3 Wheeled Metro - Help

[Nerys]

OK I have had it up to here with Insurance companies. I am tired of paying $600 a year for a stinking Geo Metro. When insurance reaches "purchase price" of the car I have a problem with that.

their reason for the latest $100 price increase? Because We Can. you heard me right that is their reason. So I canceled. got till 9/22 to get a new policy so far NOT MUCH cheaper. this is insane. 35yo never lapsed even a single day since 16 no tickets no accidents no claims NOTHING squeaky clean. what freaking gives?

anyone I got a WILD idea. I want to send a BIG F U to the insurance companies. I want to convert my metro into a 3 wheeler and re-title as a motorcycle. Then get motorcycle insurance and say F U to the insurance companies.

SO how do I do it? feasible options?

concerns.

Mass (upwards of 3000 pounds sometimes and I tow a trailer)

Tilt. I regularly ride with 3 people in the car (total) so I am concerned about it "tilting" funny when like this (the 3rd person can not sit in the middle I am large enough that I need my seat back far enough to preclude anyone occupying that space remotely comfortably.

COST and DURABILITY.

ie I want to use a NORMAL STANDARD cheap readily available WIDE tire.

this will handle the load better and handle the tilt issue better. also be more stable I would think.

Here is my "idea"

take a "trailer" and bolt it under the car essentially.

a trailer is a straight axle with leaf sprints. I would build a square tube frame with leaf springs and an axle.

bolt this into the current control arm/rod bolt holes on the car now since they are already designed for these loads.

hole in the subfloor the shape of the tire and a custom well to cover it up. if I do it right I will lose my spare tire well but not any cargo space (ideally)

that parts easy.

now for the hard part. I need a RIM that the axle would PASS THROUGH completely (like a motorcycle rim)

this would also allow me to use a motorcycle brake system to replace the ebrake.

a motorcycle seems like it might work. are any large enough to accept a normal car tire? any that can handle the mass load?

why? this dramatically simplifies substructure design and construction it would literally just BOLT IN with no mods to the metro except

Remote the existing tires and struts (just a few bolts)
Run the brake cable.
Hole in subfloor to fit tire.

Is there a better way to do this?

ANYTHING you guys can provide in info etc.. would be greatly appreciated.

My only conditions are it needs to be

Cheap
Use a normal wide cheap common auto tire
Minimize how much of my cargo space I lose (don't care about spare tire space)

I found this one which is almost example what I want. I was not sure a SINGLE MOUNT like that would be stable.

http://threewheelmotorcyclemetro.shutterfly.com/

anyone know anything about this metro?

looks like a VERY simple conversion job he did. I wonder how well it handles how its holding up etc.. etc..

but THAT is essentially what I want. I would want to use a 14inch rim with a low profile tire (but not so special that it gets uncommon or expensive) IE to minimize how TALL the tire is to try and stay out of my cargo area.

any help would be greatly appreciated.

Is this eco? will save me $500 a year I call that pretty good ecomodding with a huge and nearly immediate return.

[Frank Lee]

I posted pics of that Metro trike quite a while ago. I think it would be kinda neat but it wouldn't save as much fuel as I originally hoped.

I'd use a car wheel. Think of it, you are now asking one wheel to do the job of two, and motorcycle wheels aren't designed to withstand that much lateral loading in the first place.

You are going to sacrifice much if not all of the trunk so if the trunk space is important, you need another plan.

Anyway, perhaps you haven't shopped around enough for insurance. I haven't had any rate hikes like that so it isn't like everyone in the U.S. is suddenly being billed $100 more. In fact I'm enjoying a substantial rate drop since I put Snapshot in the car.

[Nerys]

well its less "SERIOUS" now. I just found out AAA does auto insurance. they got me a policy via pregressive (who previously quoted me $700+ for the year) for $324 for the year ($162 / 6 months)

PHEWWW !!! and score they gave me my motorcycle insurance for $75 a year. Nice. Double score.

SO I am not so ANGRY anymore and not so ERNEST in my need to do this to say FU to the insurance company.

IE I will wait till I get another metro to try this.

I NEVER intended to use a motorcycle tire. way to small even the fatties AND way to expensive/short lived. typical motorcycle tire is good for around 10k miles !!! doing THIS duty I would be lucky to get 8k miles out of each tire !!! at $150-$250 a pop. No thanks :-)

no definatly need to do what that link guy did. IE regular car tire but one larger than a metro tire ie a fatty since its taking over the duty of two tires.

the idea is not fuel economy. the idea is save money another way. IE insurance.

with motorcycle insurance I can add COLLISION protection with a relatively low deductible and STILL pay a fraction of what car insurance costs. even my new rate of $324.

I wonder how the motorcycle shop would react when I came in for inspection. Probably just sticker it :-) an no more emissions either !!! yeah !!

so I am still serious about doing it but I don't have to "do it yesterday" at least. Got a six month reprieve.

I am eyeballing a metro I saw in a lot down the street though I think its for sale. Going to have to stop and see what he wants for it.

[Nerys]

whats snapshot?

I called over 100 insurance companies !!!

I went to PA sites and they listed 809 insurance companies registered as legal in PA and just started making calls filling out the website quote forms.

I was wondering if maybe I was "black listed" or something.

Erie DUMPED me a few years ago (I was paying $432 IIRC for 4 cars) because they "claimed" the numbers of cars I had insured indicated to them I was buying and selling cars.

the fact that the cars have remained in my name since I owned them over 10 years ago appeared to mean nothing to them.

I think it was simply an excuse to "get rid of someone" paying less than they want them to pay.

I was wondering if insurance companies had a system like paychex for banking that maybe I was "black balled" as risky or something for some reason.

I made a mistake 12 years ago. I cosigned the title for a car for my brother. The moment my insurance company figured this out (he has his OWN INSURANCE mind you and lived at a different address !!!) the moment they connected "HIS" name to "MY" name my insurance went from under $300 a year to $1400 a year. (yes his record was THAT BAD)

took 3 years before my rates dropped back below $500 a year. that freaking sucked hard core and never saw a penny from my brother the son of a b(*&^#.

I won't ever make that mistake again.

In the past I simply never insured all my cars. I always kept TWO cars insured only. if I needed to use one of the "uninsured" cars I simply called up the insurance company and "switched" the coverage to the car I needed to use. (I was ALWAYS morally legal IE I never drove a car on the road till I had switched coverage to it)

technically all plated cars need insurance (BS) and by law no car can be "in public" without plates. Grrr catch 22. sucks hard core.

eventually the city (at work they get on our case about everything) started running the tags and checking insurance so I was forced to insure all of them which started this whole problem to begin with. Grrr

MIND you we are not talking cars in a junkpile here. Every single car starts runs is inspected and tagged and in good repair. I don't keep "hoopties" around.

they just don't LIKE us here so they look for any reason to give us a hard time.

I really hate government out of control.

[Frank Lee]

Snapshot is a tattletale for Progressive that plugs into the OBD port on '96 and newer vehicles and reports to them trip times and distances but probably most importantly it tells if there are any rapid decelerations. The policy on my Sable went from $137/6 mo to $90.

Check State Farm for motorcycle insurance. I just did and it was half of what I was paying Progressive.

[ShadeTreeMech]

oooh, I have progressive and my wife complains about my eco driving so much...maybe I can get a discount

[Nerys]

Ohhh man what a sort subject. GOOD for you getting the savings but I would rather DIE than ever do that.

that is one step from "mandatory" to "taxed" based on its data or FINED based on its data to total control.

No thanks. it would be so childishly easy to put a Sirf chip in that thing (yes it would work just fine from under the dash the new chips work inside even)

I would never EVER do that. I almost did not get the rate I got from AAA today because he asked for my social to check my driving record.

I said a social has nothing to do with my driving record and EVERYTHING to do with my completely irrelevant to you credit records....

he admitted as such. that (his frank honesty) my desperation and the fact that I really like AAA is the only reason I let him run it.

we shall see what happens in 6 months if Progressive (thats who the policy via AAA is through) tries to screw me or not.

I am hoping its not just a "HAND OFF" from AAA to progressive that some lingering connection between AAA and Progressive remains so maybe they might have negotiated better terms and no invalid "just because we can" rate increases.

man I hope.

if time allows I am going to take some measurements tomorrow and see what is the largest tire I can use without intruding on my cargo area. how much suspension travel do I need to account for in this?

[euromodder]

Ha, insurance companies

I had been with the same company, no accidents at fault since '94.
I even got a letter to congratulate me on reaching the bottom of their insurance ladder, and that I'd permanently stay there.
Yet they kept increasing the premiums - and had actually been doing so for years, minor but steady increases.
So I shopped around, swapped insurances and now pay 27% less
With my age and accident record, it seems you're welcome anywhere


I can't understand some companies.
My internet provider informed me my subscription fee would increase, so I had a look on their website, and downgraded my subscription, so instead of paying a modest amount more, I'm now paying 44% less

[Nerys]

well that problem is actually TOP DOWN.

you see when the economy is rough the only PROPER decision is to LOWER prices.

but people who have too much power (large corporations and government) are either SHIELDED from the consequences of raising prices (corporations) or IMMUNE to the consequences (government)

ie they raise taxes. you can't pay. in a normal environment the taxer would have a choice lower the taxes and take less or GET NOTHING AT ALL.

but in our twisted system that choice is irrelevant. its either YOU PAY or they STEAL everything from you (ie take your property your business etc..)

ie there is no DOWNSIDE to them raising taxes.

of course when they do this business now have NO CHOICE but to raise prices and HOPE people can take the increased price.

because when we don't they go out of business and the government still gets to steal their property from them.

its a viscous system that is guaranteed 100% to fail.

but since those doing the stealing do NOT suffer consequences for their actions they don't care.

I want to make a 3 wheeler to insulate myself at least somewhat from this happening again.

[Arragonis]

I was sent a renewall last year, did one of those comparison sites and the cheapest was my own insurance company but £150 less.

So I call them and all they would offer was a £50 discount, not the £150 lower price I was quoted.

So I declined to renew.

And then signed up again as a new customer with exactly the same details.

Paperwork all arrived, identical from the last lot with the exception of start and end dates.

Madness.