Building a Morgan 3-Wheeler Replica

[hang_510]

SHOTGUN!

[two_68_510s]

So, are you thinking of hanging the Honda motor out front?

I wasn't sure if the other examples had changed your thoughts on design.

[okayfine]

Honda motor, hanging out front. I've seen a lot of the reverse trikes out there, and I'm not won over by the styling or the motorcycle theme/body position. I'm not trying to get the motorcycle feel while keeping it safe with three wheels. The Morgan is exactly what I want in look, theme, and body position, so I'll try to replicate that as best as I can.

[jason]

What a great project Julian! Looking forward to the build! Just one question though, without reverse isn't this going to be a PITA for parking around town?

[okayfine]

There's a small PITA factor in not having reverse. I don't see this as a town run-about, really, and even if I do use it for that, with a ballpark weight of 1000/1100 pounds, it will be easy to push out of a space. It's not something to parallel park, for sure.

[BillF]

Cheap and simple way out -- might be handy for reference. Knowing you however . . .
http://tinyurl.com/bzfdeko

[S15DET]

How did/does the Goldwing reverse work? It was electric I believe. Was that on the later models?

[okayfine]

Later/bigger models of the GW had reverse.

[BillF]

The more I think about it, the more likely it seems that this is closer to the vision. TBI's are just to get it running while the quad-SU manifold is fabbed.

[okayfine]

Jay Leno's got one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xcITHevPrc

There are mods to the Honda to use a VW downdraft. For whatever reason. It's got CV Mikunis on it, so they're practically SUs anyway. One big SU up top with a huge bell-mouth air horn...hmmm...

[okayfine]

Deconstruction has begun. It more or less comes apart with a 10mm socket and a Phillips screwdriver. More or less.

[okayfine]

Spent about four (more) hours getting the bike down to the pieces I need. Once I got the bodywork off (which was easy), it was really a ship-in-a-bottle experience. Every piece seemed to need all the other pieces off before the first piece would come off. But then you'd move to another piece and...same thing.

Part of the difficulty was that there were some parts I didn't want to disassemble. Like the rear suspension. Removing the rear tire, final drive, and pulling the suspension arm would have enabled me to get the gas tank out. Since I didn't want to do that, I ended up cutting the chassis tubes. This wasn't as big a crime as it seemed, since I have to cut the headstock off and weld it to the Morgan come registration time. So I couldn't have saved the chassis if I wanted to.

In any case, I'm finally down to the two major components I wanted from the Goldwing, the engine:

You can see the aluminum needs some TLC, but imagine the timing covers polished up.

And the rear suspension:


The electronics are also an important part and have been saved as well. I'll go through them and eliminate wires I don't need (it has two brake light switches, radio harness, etc.).

Next step is to fix Whitebird so it can give up it's garage spot so I can start laying out the Morgan's chassis.

[RonM]

Although I hate to admit this... I owned and actually rode a black 1980 GL1100 Interstate GW exactly, and I meet EXACTLY like the one you have there. I must say in my defense however, this was after 7 years of marriage. By then, my wife had already placed my balls in a jar for "safe keeping", and I had not yet reclaimed them with a midlife crisis. To add insult to injury, In all my years of motorcycle riding, on bikes ranging from a Honda 50 Mini Trail, to a GSXR 1100, this black hippo was the bike I got injured on. Oh The horror So if you're expecting me to shed a tear of nostalgia over this one's demise... I say hack away Julian!

Mark my words though, you will learn to hate those CVs. With my wife on the back, and those flimsy ass cargo bags loaded for camping, at highway speed if I punched the throttle without down shifting, the bike would fall on it's face like it had it's balls placed in a jar, thus turning it into a torque-less wander. The memory of this life metaphor is almost too painful to bare. On a steep incline, not even down shifting would help. The only way around this was a slow roll on, but with your trike's added weight, I fear you may have issues getting enough low end grunt out of those stock CVs. Those carbs are designed for a 450 lb. bike that puts almost no lateral G force on them. I would definitely start by looking into a cheep work around for the stock carbs. $6K, 6 month budget not withstanding, with your welding skill you'd be able to fab up a nice intake manifold for a set of small downdrafts, or a cheep two barrel. There are after market intakes for single carb conversion, but the issue of clearance in the bike frame is a huge limiter on their practicality and performance. In your case however, it appears space will not be an issue. Although the simplicity of a single carb would be nice, the boxer design of the GL engine would require much longer intake runners. All that being said, any deviation from stock will surely introduce it's own set of new complications and expense. Food for thought anyway.

This will be a fun build to watch man. Thanks for posting it up for us Realmsters to ogle over. Here's to another trip down the road less traveled. By now, I'm sure Julian knows all the good dive bars along the way.

God speed my friend.

[okayfine]

Those carbs are designed for a 450 lb. bike that puts almost no lateral G force on them. I would definitely start by looking into a cheep work around for the stock carbs.

Good to know. There are options, including making my own, but for the initial build and running, I'm going with the stock pieces. Everything's mounted up top and flat, so making something won't be a huge issue. My friend that rode the bike home for me said it was pretty ballsy, and went up the grade without much more than a wrist twitch.

Wet weight for this bike is listed in the manual at 723lb, though.

[hang_510]

add another 400lbs for 2 passengers & luggage... they can still get out of their own way.


if you haven't found Tri-County motorcycle salvage in Ventura(on the ave), they have a lot of bike parts and you could probably trade your leftovers.

my trail 70 w/a 125 is almost ready