Swee's Bio-Hybrid Trike

[bennelson]

Not too long ago, I met Swee.

He makes his own bio-diesel in his garage. He and his wife run an "Organic Store", and he drives both a Biodiesel and a Vegetable Oil car.

His most recent project is a Trike.

It's the front of an ATV welded to the back of a motorcycle. He is going to run it with a forklift motor at 48 volts.

Right now, the electrical system isn't working yet. Something isn't quite right in the wiring. I tried hooking up my controller to it, but had the same results.

Still needs a little work.

He next step in the plan (once the electric part is all set) is to hook up a one-cylinder diesel engine on the back of the cycle. This will be hooked up to a generator head to run voltage into the batteries to create a Series Hybrid.

The diesel generator will be run with Bio-Diesel he makes.

Pretty cool project. Gonna be a lot cooler than my motorcycle when it's all done. He also talked about having an aero-fairing made for it as well.

Here's some photos!

[bbjsw10]

With this "series hybrid" will the generator run enough amps to do a consistent trip, no stopping to recharge? Or will it just extend your range? I was wondering about doing a electric vehicle with this concept is why I ask.

Ohh and tell Swee I love his lil trike. Does it still have half shafts up front?

[Vince-HX]

That is seriously cool. Whats the total weight going to be like?

i'm seeing those axles up front and thinking AWD trike

[bennelson]

I don't think the generator will be enough to put out all the power you would need to run the trike. I think it will only be a range extender.

I did notice that the front ATV axle IS from an all-wheel-drive trike. There is the little splined stub sticking out of the front differential.

I think hooking something up to that to make an AWD trike would be pretty slick. Alternatively, shouldn't the middle of that be disconnected to reduce drag if it is rear-wheel drive only?

It is a seriously cool cycle.

[bennelson]

Swee's cycle weighs 400 lbs.


I just got an e-mail from Swee saying that he got the trike running using a different controller.

He has a couple photos posted on his organic store web page
Trike - Future Green

[toyobug]

Man I've gotta have one of those!!

Are there plans for some sort of fairing, body panels, etc..

[bennelson]

Swee's trike is currently running under a Curtis PWM controller.

He was working on building a thumb-throttle control for it last time I saw him.

Yes, the long-term plan for it does include making a fiberglass fairing for the body.

[toyobug]

cool. I can't wait to see how the body work looks.

[Christ]

I think I'd use the rotary throttle control from the motorcycle...

Also, a slightly lower seating arrangement would benefit the rider and the aero alike.

If it's rated for high speed use (it has street tires... so why not?) a slightly longer rake on the front end (more caster angle) might help to stabilize it from the front end shimmy that Quads tend to have at speed.

I absolutely must see more of this project. I planned on doing something like this awhile back, but never made it out from the planning stages.

[bennelson]

Yesterday was another EV build day at Tom's garage.

Swee brought his trike, with the intent to work on some sort of a chain tensioner. He has had issues with chain slap on his trike.



The general consensus was that his motor was just plain mounted a little too high. It sits in a steel cradle under the seat, and is welded to the frame. We thought the best thing to do was to cut the cradle, chop about 2 inches off the bottom, and weld it back on.

After removing the motor, and looking at the cradle, it would be a lot of work to remove the welds with an angle grinder. The plan is now to wait til next time on that one, so Rich would be back in town, and could bring over the plasma cutter.

Instead, Swee focused on getting the front differential out.

The front end of the trike is from an all-wheel-drive ATV. Therefore, it has a small differential going to driveshafts to both front wheels.

The differential is really caged-in the front of the trike. To get it our required basically removing both wheels entirely from the swing-arms.



The only trouble with that is the end of the drive-shaft going to each front wheel is an important part of what holds the wheel on!

We would need to remove both drive-shafts and the differential, cut off the end of each drive-shaft, and then re-install just the end of the shaft in the wheel hub!

Here, we chop the end off the shaft.


The end of the shaft was then put in the lathe to make nice and round and balanced, and then reinstalled in the wheel hub. (Sorry I didn't get photos of that)

Now, the extra differential is removed and will provide space for an accessory battery. A few more bolts still have to get tightened up to get the whole front-end back together.

We will work more on that next time, along with lowering the motor mount.