Motorcycle with three or more in-line wheels?

(Crossposted, please feel free to remove groups)


Ever hear of or see a motorcycle with three or more in-line wheels?
I'm using the term "in-line" just to make sure it's not confused
with a sidecar or whatever. In other words, a motorcycle with at
least one additional wheel in between the front and back wheels.
Keywords or links would be greatly appreciated, if any. Thanks.

 

http://preview.tinyurl.com/63o9aj


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Here's one http://www.zippy.ws/weird.jpg

 

Triumph??

 

   http://preview.tinyurl.com/63o9aj

Old Kawasaki 2 strokes?
Bg

 

what happens if you want go fast than walking pace?

do the wheels fall off?


mh

 

Buried in the Imperial War Museum is a 1915 motorcycle the world has not
seen for the best part of a century. Developed by Spagthorpe in
conjunction with the War Department for use by despatch riders in the
bogged down front in Flanders, it has a third in-line wheel to aid in
braking, traction and steering.
Designated Iceberg at the WD, it nevertheless rapidly acquired a
different name at the works, FUPOS, as indicative of how difficult the
design was to implement successfully.
The Spagthorpe chief designer of the day, Bill Posters, was an eccentric
character, often to be seen spending more time waxing his four-feet long
moustaches than actually designing anything, but he claimed those were
his creative moments and who was to argue with him, as he did turn out
some stunning creations.
Anyway, back to the Fupos - the immediately distinguishing feature of
the bike was the third wheel, obviously. But that wasn't just it - it
was where it was - above the rider.
That's right, a triangular motorcycle. Posters' reasoning was thus - if
you lack traction, the wheel pivots backwards and drops to the ground
and bites in. If you find the front steering sliding off, the wheel will
do the same forwards and arrest the slide at the same time as providing
extra traction. This was all done before computer controls and demanded
some mighty fine design of the analogue sort.
This was allied to an extremely short wheelbase, so short in fact that
the engine had no room to be mounted in the normal position and as a
result Posters' team had to drag out of the unfinished projects cupboard
an old design for a motorised wheel and fitted three of them to the
bike.
The motorised wheel meant the need for chain or hydraulic drive was
avoided.
Astute readers will have realised by now that what Posters had done was
anticipate by a century the Unstable Fighter concept (often demonstrated
in a different arena by Range Rover-driving boxers) where a plane is
designed in an unstable configuration and is kept the right way up by
computer control.
Pure genius - British industry sorely felt his loss when he later
vanished during an attempt to conquer Mt Subbyprimee, the giant
underwater peak off the Lehman Islands.

Eventually a prototype was rolled out of the works doors and, after
successful testing at home, was sent to the rear areas of the front for
field trials.
Despatch riders' initial feedback was encouraging and so, in light of
the urgent need for cross-country message carrying, an initial order was
placed for 100 machines. These were built under an Imperial War Order
which gave the project priority for scarce alloys and materials and the
first batch of machines was delivered to the Royal Signals Corps in
August 1915.

Things went well for the first couple of months - wheel activation was
fairly predictable and reliable in battlefield conditions and the design
seemed to be reasonably trooper-proof. Some riders complained of a
slight torque effect as the top wheel spun up and moved to the front or
rear, but it was easily countered by body lean and the riders simply got
used to it, to the extent that when they rode an ordinary motorcycle
they'd fall off a lot.

In use, the machine had an unplanned advantage over ordinary
motorcycles. Canny despatchers realised the third powered wheel with its
traction spikes was, in effect, a motorised saw blade, and were able to
supplement their meagre pay by gouging out communication trenches in
seconds.


Then an unexpected problem started to surface as the weather changed for
the worse in France. Flanders, as it later became known, was notorious
for the clinging and glue-like quality of its mud. Mud that has no equal
in Britain and, in fairness, can not be tested for by even the most
diligent of design departments. This mud caused endless problems with
throttle mechanisms sticking, as the cable arrangements to control three
motorised wheels were complex.

It turned out that under certain conditions of mud and rain, if a rider
was heading from the rear areas to the trenches and rode into a series
of pools of this Flanders mud that were of just the right length, the
overhead wheel would swing forwards, encounter solid ground and swing
back up again. Immediately after, as to be almost a fluid motion, it
would swing backwards and contact the ground at the rear. After a series
of such motions some riders attempted to stop the wild swinging by
applying the third wheel pivot brake to lock the top wheel in its rest
position. Unluckily, if they did so when the wheel was in transition
from rear to front, the pivot brake had a tendency to lock the wheel
directly above - at full throttle this was disastrous, for the inertia
was enough to tip the motorcycle forwards and the rider would do a
stoppie.
Not just any old stoppie, though. This was not a stoppie as we know it,
for instead of the rider simply landing arse over tit, the still running
third wheel would contact the ground and the bike would carry on in a
straight line at full pelt - towards the German lines.

There were numerous tales from the front of soldiers being rudely
awakened from their slumbers by a ghostly banshee wail and a smell of
burning oil as something from the bowels of Hell itself soared over
their trench and made off towards Germany. One infantryman sent home a
film which was later developed and showed him holding his helmet towards
the camera - a helmet on which can be clearly seen what we now know to
be the distinctive track of a Fupos tyre.

After the loss of too many experienced despatch riders to prison camps
in Germany the WD recalled the bikes and instructed Spagthorpe to keep
the entire project secret. Works staff complained bitterly for years
afterwards that they were ordered to cut up the jigs so that no more
could ever be made - some went so far as to suspect that someone in the
WD was in the pay of the Kaiser, but such a thing was idle speculation
of the worst sort.

Many years later, it was discovered by a genealogist in Texas working
from his trailer park that Bill Posters was actually an Anglicised
German - his birth name being Wilheim von Upperstikkem. There is no
suggestion whatsoever that the Fupos was a deliberate attempt to waste
time, materials, or servicemen.

 

<applause>

Love your work!

regards,
CrazyCam

 

Ahhh Spagthorpe: so many technological advances to wonder at.

JL
<applause>

 

On Nov 27, 10:48 pm, Grimly Curmudgeon <>
wrote:

SNIP

Odd, that's the first one I've heard of that didn't have a Canine
name...courious. obtw, AEC is dragging their feet re-certifying my
airdales containment body. Assholes...garage fees at Los Alomos are
killing me.

 

Well, there's stupid custom stuff like this:

http://www.superstreetbike.com/custombikes/2003_suzuki_hayabusa/index.html

--
"Outback" Jon - KC2BNE

AMD Opteron 165 (@2.5) and 6.1 GHz of other AMD power...
http://folding.stanford.edu - got folding? Team 53560

2006 ZG1000A Concours "Blueline" COG# 7385 CDA# 0157

 

Ah, but FUPOS is only an acronym for "Foxhound, Ultimate mastiff,
Pekingese, Otterhound, and South russian ovtcharka", which pretty much
explains why it was an unsuccessful model...

It kept eating it's riders.

 

Badly, of course.

 

There's been a few hillclimb specials with two inline rear wheels. A
google for rachau hill climb might turn up some pics.

--
Krusty
www.MuddyStuff.co.uk
Off-Road Classifieds

'02 MV Senna '03 Tiger 955i '96 Tiger '79 Fantic Hiro 250

 

Point of clarification for UK posters.

*Freak* hillclimb, not *speed* hillclimb.

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Instantly! (Err... you did mean "turn stomachs" didn't you?)

 

All the roads are straight in ap Meryk Land. You don't need to turn.

 

http://www.motomagazin.cz/photos.php?photo=photos/action/2005/sraz_pavu05/moto/foto20.jpg

 

You mean, like the Kettenrad TOG posted a link to the other week?

http://groups.google.co.uk/group/uk.rec.motorcycles/msg/060ee953fc7fa401?hl=en

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Pete Fisher

At your age? It's a fucking miracle.