto when adjusting gears. (However, when the rear wheel comes off you do need to secure the two front brakes with some straps to avoid it moving; the rear brake does this job when a front wheel comes off).
5. Fun. They change direction like you wouldn’t believe, although you have to treat a fully laden machine with respect as the wheels are taking lateral force when cornering;
6. And they start conversations with anyone and everyone – like “where’s the motor”, “how much did your rig cost?”, “that’s cool, is it really as comfortable as it looks?”
On the downside, three wheels makes avoiding debris and potholes a bit more challenging; and of course you are that much more likely to pick up a puncture.
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How it Behaved
In short, the trike behaved impeccably, apart from two minor problems – in the early days one of the wheels was causing punctures on the inside of the tube; evidence suggested that this was linked to the spoke holes, so more rim tape was put on and the problem solved.
The other was that half way into the trip, the SRAMM gear change became reluctant to engage bottom gear (sticking cable is the most likely cause and so I put up with it, getting off the trike to give it a helping hand on the few occasions when I needed bottom gear).
That apart the machine did exactly what I wanted of it, was wonderfully comfortable (recumbent butt set in for short periods on a handful of days), and as mentioned elsewhere it was wonderful on hills – not sure how I can go back to a two wheeler!
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Tyres and Punctures
I am now a convert to “Green Slime” or its equivalent – the stuff that goes in the tube and seals small punctures. I finally overcame my reluctance to add weight and possible complications (how do you mend a large hole with all that goo everywhere?) when I got two thorns in the same tyre at the same time – and of course I only discovered the second after fixing the first and replacing the wheel! The thorns in question were from the infamous “goats head” thorns; they are small and almost impossible to spot, and like the metal spikes in James Bond movies always land with a thorn uppermost.
Anyway this stuff really worked for me – no further punctures for the last 1000 miles. The slime did give me one heart-stopping hour though. I had decided to add some more slime to one of the tubes as I felt that the amount I had put in when on the road was too little. During this operation I somehow arrived at a point where the tyre was partially inflated but I could neither inflate it further nor deflate it! And of course I could not remove the tyre from the rim. After removing the Schrader valve stem I finally managed to release some of the air with the use of a needle, got one tyre lever in place and then used a knife to slit the tube. I’ve never enjoyed the sound of escaping air so much!
Two thirds of the way into the trip I had three new tyres (Schwalbe Marathons) shipped out to my hotel. The rear tyre had already been changed for the spare and I was getting concerned about the other two. It is possible that they would have done the distance but I was not keen to take any chances.
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Fitting the sunshade
Before I left I was determined to add a sunshade to the trike, despite the scepticism of the family who thought it would be too heavy, would blow off, and would get laughed at! Well, the third design worked; it consists of an umbrella from a child’s pushchair and was mounted behind the seat and to the left (I was travelling west so the sun was on that side most of the day). It could be put up and down on the move, and removed and stored in a pannier very quickly. I have no idea if I was laughed at – but it worked very well, only getting inverted a couple of times, and was a boon in the early days of the trip when I was in 90 degree heat and high humidity, and it was also much admired by a number of the long distance cyclists that I met.
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